R.I.P., Kaylee Hottle, Godzilla Vs. Kong actor

On a Facebook live stream, her father, Joshua Hottle, who is deaf, signed that he was flying from Texas to Maryland to claim his daughter’s body. “I am taking a flight that I never would like to take,” the caption to the post read.

Born in Atlanta, Georgia, to a multigenerational deaf family, Hottle began her career in commercials while a student at the Texas School for the Deaf. After appearing in spots for Glide, a live video messaging app used by people who are deaf and hard-of-hearing, the PSA 10 Deaf Children: One Powerful Message, and Convo, a video relay service, Hottle caught the eye of casting director Sarah Halley Finn, who was looking for a girl to play Kong’s friend Jia, an orphaned deaf girl at the center of Godzilla Vs. Kong. In the film, Jia uses sign language to communicate and connect with King Kong before finding a family in Dr. Ilene Andrews (Rebecca Hall). Hottle returned as Jia for Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire and earned a Saturn Award nomination for her performance. 

“I think that it’s important having deaf actors plays deaf characters,” Hottle signed in 2021. “Because deaf people are aware of their own language and they’re more familiar with the culture.”