Hudson was born in Los Angeles, the daughter of Academy Award-winning actress Goldie Hawn and Bill Hudson, an actor, comedian, and musician. Hudson's parents divorced eighteen months after her birth; she and her brother, actor Oliver Hudson, were raised in Colorado by her mother and her mother's long-time boyfriend, actor Kurt Russell. Hudson has stated that her biological father "doesn't know me from a hole in the wall", and that she considers Kurt Russell to be her father. Hudson has described her mother as "the woman that I've learned the most from, and who I look up to, who has conducted her life in a way that I can look up to". She has three half-siblings, Emily and Zachary Hudson, from her biological father's subsequent marriage to actress Cindy Williams, and Wyatt, from her mother's relationship with Kurt Russell. Hudson is of Hungarian, Italian, and Ashkenazi Jewish descent, and was raised in her maternal grandmother's Jewish religion; her family also practiced Buddhism. Hudson graduated from Crossroads, a performing school in Santa Monica, in 1997. She was accepted to New York University, but chose to pursue an acting career instead of attending.
