Troy Michael Kotsur (born July 24, 1968) is an actor and filmmaker from the United States.

He won an Academy Award, a British Academy Film Award, a Screen Actors Guild Award, and a Critics’ Choice Movie Award for his supporting role in the film CODA (2021), making him the first deaf actor to win the latter three awards, and the first deaf man and second deaf performer overall to win the former.

No Ordinary Hero: The SuperDeafy Movie was also directed by Kotsur.

Who is Troy Kotsur and Is He a Deaf Actor?

On July 24, 1968, Kotsur was born in Mesa, Arizona, the largest suburb of Phoenix, to JoDee (née True) and Mesa Police Chief Leonard Stephen “Len” Kotsur. He is a deaf actor who has featured and produced many films.

When Kotsur’s parents found he was deaf when he was nine months old, they learned American Sign Language so the family could communicate.

Kotsur’s parents pushed him to participate in sports and make friends with the neighborhood’s hearing youngsters. Kotsur originally became interested in acting while attending the Phoenix Day School for the Deaf.

He attended Westwood High School and graduated with honors. His theatre teacher urged him to appear in the senior variety show, and he did so with a pantomime skit that was well received and inspired him to continue theater.

Kotsur interned at KTSP-TV after graduating from high school (now KSAZ-TV).

“My directing dream poofed once I accepted the fact that I lived in a world that did not speak my language,” he recalls of his internship, where he aided an editor and did not feel connected with others.

From 1987 to 1989, he studied theater, television, and cinema at Gallaudet University.