Molly Ranson

Molly Ranson is an American actress and singer born in New York City whose Broadway career spans from 2007 to 2024.

Ranson entered Broadway in 2007 with the Tony Award-winning production of August: Osage County. In 2011, she joined the cast of Jerusalem, playing the role of Pea alongside Mark Rylance, who had originated the role in the production's earlier runs at the Royal Court Theatre in London and the Apollo Theatre in the West End. In 2015, she appeared in the comedy Fish in the Dark as Natalie Drexel, opposite Larry David in the role of Norman Drexel; when the production extended its run, Jason Alexander assumed the role for six weeks.

Off Broadway, Ranson originated the role of Melody in Bad Jews in 2013. She also participated in a 2009 reading of a Carrie revival, portraying Carrie White alongside Sutton Foster and Marin Mazzie. That production was developed with the aim of bringing the musical back to Broadway following its 1988 run, which closed after five performances; the show ultimately opened Off Broadway at the Lucille Lortel Theatre in 2010.

In 2022, Ranson played the character Molly in Prayer for the French Republic, a family drama by playwright Joshua Harmon set across two time periods — contemporary Paris in 2016–2017, following the Benhamous family, and the same apartment space during World War II, where the Salomons' story unfolds. Harmon had first approached Ranson about the project while she was in graduate school, at a point when he had only recently begun writing the play. She rehearsed Prayer for the French Republic concurrently with Plaza Suite, which opened after the former closed. Ranson reprised her role in Prayer for the French Republic when Manhattan Theatre Club mounted the production again on Broadway in 2024.

Ranson received a Drama Desk Award nomination for Outstanding Actress in a Musical in 2012.