Kaylee Hottle, Godzilla vs. Kong star, dies in Maryland crash
Kaylee Hottle, the deaf actor who played Jia in two MonsterVerse films, died in a Maryland crash after deputies responded near Windsor Road before 3 a.m.
Kaylee Hottle died in a car crash in Frederick County, Maryland, after deputies and medics responded shortly before 3 a.m. to the 11400 block of Windsor Road. The Frederick County Sheriff's Office confirmed that Hottle was one of two passengers in the wreck. She was 18.
The vehicle was a 1995 Honda Accord driven by a 19-year-old Frederick man, and it swerved off the side of the road before crashing. Inside the car, the driver suffered non-life-threatening injuries and a second passenger was uninjured. Hottle was taken to a hospital, where she was pronounced dead.
Hottle became known to international audiences for playing Jia in Godzilla vs. Kong in 2021 and Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire in 2024. BBC identified Hottle as deaf, and her portrayal gave one of the biggest studio franchises in the world a deaf child character who communicated with Kong through sign language. Her presence in those films gave uncommon visibility to a young deaf performer in mainstream Hollywood.
Her background also traced to Texas, including the Texas School for the Deaf. Joshua Hottle announced her death in American Sign Language during a Facebook livestream and said he was flying from Texas to Maryland after the crash. In a film industry where deaf performers remain limited in number and often fight for screen time, Hottle’s role made her one of the most recognizable young deaf actors in major studio entertainment.
This article was produced by Prism’s automated news system from verified source data, official records, and press releases, then run through automated quality and moderation checks before publishing. The system is built and supervised by the people who set the standards it runs under. Read our full AI policy.
Did this article answer your question?
