Octavia Lenora Spencer is an American actress, voice actress, and comedian. She is best known for her role as Minny Jackson in the Touchstone Pictures film The Help. For the role, she received a Golden Globe Award, a BAFTA, a Screen Actors Guild Award, and an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, and was nominated in the same category for her roles as Dorothy Vaughan in the biographical drama film, Hidden Figures and as Zelda Fuller in Guillermo del Toro's fantasy film, The Shape of Water, both of which she received Best Supporting Actress nominations, simultaneously.
For Disney, she played Dr. Evilini in Wizards of Waverly Place and the voice of Mrs. Otterton in Zootopia. She also played Minny Jackson in the 2011 Touchstone Pictures adaptation of The Help. She also voiced Corey the Manticore in the 2020 Disney/Pixar film, Onward.
Trivia[]
- At the 2012 BAFTA Awards, Spencer and director Tate Taylor talked with Miss Piggy for the latter's Orange Film red carpet show. Piggy told Spencer she was "splendid as Ringo [Starr]" in The Help, referring to The Beatles' song "Help!" Going along with the joke, Spencer corrected the pig, saying that she was actually "going more towards John [Lennon]," and felt as though she must've failed miserably.