Tragic Details About Kimberly Williams-Paisley's Life

A fresh-faced Kimberly Williams-Paisley first came onto the scene starring opposite Hollywood veterans Steve Martin and Diane Keaton. "Father of the Bride" was the young actor's big break, and her subsequent rise to fame was pretty quick. As Williams-Paisley told ABC News in April 2017, "It was a classic Hollywood story: I was 'plucked' out of obscurity, chosen from an exhaustive nationwide search and thrown into the spotlight overnight at the age of nineteen."

Over the past several decades, Williams-Paisley has continued her work on screen (with a couple years off here and there), becoming a beloved figure in Hollywood with a squeaky-clean public image. While she's found success with her acting career and kept busy in motherhood and her charitable work, Williams-Paisley's life is also marred by tragedy. She's dealt with difficult situations in her line of work, endured heartbreaking loss, and even had a serious health scare.

Despite it all, the actor isn't one to dwell on what's gone wrong in her life as she often finds the silver linings in her misfortune. During an interview with Southern Living in April 2024, in which Williams-Paisley discussed what it's like to juggle everything she has on her plate, she said, "I have a very messy kitchen. But honestly, it's all something I want to be doing. That's such a luxury, that my life is busy with stuff that I've chosen to do. It's amazing."

Kimberly Williams-Paisley is certainly a familiar face in Tinseltown. After she played Annie Banks in "Father of the Bride," and again reprised her role in the 1995 sequel, she landed the lead in 1996's "Relativity." She starred opposite David Conrad in the well-received romantic comedy series for the single season it aired, and while was praised for her performance by critics at the time and had even been nominated for a Golden Satellite award, ABC ultimately pulled the plug on the show.

"Relativity" producer Marshall Herskovitz spoke with the Los Angeles Times in November 1996 about the difficulties he faced as a showrunner. "What's frustrating is what ratings do to our survivability on a network. The poor ratings themselves don't particularly upset us, because a poor rating on a television show still represents a huge number of people. Even in failure we're reaching 11 [million] or 12 million people. ... It's really just the frustration of having to deal with the system we have chosen to be a part of, which is that commercial television needs a mass audience for your show to survive," he explained.

In speaking to the same outlet, fellow producer Edward Zwick added about the unfortunate reality "Relativity" would soon be facing, "They're very aware of the predicament in which they've put us. The Saturday at 10 time slot was never one in which they had inflated expectations." So, what could've been a monumental project for Williams-Paisley was unfortunately short-lived.

Kimberly Williams-Paisley didn't stand still for long after "Relativity" was canceled, as she secured a couple movies and even performed a play at the Geffen Playhouse in Los Angeles the following year. She starred in "All in the Timing" by David Ines, a series of six short plays, back in 1998, and as she explained during an interview with the Chicago Tribune in November 2019, it was during this time that she experienced her career's "worst moment."

"In the middle of this scene all of a sudden we hear: 'Is there a doctor in the house?' And I was like, 'Is this a joke?' ... There was no avoiding it, we had to turn and look at the audience. So we broke the fourth wall — I had never had that moment before, of turning and actually looking at the audience. It's so jarring when you've never done that before," Williams-Paisley explained. Once she snapped out of the scene, she realized something was very wrong. 

Apparently, an attendee had collapsed in the middle of the show. Paramedics were called to the theater, and the audience member was carted out.  Thankfully the man, who suffered a heart attack, was okay. As Williams-Paisley added, "Sometimes the worst experiences turn out to be the best stories later, that's for sure. But also, I made an assumption that after we all went through something like that, the audience would not welcome us back. And it turned out it was the exact opposite."

Unfortunately, back in 2013, a scam artist began targeting both celebrities and average people in an elaborate hoax. Among these hoax victims were Kimberly Williams-Paisley and Brad Paisley, who spoke to ABC News about their correspondence with a woman who claimed her daughter was dying of cancer.

"She said that her daughter had begged her to get in touch with me. So it sounded very sort of real. But she wasn't dying to get a hold of me. You know, that was kind of the beginning of the manipulation," Kimberly explained at the time. Over the course of 10 days, the actor and her husband got to know this "dying girl," Claire and her "mother," Carrie. Brad even sang to who he thought was Claire over the phone. He added, "You're singing to someone's dying kid. And in the middle of it, there's no way that's not real. How can that not be real?"

Eventually, the woman the famous couple had been in communication with stated that her daughter had died. When Kimberly requested the funeral home address to send flowers to and the woman wasn't able to provide an address, the jig was up. While the con artist never requested money from Kimberly and Brad, the deceit was still unsettling.

Kimberly Williams-Paisley's tragic life details haven't just centered around her career. Many years ago, the "Father of the Bride" actor's mother, Linda Williams, began having issues with her dexterity, specifically when it came to writing. Kimberly initially was not so concerned about her mother's symptoms. "I'd say, 'It's probably hormones,'" as she told Brain & Life in November 2016. "I never thought it was something serious that would slowly take her from us."

Then, over the Christmas period in 2005, Linda sat her daughters and son-in-law down and revealed she'd been diagnosed with a serious condition. "That's when we learned the outcome of tests we didn't even know our mom had undergone and that she had primary progressive aphasia," Kimberly explained. Aphasia, which is a form of dementia, can impact a person's ability to communicate, so Linda's previous symptoms suddenly made sense. Kimberly also noted that her mother said she'd most likely need full-time care as her condition progressed.

It wasn't until 2014 that the Hollywood star spoke publicly about Linda's diagnosis. While speaking with "Good Morning America," Kimberly remarked, "There was a long time ... that she didn't want us to talk about it, and that was so much a part of the stress of what we were all going through, was that we had to hide it and cover up for her, and protect her pride. And I just felt like ... our story could help other people."

Tragically, Linda Williams died in November 2016 at the age of 73, 11 years after she first received her aphasia diagnosis. Kimberly Williams-Paisley shared an Instagram post in tribute to her late mother at the time to inform her followers of her mom's death, Alongside a snap of Linda smiling, the actor wrote, "I will remember you this way, Mom. Rest in love and peace."

Because of her long illness, as well as Linda's work in raising donations for Parkinson's research, Kimberly and her family requested that well-wishers make a donation to Alzheimer's Association or the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research. Not long after her mom died, the actor went on to star in several Hallmark holiday movies and her career saw a resurgence. While it was undoubtedly a difficult time in her life, she thankfully had an outlet that allowed her to either distract from or process what she was going through.

Kimberly Williams-Paisley first met Brad Paisley in 2001 when she starred in one of his music videos. They got married a couple years later, and welcomed their two sons, Jasper Paisley and William Paisley, in 2006 and 2009 respectively. While Kimberly's relationship with her country star husband has never seemed anything but perfect, that unfortunately didn't stop the rumor mill from working overtime in December 2017.

At the time, it had been reported that Brad was secretly going behind his wife's back to hook up with his Country Music Awards co-host, fellow country legend Carrie Underwood. Us Weekly was the first to inform Kimberly of the rumors, and her response was thankfully lighthearted. "Are you serious? Wow! I hope it helps our careers! That's all I can say," the "Nashville" star remarked. While nobody wants to hear about their significant other cheating on them, at least Kimberly took the comments in stride and seemed to be unbothered by them.

Kimberly Williams-Paisley has maintained a steady, decades-long acting career. However, she apparently took a hiatus from the screen in 2023. The following year, she shared why she'd stepped away from the limelight. In an August 2024 Instagram post, Williams-Paisley revealed she'd been struggling with a vocal injury. "I've been going through a thing," she began the caption.

"Almost two years ago I lost my voice on stage at my Alzheimer's event in Nashville. It was embarrassing & scary & it never quite came back. It's been a challenging couple of years, but we finally got to the bottom of it. I have damage to my laryngeal nerve," Williams-Paisley continued, referring to the part of her throat that controls her voice box. The actor added that she'd finally had surgery done on her throat and shared a snap of her new scar.

Williams-Paisley hadn't wanted to share the details of her health struggles until recently, but she concluded her post sharing that she's been able to find some silver lining in all of this. "I've healed old emotional wounds," she wrote. "I've learned the strength & beauty of silence. I've become a serious meditator. I'm deadlifting over a hundred pounds. I'm taking better care of my body. I'm managing stress. I'm dissolving shame. ... Was losing my voice worth it? Mm, not exactly. Was it worthless? Not for a second."