Jill Hennessy

Jillian Noel Hennessy, born November 25, 1968, in Edmonton, Alberta, is a Canadian actress and singer whose career has spanned Broadway, film, and television. Her father, John Hennessy, worked as a meat salesman and sales and marketing executive, a profession that required the family to relocate frequently. Her mother, Maxine, departed the family in 1982, after which Hennessy was partly raised by her paternal grandmother, Eleanor, in Kitchener, Ontario. Hennessy has an identical twin sister, Jacqueline, who works as a magazine writer and television host in Canada, as well as a younger brother, John Paul Hennessy, Jr. Her ancestry includes Irish, French, Swedish, and Italian heritage on her father's side, and predominantly Ukrainian Roma, along with Austrian roots, on her mother's side. She completed her secondary education at Grand River Collegiate Institute in Kitchener and, during her early years, busked in the Toronto subway.

Hennessy and her sister Jacqueline made their acting debut together in the 1988 film Dead Ringers, in which they played twin call girls. Her Broadway career began in 1990, when she appeared in the musical Buddy: The Buddy Holly Story. In 1993, she joined the NBC crime drama Law and Order, where Dick Wolf cast her as assistant district attorney Claire Kincaid. She held the role for three seasons before departing in 1996. That same year, she had appeared as Dr. Marie Lazarus in RoboCop 3. Hennessy was also among the actresses short-listed for the role of Dana Scully on The X-Files, a part that ultimately went to Gillian Anderson.

Following her departure from Law and Order, Hennessy continued working across film and television. In 1999, she appeared as Lisa in the independent film Chutney Popcorn. The following year, she wrote, produced, and co-directed, alongside Elizabeth Holder, an independent mockumentary called The Acting Class, which centered on a dysfunctional acting class and featured her sister Jacqueline as well as several former Law and Order cast members in cameo roles. Also in 2000, she appeared in the film Nuremberg as Elsie Douglas. In 2001, she portrayed Jackie Kennedy in Jackie, Ethel, Joan: The Women of Camelot and took a supporting role as Commander Mulcahy in the Steven Seagal film Exit Wounds. From 2001 to 2007, she starred as the title character Jordan Cavanaugh in the television series Crossing Jordan, a role she sustained for six seasons. She also appeared in the 2007 film Wild Hogs as the wife of Tim Allen's character. On June 9, 2007, she was honored with a star on Canada's Walk of Fame.

Hennessy recorded the album Ghost in My Head during sessions in Austin, Texas, releasing it in June 2009. She performed as a guest of the Indigo Girls on a November 2009 episode of Mountain Stage and was the subject of a separate episode of the same program later that month. In 2010, she performed at Lilith Fair and starred in the independent crime thriller Small Town Murder Songs. She appeared as a veterinarian in the HBO series Luck and promoted Zaxby's in two television commercials in 2012. In 2015, she appeared in multiple episodes of Madam Secretary, and that October her second album, I Do, was released. In 2018, she appeared on the series Bull as the mother of the deceased hacker character Cable McCrory and began portraying Senator Huntington on Yellowstone.

In her personal life, Hennessy speaks English, Italian, French, Spanish, and German fluently, and plays guitar. She married Paolo Mastropietro in 2000, with a second ceremony held in January 2001 at New York City Hall, officiated by Mayor Rudy Giuliani. The couple have two sons, Marco, born in 2003, and Gianni, born in 2007.