Kaylee Hottle (born 2007 or 2008) is a deaf American actress who stars in the 2021 film Godzilla vs. Kong and its 2024 sequel film Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire.
[1] She was born to an all-deaf family, with her father's side having four generations of deaf relatives, and is fluent in American Sign Language.
[4] For the 2021 film Godzilla vs. Kong, casting director Sarah Halley Finn looked for a deaf actor for the deaf character Jia through a network of casting directors and theaters,[2] and she was guided to Hottle by an assistant director from the earlier film Kong: Skull Island who saw her in a Convo commercial.
Starring actors, Rebecca Hall and Alexander Skarsgård, learned ASL so they and Hottle could communicate on set when not acting,[5] like how Jia uses ASL to communicate with Kong.
Hottle reprised her role as Jia for the 2024 film Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire,[6] for which she was nominated for the Saturn Award for Best Performance by a Younger Actor at the 52nd Saturn Awards.