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Alison Pill

Alison Pill (born November 27, 1985) is a Canadian actress. A former child actress, Pill began her career at age 12, appearing in numerous projects before transitioning to adult roles with a breakthrough role in the television series The Book of Daniel (2006). That same year, she made her Broadway debut in The Lieutenant of Inishmore (2006) earning a Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play nomination. Her other notable stage roles include in Blackbird (2007), Mauritius (2007), The Miracle Worker (2010), The House of Blue Leaves (2011), and Three Tall Women (2018).

Pill had prominent roles in the films Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen (2004), Plain Truth (2004), Dan in Real Life (2007), Milk (2008), Midnight in Paris (2011), Hail, Caesar! (2016), and Vice (2018). From 2012 to 2014 she played Maggie Jordan in Aaron Sorkin's HBO drama series The Newsroom and acted in the television series In Treatment (2009), The Pillars of the Earth (2010), American Horror Story: Cult (2017), Star Trek: Picard (2020–2022), Devs (2020), and Them (2021). She is also known for her role as Kim Pine in the film Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (2010) and the Netflix animated series Scott Pilgrim Takes Off (2023).

Early life and education

Pill was born in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Her father, a professional engineer, is Estonian. Pill attended Vaughan Road Academy, in its Interact program, designed for studying dance, music, athletics, and theatre.

Career

1997–2007: Rise to prominence

Pill decided to become an actor when she was 10 years old. As a member of the Toronto Children's Chorus, she was chosen to narrate one of their performances. Her mother tried to discourage Pill by getting her a job as a background performer on the series Kung Fu: The Legend Continues. By the time she was 11, she had played a guest role on an episode of the children's series The New Ghostwriter Mysteries. At 12, she landed roles in two TV movies and a mini-series, a guest appearance on the TV series Psi Factor and voiced the character "Cornflower" on the animated series "Redwall" (1999–2001). After roles in two more television movies, she landed her first feature film role, a small-budget Canadian movie called The Life Before This in 1999, followed by the role of Jacob's older sister Marfa in Jacob Two Two Meets the Hooded Fang. Pill played roles in four more TV movies before the age of fourteen. The next year, she landed a small role in Skipped Parts in 2000 starring Drew Barrymore and Mischa Barton, then appeared in four more TV movies and features that year, including playing Farrah Fawcett's daughter in the TNT network movie Baby and a lead role in the Canadian film The Dinosaur Hunter, which was originally intended to be shown at a dinosaur museum and on a provincial education channel, but which made its way to the Burbank International Film Festival, winning Pill an award for Best Child Actress.

She landed the role of young Lorna in the ABC-TV biopic Life with Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows in 2001, based on the memoir by Garland's daughter, Lorna Luft. That year, Pill also played Sissy Spacek's daughter in the TV flick Midwives. In 2003, she played Katie Holmes's sister in the indie feature Pieces of April. Pill won the lead in the CTV-TV movie Fast Food High, about a teenager who gets a job at a fast food restaurant and tries to set up a union. She also landed a supporting role in Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen in 2003, starring Lindsay Lohan. Pill ventured off into stage acting, with the New York City staging of None of the Above as the first item in her theatre credentials. In 2006, she starred as Grace Webster in the short-lived NBC drama The Book of Daniel. That same year, she made her Broadway debut playing Mairead in Martin McDonagh's black comedy play The Lieutenant of Inishmore for which she was nominated for the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play.

Because of her busy work schedule, Pill's schooling was done through a program for youngsters in the business. Since graduating from high school, Pill moved to New York to pursue a career in theatre, but continued to work in movies such as Dan in Real Life in 2007. She returned to Broadway in the Theresa Rebeck play Mauritius (2007) acting alongside F. Murray Abraham, Bobby Cannavale, and Dylan Baker. John Lahr of The New Yorker praised Pill describing her as "excellent" adding, "It says something about the appeal of Alison Pill—an actress with a big future—that her compelling combination of ferocity and fragility carries the audience beyond the inconsistencies of the story." That same year she acted in the Manhattan Theatre Club production of the David Harrower play Blackbird starring alongside Jeff Daniels. The production was directed by Joe Mantello and was helmed at New York City Center's Stage I. For her performance she received the Drama League Award, Lucille Lortel Award, and Outer Critics Circle Awards nominations. This was followed by The Distance From Here, On the Mountain,.

2008–2014: Film roles and The Newsroom

Pill had a major supporting role as campaign manager Anne Kronenberg in the 2008 film Milk. In 2009, she performed with Erin Hill & her Psychedelic Harp playing the Twilight Zone-inspired "Meredith Moon" and "The Real North Pole" sci-fi Christmas Harp. Pill was cast as April on In Treatment. In 2009 she replaced Elliot Page in a role in Jack & Diane but due to postponement of the project neither ended up in it by the time it ran in 2012. She later played Kim Pine in the movie Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, as well as in Scott Pilgrim vs. the Animation. She portrayed Empress Maud in the miniseries The Pillars of the Earth. In theatre, Pill starred with Abigail Breslin in the Broadway revival of the William Gibson play The Miracle Worker (2010), David Rooney of Variety wrote, "Pill has demonstrated her skill at animating prickly contemporary women who can go from sullen vulnerability into bellicose attack mode in a flash. She’s no less convincing as 20-year-old Boston-Irish Sullivan, hired in 1887 by the Keller family in Alabama to serve as governess to Helen, left deaf and blind by an illness in her infancy".

The following year she acted in another Broadway revival, the John Guare play The House of Blue Leaves with Ben Stiller, Edie Falco, Jennifer Jason Leigh, and Thomas Sadoski In the play she portrayed a kindly, partially deaf actress. She received positive reviews with Entertainment Weekly describing her as "delightfully daffy", and The Hollywood Reporter declaring, "Pill’s funny-sad ethereal performance exposes the cultivated poise and glamour of Hollywood as another empty fantasy". She acted in Woody Allen's acclaimed romantic comedy Midnight in Paris (2011) portraying Zelda Fitzgerald alongside Tom Hiddleston as F. Scott Fitzgerald. The following year she reunited with Allen playing Hayley in To Rome with Love (2012). She has starred in short films including Denise in 2012 with Chris Messina and Santa Baby; she sang and danced in Santa Baby. In 2016, she appeared in Cover Up by Satya Bhabha with Jason Ritter, to be released at the LA Shorts Fest, and Woman in Deep, where she played a woman who calls a suicide prevention hot line and is put on hold, directed by Janicza Bravo.

From 2012 until its ending in 2014, she acted in the Aaron Sorkin created HBO political drama series The Newsroom portraying a journalist Maggie Jordan at a fictional news cable show. Pill acted alongside Jeff Daniels, Emily Mortimer, Dev Patel, John Gallagher Jr., Olivia Munn, and Sam Waterston. In a Geffen Playhouse production of Wait Until Dark (2013), Pill starred as a blind woman who must fend for her life. Myron Meisel of The Hollywood Reporter compared Pill's performance favorably to previous actors who played the role such as Lee Remick, and Audrey Hepburn writing "the reliably talented Pill instills [the role] with a distinctive individuality." She also starred in Bong Joon-ho's post-apocalyptic film Snowpiercer, alongside Chris Evans and Tilda Swinton, which was released in 2013. Pill appeared in Cooties (2014) starring Elijah Wood. In Zoom, Pill played Emma, an aspiring comic book artist.

2015–present

She acted in the Coen Brothers comedy Hail, Caesar! (2015) playing Eddie Mannix's wife. Pill starred in Goon: Last of the Enforcers as Eva Glatt, Glatt's love interest in first movie Goon, now married to Glatt. Pill was part of the cast of The Family as Willa Warren. In 2016, Pill co-starred with Jessica Chastain in the EuropaCorp thriller Miss Sloane. In 2017, she joined American Horror Story: Cult, starring as Ivy Mayfair-Richards, one of the main characters of the storyline. In 2018 she played former Vice President Dick Cheney's daughter Mary in the Oscar-nominated film Vice. That same year she acted in the Broadway revival of the Edward Albee memory play Three Tall Women acting alongside Glenda Jackson and Laurie Metcalf.

In 2020, she was part of the TV series Devs directed by Alex Garland on FX on Hulu, playing Katie, the chief designer of the Devs system. In 2021, she starred in the film All My Puny Sorrows with Sarah Gadon, as two Mennonite sisters who leave their religious lives behind. Alison won Best Actress in a Canadian Film by Vancouver Film Critics Circle for her role in the movie. Pill was also part of the TV series Them, playing Betty Wendell. For the first two seasons of Star Trek: Picard, she played scientist Dr. Agnes Jurati. Pill returned to Broadway playing Sonya in the 2024 revival of the Anton Chekov play Uncle Vanya starring opposite Steve Carell, William Jackson Harper, Jayne Houdyshell, and Alfred Molina at Lincoln Center. David Cote of The Observer hailed her performance writing, "Pill proves to be the evening’s MVP" adding, "[She] embodies that brokenness with a palpable heat I wish could have ignited everything around her".

Personal life

Pill was engaged to actor Jay Baruchel from 2011 to 2013. Baruchel made their engagement public when he thanked Pill as his fiancée during an acceptance speech at the Genie Awards in Ottawa, Ontario. Baruchel alluded to their break-up in a Twitter posting on February 16, 2013.

Pill married actor Joshua Leonard May 24, 2015, having become engaged that January. They have a daughter, Wilder, born November 19, 2016.