American actress Heather Matarazzo was BOTD in 1982. Born and raised in New York City, she began acting aged six, and found an agent after commandeering the microphone at an HIV/AIDS benefit. She made a spectacular film debut in Todd Solondz‘s 1995 indie film Welcome to the Dollhouse, playing Dawn Wiener, a plain, perennially victimised middle-schooler navigating the horrors of suburban adolescence, winning her an Independent Spirit Award. Her other films include The Devil’s Advocate, Scream 3, The Princess Diaries and Hostel Part II. She came out publicly as lesbian when she was 21, starting (inevitably) in Sapphic TV series The L Word. She portrayed lesbian activist (and birthday twin) Phyllis Lyon in the 2020 docudrama Equal, and had a supporting role as a lesbian raising a child with her gay best friend in the 2023 film The Mattachine Family. Matarazzo lives in New York with her wife Heather Truman.