Linda Cardellini

Linda Cardellini (born June 25, 1975, Redwood City, California, U.S.) is a versatile actress who rose to prominence portraying teenager Lindsay Weir in the cult-classic coming-of-age television series Freaks and Geeks (1999–2000). She is also known for playing eccentric art instructor Judy Hale in the dark comedy-drama series Dead to Me (2019–22) and for her turn as brainy sleuth Velma Dinkley in the live-action adventure comedy Scooby-Doo (2002) and its sequel Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed (2004).

Early life

Cardellini is the youngest of four siblings born to businessman Wayne Cardellini and homemaker Lorraine (née Hernan) Cardellini. In a 2015 interview with Elle magazine, Cardellini described how her mother led by example and inspired her to pursue her career goals:

My mom is a very independent person and she’s the funniest, smartest person in the room, all the time. She’s strong and pretty, and she believed in the power of a great example….My mom was there for everything, every show. She led me to believe—and my dad, too—that I could do anything I put my mind to, regardless of whether it seemed impossible to other people. She showed me how a woman could be.

As a child, Cardellini would put on performances for her family in their home, including comedy sketches and a mock talk show. She became interested in acting at age 10, when she sang in a school Christmas play. She went on to perform in school plays and community theater productions. Cardellini attended Saint Francis High School in Mountain View, California, and graduated in 1993. She then moved to Los Angeles to study theater at Loyola Marymount University, from which she graduated in 1997.

Career

Cardellini made her television debut in the children’s horror-comedy series Bone Chillers (1996). She subsequently landed her breakout role, as Lindsay Weir, an exceptionally smart and driven high-school student, in the comedy-drama series Freaks and Geeks. The show focuses on two groups of high-school students in suburban Michigan in 1980. Throughout the series, Lindsay reconsiders the value of things she previously held in high importance, such as getting good grades and following the rules. She quits the “mathletes” (an academic team that competes in mathematics competitions) and starts hanging out with the “freaks,” a group of misfits who skip class, experiment with drugs, and rebel against their parents. In a 2020 interview with Rolling Stone magazine, Cardellini discussed how she identified with Lindsay’s character:

I read the script and I just thought it was so beautiful. It was so different. A lot of the girls that I was seeing on screen…I related to them as somebody I knew in high school, but not somebody that was like me. I felt that Lindsay represented the struggle that I had, that she wanted to be grown up in some ways but was still a kid. As opposed to these other relationships on screen, where people are having sexy adult style relationships, they were still teenagers and the awkwardness of it felt so real to me.

In 2001 Cardellini played Chutney Windham, the daughter of a deceased millionaire, opposite Reese Witherspoon in the romantic comedy Legally Blonde. She went on to portray Velma Dinkley in the live-action comedy Scooby-Doo and its sequel Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed. When Scooby-Doo was released, Cardellini recalled with pride that people did not recognize her as playing Velma. “That’s the fun part of it, being able to hide inside of a character and change yourself,” she told The New York Times in 2013.

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Cardellini played jilted lover Cassie Cartwright in director Ang Lee’s romantic drama Brokeback Mountain (2005). She also performed in the crime drama film American Gun (2005) and starred in the comedy Grandma’s Boy (2006). From 2003 to 2009 she portrayed nurse Samantha Taggart in the medical drama series ER (1994–2009). Concurrently, she appeared in the western miniseries Comanche Moon (2008). In 2011 she starred in the indie film Return and performed in the crime biopic Kill the Irishman.

Cardellini portrayed Sylvia Rosen (2013–15), a love interest of protagonist Don Draper (played by Jon Hamm), in the popular drama series Mad Men (2007–15). She garnered a 2013 Emmy Award nomination for outstanding guest actress in a drama series for her performance. She went on to play former S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Laura Barton in the Marvel Cinematic Universe film Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015) and in its sequel Avengers: Endgame (2019). Additionally, she starred as lawyer Meg Rayburn in the drama series Bloodline (2015–17).

Cardellini teamed up with Christina Applegate in the dark comedy-drama series Dead to Me, which follows the friendship of two women who meet in a grief support group: Judy Hale (Cardellini), a quirky, free-spirited painting instructor, and Jen Harding (Applegate), a hard-edged recently widowed real estate agent. In 2020 both Cardellini and Applegate were nominated for the Emmy Award for outstanding lead actress in a comedy series. The two actresses became close friends, especially after Applegate was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 2021. In a 2022 interview with Yahoo! Entertainment, Cardellini discussed how her relationship with Applegate mirrored the friendship between their characters on Dead to Me:

Jen and Judy are friends, and you see them leaning on each other in the show. But Linda and Christina are also friends, and we leaned on each other….I just wanted to be the best support for anything she needed.

Personal life

Cardellini gave birth to a daughter, Lilah-Rose, in 2012. In an interview with People magazine that year, she described the difficulties she experienced during pregnancy and delivery:

It was a very traumatic period. I had a really scary pregnancy and a very difficult delivery. My daughter and I are lucky to be alive….Her heart rate dropped and she had the umbilical cord around her neck. We had to do an emergency C-section. It was very intense and scary….We often forget how dangerous childbirth is.

In 2013 Cardellini and her childhood sweetheart, Steven Rodriguez, became engaged. The couple has not yet married as of 2024.