Timothy Hutton Biography Quotes 2 Report mistakes

Early Life and Family Background
Timothy Tarquin Hutton was born on August 16, 1960, in Malibu, California, into a family already steeped in film and television. His father, Jim Hutton, was a popular actor known for both film work and the television series Ellery Queen, and his mother, Maryline Adams, worked as a teacher. After his parents divorced, Hutton spent much of his childhood with his mother, moving between Boston and the Bay Area and finding community in school theater productions. The pull of performance was present from an early age, and time spent with his father during his teen years sharpened his sense of what a professional acting life might require. Jim Hutton's example, and his early death in 1979, became a lasting emotional and professional touchstone for Timothy, who has often acknowledged his father's influence on his career and outlook.

Breakthrough and Film Career
Hutton's breakthrough arrived with a role that would be career-defining: Conrad Jarrett in Robert Redford's Ordinary People (1980). Playing a suburban teenager navigating grief and guilt opposite Donald Sutherland, Mary Tyler Moore, and Judd Hirsch, Hutton delivered a delicate and deeply felt performance that earned him the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. He was barely 20, the youngest winner in the category, and also received a Golden Globe recognizing his work. The film's success placed him instantly among the most closely watched young actors of his generation.

He followed Ordinary People with a run of films that paired him with notable directors and co-stars. In Taps (1981), he appeared with George C. Scott, Sean Penn, and a young Tom Cruise in a tense military-school drama. He reunited with Penn in John Schlesinger's The Falcon and the Snowman (1985), playing an idealistic defense contractor's employee drawn into espionage. He explored offbeat romance in Made in Heaven (1987) and delved into moral ambiguity with Sidney Lumet's Q&A (1990) alongside Nick Nolte and Armand Assante. Hutton also embraced genre storytelling: in George A. Romero's The Dark Half (1993), adapted from a Stephen King novel, he portrayed an author haunted by a violent alter ego. He showed a lightness of touch in ensemble pieces such as Ted Demme's Beautiful Girls (1996), holding the screen amid performances by Natalie Portman, Uma Thurman, and Matt Dillon. Throughout, he honed a reputation for intelligence and restraint, choosing projects with strong directors and character-driven scripts.

Directing and Producing
Hutton expanded his creative scope behind the camera in the 1990s. He directed the feature Digging to China (1997), a gentle, small-town drama starring Evan Rachel Wood and Kevin Bacon. The film underscored his interest in intimate, character-centered storytelling and paved the way for later producing and directing efforts in television. The move reflected a practical understanding of the industry he had observed since childhood and a desire to shape stories from the ground up rather than solely as a performer.

Television Career
Although recognized first for film, Hutton became a mainstay of high-quality television. He played Archie Goodwin to Maury Chaykin's Nero Wolfe in the A&E series A Nero Wolfe Mystery (2001, 2002), contributing as both star and director on select episodes. He took on the role of a wealthy father caught in a crisis in the NBC drama Kidnapped (2006), working with an ensemble that included Dana Delany and Delroy Lindo.

Hutton reached a new wave of audiences as Nathan Ford, the brilliant, wounded mastermind at the center of Leverage (2008, 2012). Developed by John Rogers and Chris Downey and produced with Dean Devlin, the series matched him with Gina Bellman, Aldis Hodge, Christian Kane, and Beth Riesgraf in a caper format that balanced humor, heist mechanics, and a found-family dynamic. Hutton directed episodes and helped anchor the show's tone, which built a durable fan base and influenced later ensemble procedurals.

He earned further acclaim in John Ridley's American Crime (2015, 2017), an anthology noted for incisive writing and social engagement. Sharing the screen with Felicity Huffman, Regina King, and Lili Taylor, Hutton moved between roles season to season, emphasizing range over repetition. He followed with a key part in Mike Flanagan's The Haunting of Hill House (2018) as the adult version of complicated patriarch Hugh Crain, paired with Henry Thomas, who portrayed the younger Hugh. The series blended psychological nuance and supernatural dread, and Hutton's reflective performance helped ground its time-hopping structure.

Personal Life and Interests
Hutton has maintained close ties to both film and the broader cultural life of the cities where he has lived and worked. He has been involved in the hospitality business as a part-owner of P.J. Clarke's, a storied New York restaurant, a venture that reflects his appreciation for convivial spaces and long-standing institutions. In his personal life, he was married to actor Debra Winger in the mid-1980s, and they have a son, the filmmaker Noah Hutton. He later married French illustrator Aurore Giscard d'Estaing; they have a son, Milo. Family and collaboration have been recurring themes, from early encouragement by his father Jim Hutton to sustained partnerships with directors Robert Redford, Sidney Lumet, John Schlesinger, John Ridley, and Mike Flanagan, and with colleagues including Donald Sutherland, Mary Tyler Moore, Sean Penn, Regina King, and Gina Bellman.

Legacy and Influence
Timothy Hutton's career arcs across eras and mediums: from a historic Oscar win that captured the zeitgeist of late-20th-century American cinema to steady, evolving work in television during its prestige surge. He has gravitated toward ensembles and filmmakers who privilege character and moral complexity, and he has revisited leadership roles, on screen as a strategist or father figure, and off screen as a director and producer, with a calm, considered presence. The measure of his influence lies not only in awards but in the durability of the projects he helped define: Ordinary People as a touchstone in American family drama; Leverage as a fan-beloved model for camaraderie and clever narrative design; American Crime and The Haunting of Hill House as emblematic of television's capacity for nuance. Through decades of change in the industry, he has remained a thoughtful craftsman, attentive to story, collaboration, and the quiet details that give performances their staying power.

Our collection contains 2 quotes who is written by Timothy, under the main topics: Justice - Friendship.

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