Alison Pill (born November 27, 1985)
is a
Canadian
Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...
actress. A former
child actress, Pill began her career at age 12, appearing in numerous films and television series. She transitioned to adult roles and her breakthrough came with the television series ''
The Book of Daniel
The Book of Daniel is a 2nd-century BC biblical apocalypse with a 6th century BC setting. Ostensibly "an account of the activities and visions of Daniel, a noble Jew exiled at Babylon", it combines a prophecy of history with an eschatology (a ...
'' (2006). That same year, she was nominated for a
Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play
The Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play is an honor presented at the Tony Awards, a ceremony established in 1947 as the Antoinette Perry Awards for Excellence in Theatre, to actresses for quality supporting roles in a Broadway play. Th ...
for her performance in ''
The Lieutenant of Inishmore'' (2006).
Pill had prominent roles in the films ''
Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen
''Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen'' is a 2004 American teen musical comedy film directed by Sara Sugarman from a screenplay by Gail Parent, based on Dyan Sheldon's 1999 novel of the same name. It stars Lindsay Lohan as an aspiring tee ...
'' (2004), ''
Plain Truth'' (2004), ''
Milk
Milk is a white liquid food produced by the mammary glands of mammals. It is the primary source of nutrition for young mammals (including breastfed human infants) before they are able to digest solid food. Immune factors and immune-modulati ...
'' (2008), ''
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World'' (2010), ''
Midnight in Paris
''Midnight in Paris'' is a 2011 fantasy comedy film written and directed by Woody Allen. Set in Paris, the film follows Gil Pender ( Owen Wilson), a screenwriter, who is forced to confront the shortcomings of his relationship with his materiali ...
'' (2011), ''
Hail, Caesar!'' (2016), ''
Vice
A vice is a practice, behaviour, or Habit (psychology), habit generally considered immorality, immoral, sinful, crime, criminal, rude, taboo, depraved, degrading, deviant or perverted in the associated society. In more minor usage, vice can refe ...
'' (2018), the television series ''
In Treatment'' (2009), ''
The Pillars of the Earth'' (2010), ''
The Newsroom'' (2012–2014), ''
American Horror Story: Cult'' (2017), ''
Star Trek: Picard'' (20202022), ''
Devs
''Devs'' is an American science fiction thriller television miniseries created, written, and directed by Alex Garland. It premiered on March 5, 2020, on FX on Hulu.
Lily Chan ( Sonoya Mizuno) is a software engineer for Amaya, a quantum computi ...
'' (2020), and ''
Them
Them or THEM, a third-person plural accusative personal pronoun, may refer to:
Books
* ''Them'' (novel), 3rd volume (1969) in American Joyce Carol Oates' ''Wonderland Quartet''
* '' Them: Adventures with Extremists'', 2003 non-fiction by Wels ...
'' (2021).
Early life
Pill was born in
Toronto
Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, most pop ...
,
Ontario
Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central C ...
, Canada. Her father, a professional engineer, is
Estonia
Estonia, formally the Republic of Estonia, is a country by the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, and t ...
n.
Pill attended
Vaughan Road Academy,
in its Interact program, designed for studying dance, music, athletics, and theatre.
Career
1997–2007

Pill decided to become an actor when she was 10 years old. As a member of the
Toronto Children's Chorus
The Toronto Children's Chorus is a children's choir based in Toronto. It was founded in 1978 by Jean Ashworth Bartle. The group has close to 500 members aged 6 to 30.
History
In 1982, the choir won first prize at the International Eisteddfod in ...
, 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
''Ghostwriter'' is a Children's television series, children's Mystery fiction, mystery television series created by Liz Nealon and produced by Sesame Workshop, Children's Television Workshop and BBC Television. It began airing on PBS on October ...
''. 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
Drew Blythe Barrymore (born February 22, 1975) is an American actress, director, producer, talk show host and author. A member of the Barrymore family of actors, she is the recipient of several accolades, including a Golden Globe Award and a ...
and
Mischa Barton
Mischa Anne Marsden Barton (born 24 January 1986) is a British-American film, television, and stage actress. She began her career on the stage, appearing in Tony Kushner's '' Slavs!'' and took the lead in James Lapine's ''Twelve Dreams'' at ...
, then appeared in four more TV movies and features that year, including playing
Farrah Fawcett
Farrah Leni Fawcett (born Ferrah Leni Fawcett; February 2, 1947 – June 25, 2009) was an American actress. A four-time Primetime Emmy Award nominee and six-time Golden Globe Award nominee, Fawcett rose to international fame when she played ...
's daughter in the TNT network movie ''
Baby
An infant or baby is the very young offspring of human beings. ''Infant'' (from the Latin word ''infans'', meaning 'unable to speak' or 'speechless') is a formal or specialised synonym for the common term ''baby''. The terms may also be used to ...
'' 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
Kate Noelle Holmes (born December 18, 1978) is an American actress. She first achieved fame as Joey Potter on the television series '' Dawson's Creek'' (1998–2003).
Holmes made her feature film debut in 1997 with a supporting role in Ang Le ...
'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
''Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen'' is a 2004 American teen musical comedy film directed by Sara Sugarman from a screenplay by Gail Parent, based on Dyan Sheldon's 1999 novel of the same name. It stars Lindsay Lohan as an aspiring tee ...
'' in 2003, starring
Lindsay Lohan
Lindsay Dee Lohan ( ; born July 2, 1986) is an American actress and singer. Born in New York City and raised on Long Island, Lohan was signed to Ford Models at the age of three. Having appeared as a regular on the television soap opera '' ...
. Pill ventured off into stage acting, with the
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...
staging of ''None of the Above'' as the first item in her theatre credentials. This was followed by ''The Distance From Here'', ''On the Mountain'', ''
Blackbird'', and ''
Mauritius
Mauritius ( ; french: Maurice, link=no ; mfe, label=Mauritian Creole, Moris ), officially the Republic of Mauritius, is an island nation in the Indian Ocean about off the southeast coast of the African continent, east of Madagascar. It incl ...
''. In 2006, she starred as Grace Webster in the short-lived
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American English-language commercial broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, its headquarters ...
drama ''
The Book of Daniel
The Book of Daniel is a 2nd-century BC biblical apocalypse with a 6th century BC setting. Ostensibly "an account of the activities and visions of Daniel, a noble Jew exiled at Babylon", it combines a prophecy of history with an eschatology (a ...
''. That same year, she was nominated for the
Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play
The Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play is an honor presented at the Tony Awards, a ceremony established in 1947 as the Antoinette Perry Awards for Excellence in Theatre, to actresses for quality supporting roles in a Broadway play. Th ...
for her performance as Mairead in
Martin McDonagh
Martin Faranan McDonagh (; born 26 March 1970) is a British-Irish playwright, screenwriter, producer, and director. Born and brought up in London, he is the son of Irish parents. He is known as one of the most acclaimed modern playwrights whose ...
's ''
The Lieutenant of Inishmore''.
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.
2008–present
Pill had a major supporting role as campaign manager
Anne Kronenberg in the 2008 film ''
Milk
Milk is a white liquid food produced by the mammary glands of mammals. It is the primary source of nutrition for young mammals (including breastfed human infants) before they are able to digest solid food. Immune factors and immune-modulati ...
''. 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
Elliot Page (formerly Ellen Page; born February 21, 1987) is a Canadian actor. He has received List of awards and nominations received by Elliot Page, various accolades, including an Academy Award for Best Actress, Academy Award nomination, tw ...
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
Abigail Kathleen Breslin (born April 14, 1996) is an American actress. She rose to prominence with the comedy-drama film ''Little Miss Sunshine'' (2006), for which she received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress at ...
in Broadway's ''
The Miracle Worker
''The Miracle Worker'' refers to a broadcast, a play and various other adaptations of Helen Keller's 1903 autobiography ''The Story of My Life''. The first of these works was a 1957 ''Playhouse 90'' broadcast written by William Gibson and sta ...
''. She has worked with
Woody Allen
Heywood "Woody" Allen (born Allan Stewart Konigsberg; November 30, 1935) is an American film director, writer, actor, and comedian whose career spans more than six decades and multiple Academy Award-winning films. He began his career writing ...
twice, as
Zelda Fitzgerald
Zelda Fitzgerald (; July 24, 1900 – March 10, 1948) was an American novelist, painter, dancer, and socialite.
Born in Montgomery, Alabama, she was noted for her beauty and high spirits, and was dubbed by her husband F. Scott Fitzgerald a ...
in ''
Midnight in Paris
''Midnight in Paris'' is a 2011 fantasy comedy film written and directed by Woody Allen. Set in Paris, the film follows Gil Pender ( Owen Wilson), a screenwriter, who is forced to confront the shortcomings of his relationship with his materiali ...
'' and as Hayley in ''
To Rome with Love''.
She has starred in short films including ''Denise'' in 2012 with
Chris Messina
Christopher Messina (born August 11, 1974)Hochberg, Mina.Chris Messina stars in 'Ruby Sparks'��. ''Newsday'' (Long Island, New York). August 8, 2012: “...the actor, who turns 38 Saturday ugust 11, 2012 After graduating from Northport ew Yor ...
and ''Santa Baby;'' she sang and danced in ''Santa Baby''. In 2016, she appeared in ''Cover Up'' by
Satya Bhabha
Satya Sorab Bhabha (born 13 December 1983) is a British actor known for his role as Matthew Patel in the 2010 film '' Scott Pilgrim vs. the World'' and his recurring role as Shivrang in '' New Girl''.
Life and career
Bhabha was born in London, E ...
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. In a new theatre production of ''
Wait Until Dark'', Pill starred as a blind woman who must fend for her life. She also starred in
Bong Joon-ho
Bong Joon-ho (, ; Hanja: 奉俊昊; born September 14, 1969) is a South Korean film director, producer and screenwriter. The recipient of four Academy Awards, his filmography is characterised by emphasis on social themes, genre-mixing, black ...
's post-apocalyptic film ''
Snowpiercer
''Snowpiercer'' () is a 2013 post-apocalyptic science fiction action film based on the French climate fiction graphic novel ''Le Transperceneige'' by Jacques Lob, Benjamin Legrand and Jean-Marc Rochette. The film was directed by Bong Joon-ho an ...
'', alongside
Chris Evans and
Tilda Swinton
Katherine Matilda Swinton (born 5 November 1960) is a British actress. Known for her roles in independent films and blockbusters, she has received various accolades, including an Academy Award and a British Academy Film Award, in addition to ...
, which was released in 2013.

From 2012 until its ending in 2014, she appeared in
Aaron Sorkin
Aaron Benjamin Sorkin (born June 9, 1961) is an American playwright, screenwriter and film director. Born in New York City, he developed a passion for writing at an early age. Sorkin has earned an Academy Award, a BAFTA Award, five Primetime Em ...
's
HBO series ''
The Newsroom'' as Maggie Jordan. Pill appeared in ''
Cooties'' starring
Elijah Wood
Elijah Jordan Wood (born January 28, 1981) is an American actor and producer. He is best known for his portrayal of Frodo Baggins in the ''Lord of the Rings'' film trilogy (2001–2003) and '' The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey'' (2012).
Woo ...
. In ''
Zoom'', Pill played Emma, an aspiring comic book artist. She had a part in ''
Hail, Caesar!'' as 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
A family is a domestic or social group.
Family or The Family may also refer to:
Mathematics
*Family of curves, a set of curves resulting from a function with variable parameters
*Family of sets, a collection of sets
*Indexed family, a family wh ...
'' as Willa Warren. In 2016, Pill co-starred with
Jessica Chastain in the EuropaCorp thriller ''
Miss Sloane
''Miss Sloane'' is a 2016 political thriller film directed by John Madden and written by Jonathan Perera. The film stars Jessica Chastain, Mark Strong, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Michael Stuhlbarg, Alison Pill, Jake Lacy, John Lithgow, and Sam Waterst ...
''. 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
A vice president, also director in British English, is an officer in government or business who is below the president (chief executive officer) in rank. It can also refer to executive vice presidents, signifying that the vice president is o ...
Dick Cheney
Richard Bruce Cheney ( ; born January 30, 1941) is an American politician and businessman who served as the 46th vice president of the United States from 2001 to 2009 under President George W. Bush. He is currently the oldest living former ...
's daughter
Mary in the Oscar-nominated film ''
Vice
A vice is a practice, behaviour, or Habit (psychology), habit generally considered immorality, immoral, sinful, crime, criminal, rude, taboo, depraved, degrading, deviant or perverted in the associated society. In more minor usage, vice can refe ...
''.
In 2020, she was part of the TV series ''
Devs
''Devs'' is an American science fiction thriller television miniseries created, written, and directed by Alex Garland. It premiered on March 5, 2020, on FX on Hulu.
Lily Chan ( Sonoya Mizuno) is a software engineer for Amaya, a quantum computi ...
'' directed by
Alex Garland
Alexander Medawar Garland (born 26 May 1970) is an English writer and filmmaker. He rose to prominence as a novelist in the late 1990s with his novel '' The Beach'', which led some critics to call Garland a key voice of Generation X. He subsequ ...
on
FX on Hulu, playing Katie, the chief designer of the Devs system.
In 2021, she starred in the film ''
All My Puny Sorrows
''All My Puny Sorrows'' is the sixth novel by Canadian writer Miriam Toews. The novel won the 2014 Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize, and was shortlisted for the 2014 Scotiabank Giller Prize, the 2015 Folio Prize for Literature, and the 2015 W ...
'' with
Sarah Gadon
Sarah Lynn Gadon (born April 4, 1987) is a Canadian actress. She began her acting career guest-starring in a number of television series, such as '' Are You Afraid of the Dark?'' (1999), '' Mutant X'' (2002), and ''Dark Oracle'' (2004). She also ...
, as two
Mennonite
Mennonites are groups of Anabaptist Christian church communities of denominations. The name is derived from the founder of the movement, Menno Simons (1496–1561) of Friesland. Through his writings about Reformed Christianity during the Ra ...
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
Them or THEM, a third-person plural accusative personal pronoun, may refer to:
Books
* ''Them'' (novel), 3rd volume (1969) in American Joyce Carol Oates' ''Wonderland Quartet''
* '' Them: Adventures with Extremists'', 2003 non-fiction by Wels ...
,'' playing Betty Wendell.
Since 2020, Pill has played Dr. Agnes Jurati in
CBS All Access
Paramount+ is an American subscription video on-demand service owned by Paramount Global. The service's content is drawn primarily from the libraries of CBS Media Ventures (including CBS Studios), Paramount Media Networks (formerly Viacom Media ...
's
Star Trek
''Star Trek'' is an American science fiction media franchise created by Gene Roddenberry, which began with the eponymous 1960s television series and quickly became a worldwide pop-culture phenomenon. The franchise has expanded into vario ...
series, ''
Star Trek: Picard'', centered on an older
Jean-Luc Picard, the Starfleet captain from ''
Star Trek: The Next Generation''.
Personal life
Pill was engaged to actor
Jay Baruchel
Jonathan Adam Saunders Baruchel (; born April 9, 1982) is a Canadian actor, comedian, director and screenwriter. He is known for his voice role as Hiccup Haddock in the ''How to Train Your Dragon'' franchise, and for his roles in comedy movies ...
from 2011 to 2013. Baruchel made their engagement public when he thanked Pill as his fiancée during an acceptance speech at the
Genie Awards
The Genie Awards were given out annually by the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television to recognize the best of Canadian cinema from 1980–2012. They succeeded the Canadian Film Awards (1949–1978; also known as the "Etrog Awards," for scu ...
in
Ottawa
Ottawa (, ; Canadian French: ) is the capital city of Canada. It is located at the confluence of the Ottawa River and the Rideau River in the southern portion of the province of Ontario. Ottawa borders Gatineau, Quebec, and forms the core ...
, Ontario. Baruchel alluded to their break-up in a
Twitter
Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...
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.
Filmography
Film
Television
Music videos
Web
Theater
Discography
with Sex Bob-Omb
;Soundtrack
Awards and nominations
References
External links
*
Alison Pill profile in ''The New York Observer''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pill, Alison
1985 births
20th-century Canadian actresses
21st-century Canadian actresses
Canadian child actresses
Canadian film actresses
Canadian stage actresses
Canadian television actresses
Canadian voice actresses
Living people
Actresses from Toronto
Canadian people of Estonian descent
Canadian expatriate actresses in the United States