Lauren Ambrose

Lauren Ambrose is an American actress born on February 20, 1978, in New Haven, Connecticut. Her father, Frank D'Ambruoso, worked as a caterer, and her mother, Anne (née Wachtel), was an interior designer. Ambrose is of Italian descent on her father's side and of German, English, and Irish heritage on her mother's side. She attended several schools in New Haven, including Choate Rosemary Hall, Wilbur Cross High School, High School in the Community, and the ACES Educational Center for the Arts, graduating in 1996. A trained opera singer, she studied voice and opera at the Boston University Tanglewood Institute during the summers of 1994 and 1995.

Ambrose launched her career in New York theater, appearing in the Off-Broadway production Soulful Scream of a Chosen Son at the Vineyard Theatre from August to September 1990. Her early screen work included guest appearances on the NBC crime drama Law & Order, with a notable feature role in the 1998 episode "Damaged," in which she played Valerie Maxwell. Her film debut came in the 1997 comedy In & Out, where she portrayed Vicky Rayburn, followed by a prominent role as Denise Fleming in the 1998 high school comedy Can't Hardly Wait. In 1999, she had a recurring role as Myra Wringler in five episodes of the Fox teen drama Party of Five. She then starred as Florence "Chicklet" Forrest in the horror comedy Psycho Beach Party (2000) and as Frankie Wheeler in the coming-of-age drama Swimming (2000).

Ambrose gained widespread recognition for her starring role as Claire Fisher in the HBO drama series Six Feet Under, which ran from 2001 to 2005. The performance earned her two Primetime Emmy Award nominations for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series, as well as two Screen Actors Guild Awards for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series, drawn from five ensemble nominations. In 2004, she appeared in the Royal National Theatre production of Buried Child, playing the role of Shelly.

Ambrose made her Broadway debut in 2006 in the Lincoln Center Theater revival of Awake and Sing! at the Belasco Theatre, a production that earned her a Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Ensemble Performance. She returned to Broadway in 2009 in the revival of Eugène Ionesco's Exit the King at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre, appearing alongside Geoffrey Rush and Susan Sarandon. Between those productions, she performed with the Public Theater's Shakespeare in the Park, playing Juliet in Romeo and Juliet in 2007 and Ophelia in Hamlet in 2008.

Her screen work during this period included a starring role as Coco Tompkins in the Fox comedy series The Return of Jezebel James (2008), created by Amy Sherman-Palladino, which was cancelled after one season. In 2009, she appeared in several films, including the comedy-dramas A Dog Year and Cold Souls, the romance dramas The Other Woman and Loving Leah, and provided the voice of the monster KW in Spike Jonze's Where the Wild Things Are. Also in 2009, she formed Lauren Ambrose and the Leisure Class, a ragtime dixieland jazz band that has performed at Joe's Pub and various charity events.

In 2011, Ambrose appeared in seven episodes of the BBC One science fiction series Torchwood: Miracle Day as Jilly Kitzinger, earning a Saturn Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress on Television. That same year, she produced and starred in the drama film About Sunny, which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival and brought her an Independent Spirit Award nomination for Best Female Lead. Her subsequent screen credits included the A&E miniseries Coma (2012), the comedy films Sleepwalk with Me (2012) and Wanderlust (2012), the Lifetime television film Deliverance Creek (2014), the USA Network miniseries Dig (2015), and a recurring role as Special Agent Liz Einstein in The X-Files on Fox from 2016 to 2018.

Ambrose returned to Broadway in March 2018, taking on the title role of Eliza Doolittle in the Lincoln Center Theater revival of My Fair Lady at the Vivian Beaumont Theatre, directed by Bartlett Sher. The performance earned her a Tony Award nomination for Best Actress in a Musical, a Grammy Award nomination for Best Musical Theater Album, and an Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Actress in a Musical. She departed the production in October 2018 to lead the Apple TV+ psychological horror series Servant, playing Dorothy Turner in the M. Night Shyamalan and Tony Basgallop production, which ran for four seasons from November 2019 through March 2023. Her work on the series brought a nomination for the Critics' Choice Super Award for Best Actress in a Horror Series. In 2023, she joined the cast of the Showtime drama thriller series Yellowjackets, portraying the adult version of Vanessa "Van" Palmer.

Ambrose has been married to writer Sam Handel since September 2001, and the couple has two children. In addition to her performance work, she has narrated audiobooks, including The Maid by Nita Prose in 2022.