Natasha Lyonne Biography

Natasha Bianca Lyonne Braunstein (born April 4, 1979), better known as Natasha Lyonne, is an American actress. She is best known for her role as Jessica in the American Pie series and her appearances in the films Everyone Says I Love You, Slums of Beverly Hills, But I'm a Cheerleader, and Blade: Trinity. She currently portrays Nicky Nichols in the Netflix series Orange Is the New Black, for which she received a nomination for the 2014 Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series.

Early life

Lyonne was born in New York City, the daughter of Ivette (ne Buchinger) and Aaron Braunstein, a boxing promoter, race car driver, and radio host, who was distantly related to cartoonist Al Jaffee.

Lyonne's parents were both from Orthodox Jewish families, and she herself was raised Orthodox. Her mother was born in Paris, France, to Hungarian Jewish parents who were Holocaust survivors. Lyonne sometimes darkly jokes that her family consists of "my father's side, Flatbush, and my mother's side, Auschwitz." Her grandmother Ella came from a large family, but only she and her two sisters and two brothers survived, which Lyonne credits to their blonde hair and blue eyes. Lyonne's grandfather, Morris Buchinger, operated a watch company in Los Angeles. During the war, he hid in Budapest as a non-Jew working in a leather factory.

Lyonne spent the first eight years of her life living in Great Neck, New York. Then she and her parents moved to Israel, where Lyonne spent a year and a half. Her parents divorced, and Lyonne and her older brother Adam returned to America with their mother. After this move back to New York City, Lyonne attended Ramaz School, also known as The Rabbi Joseph H. Lookstein Upper School of Ramaz, a private Jewish school, where Lyonne said she was a scholarship kid who took honors Talmud classes and read Aramaic. She was expelled for selling marijuana at school. Lyonne grew up on the Upper East Side, where she felt she was an outcast. Her mother then moved their family to Miami, where Lyonne graduated from Miami Country Day School. Lyonne was estranged from her father, who lived on the Upper West Side until his death in October 2014 and in 2013 was a Republican candidate for City Council for the sixth District of Manhattan. Lyonne has said she is not close with her mother and has essentially lived independently of her family since age 16.

Career

As a young child, Lyonne was signed by the Ford Modeling Agency. At the age of six, she was cast as Opal on Pee-wee's Playhouse, followed by film appearances in Heartburn, A Man Called Sarge, and Dennis the Menace. On working as a very young child actor, Lyonne said: "I didn"?t have the best parents. I don"?t think they are bad people. Even if they were ready to have children, it is kind of a wacky idea to put your child in business at six years old."

Film

When she was 16, Woody Allen cast her in Everyone Says I Love You, which led to appearances in almost 30 films over the next 10 years, including starring roles in the independent films Slums of Beverly Hills and But I'm a Cheerleader. Lyonne's other films include Detroit Rock City, Scary Movie 2, The Grey Zone, Kate and Leopold, Party Monster, and Blade: Trinity. She has also made television appearances on shows such as NBC's Will and Grace. In what is perhaps her most well known role, she appeared as Jessica in the American Pie film series.

When she was 18 years old, Lyonne used the paycheck from her work on the Woody Allen film Everyone Says I Love You to buy a small apartment near Gramercy Park. She attended New York University for a very short time, studying film and philosophy.

Since then, Lyonne has worked steadily in the New York theatre scene, as well as in film and television. Her newer film appearances include All About Evil, 4:44 - Last Day on Earth, Girl Most Likely, The Rambler, and Clutter.

Theater

Lyonne made her New York stage debut in the award-winning New Group production of Mike Leigh's Two Thousand Years. Lyonne was in the original cast of the award-winning Love, Loss, and What I Wore, a play written by Nora Ephron and Delia Ephron and based on the book by Ilene Beckerman. She received positive reviews for her performance in Kim Rosenstock"?s comedy,Tigers Be Still at the Roundabout Theatre Company: "a thorough delight in the flat-out funniest role, the grief-crazed Grace, so deeply immersed in self-pity that she has cast aside any attempts at decorum."

In 2011, Lyonne was in Tommy Nohilly's Blood From a Stone, from the New Group. Lyonne participated in New Group's benefit performance of Women Behind Bars in 2012.

On working in the theater: "There"?s something about theater that squashes the self-critical voices because you have to be in the moment. I"?m glad that I didn"?t do this before I was ready, before I was capable of showing up every day. That is not a skill set I had before."

Television

Lyonne has made guest appearances on the series Weeds, New Girl, Will and Grace, and Law & Order Special Victims Unit.

In late 2012, Lyonne was reported to be developing a TV series for Fox Television about a young girl, who, fresh out of rehab and committed to starting a new life as a sober, responsible adult, is forced to move in with her conservative brother and young family.

She is currently starring as Nicky Nichols in the critically acclaimed Netflix original series Orange Is the New Black, for which she has received positive reviews. The role is Lyonne's first television show as a series regular. She received her first Primetime Emmy nomination for the role in 2014.

In 2014, Lyonne was cast in Amy Poehler's NBC comedy pilot Old Soul, directed by David Wain. From 2016, she took up voicing the character of Smoky Quartz, in Cartoon Network's hit show Steven Universe.

Personal life

Lyonne lives in New York City.

During the early 2000s, Lyonne experienced legal problems and was arrested on a couple of occasions for driving under the influence of alcohol and for incidents involving her neighbors. In 2005, she was evicted by her landlord, actor Michael Rapaport, following complaints by other tenants about her behavior.

In 2005, Lyonne was admitted to Beth Israel Medical Center in Manhattan under a pseudonym, suffering from hepatitis C, a heart infection, and a collapsed lung; she was also undergoing methadone treatment. In January 2006, another arrest warrant was issued for her after she missed a court hearing relating to her prior problems. Her lawyer said an emergency had arisen, but did not give details. Later that year, Lyonne was admitted to the Caron Foundation, a drug and alcohol treatment center, and finally appeared in court. A judge sentenced her to conditional discharge.

Lyonne underwent open heart surgery to correct damage caused by her heart infection. She quickly recovered from the surgery, and discussed her past health problems on The Rosie Show in March 2012.

She has been in a relationship with actor Fred Armisen since 2014.

Filmography

Film

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1986	Heartburn	Rachel's Niece	Uncredited
1990	A Man Called Sarge	Arab Girl
1993	Dennis the Menace	Polly
1996	Everyone Says I Love You	Djuna "DJ" Berlin
1998	Slums of Beverly Hills	Vivian Abromowitz
1998	Krippendorf's Tribe	Shelly Krippendorf
1998	Modern Vampires	Rachel
1999	American Pie	Jessica
1999	Detroit Rock City	Christine Sixteen
1999	Freeway II: Confessions of a Trickbaby	Crystal "White Girl" Van Meuther
1999	But I'm a Cheerleader	Megan Bloomfield
1999	The Auteur Theory	Rosemary Olson
2001	Plan B	Kaye
2001	Fast Sofa	Tamara Jenson
2001	Scary Movie 2	Megan Voorhees
2001	American Pie 2	Jessica
2001	The Grey Zone	Rosa
2001	Kate & Leopold	Darci
2002	Comic Book Villains	Judy Link
2002	Zig Zag	Jenna the Working Girl
2002	Night at the Golden Eagle	Amber
2003	Die, Mommie, Die!	Edith Sussman
2003	Party Monster	Brooke
2004	America Brown	Vera
2004	Madhouse	Alice
2004	Blade: Trinity	Sommerfield
2005	Robots	Loretta Geargrinder	Voice
2005	My Suicidal Sweetheart	Grace
2008	Tricks of a Woman	Sally
2009	The Immaculate Conception of Little Dizzle	Tracy
2009	Jelly	Mona Hammel
2009	Goyband	Fani
2009	Outrage: Born in Terror	Molly
2009	Heterosexuals	Ellia
2009	All About Evil	Deborah Tennis
2011	4:44 Last Day on Earth	Tina
2012	American Reunion	Jessica
2013	He's Way More Famous Than You	Herself
2013	The Rambler	Cheryl
2013	G.B.F.	Ms. Hogel
2013	Girl Most Likely	Allyson
2013	Clutter	Lisa Bradford
2014	Loitering with Intent	Kaplan
2015	Addicted to Fresno	Martha Jackson
2015	Sleeping with Other People	Kara
2015	Hello, My Name Is Doris	Sally
2015	Bloomin Mud Shuffle	Jock
2015	#Horror	Emma
2016	Yoga Hosers	Tabitha Collette
2016	The Intervention	Sarah
2016	Antibirth	Lou
2016	Adam Green's Aladdin	Mom
2016	Jack Goes Home	Nancy
2017	A Futile and Stupid Gesture	Anne Beatts	In post-production
2017	Handsome	Det. Fleur Scozzari	In post-production

Television

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1986-87	Pee-wee's Playhouse	Opal	6 episodes
2000	Will & Grace	Gillian	Episode: "Girl Trouble"
2000	If These Walls Could Talk 2	Jeanne	Television film
2001	Night Visions	Bethany Daniels	Episode: "If a Tree Falls"
2002	Grounded for Life	Gretchen	Episode: "Relax!"
2007	The Knights of Prosperity	Female Co-Star	Episode: "Operation: Rent Money"
2009	Loving Leah	Esther	Television film
2011	New Girl	Gretchen	Episode: "Wedding"
2011	Law & Order: Special Victims Unit	Gia Eskas	Episode: "Educated Guess"
2012	Weeds	Tiffani	2 episodes
2013	NTSF:SD:SUV::	Mrs. Barbato	Episode: "Comic Con-Air"
2013-present	Orange Is the New Black	Nicky Nichols	36 episodes Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series Nominated - Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series
2015	Girls	Rickey	Episode: "Iowa"
2015-16	Portlandia	Various	3 episodes
2015	Comedy Bang! Bang!	Katie	Episode: "Dax Shepard Wears a Heather Grey Shirt and Black Blazer"
2015-16	Inside Amy Schumer	Various	2 episodes
2015	Sanjay and Craig	Chido (voice)	Episode: "Bike-o Psycho/Boulder Rollers"
2016	Steven Universe	Smoky Quartz (voice)	2 episodes
2016	The $100,000 Pyramid	Herself	Episode: "Natasha Lyonne vs. Terry Crews"
2016	The Simpsons	Sophie (voice)	Episode: "The Nightmare After Krustmas"

Awards and nominations

Year	Award	Category	Work	Result
1999	Chicago Film Critics Association Awards	Most Promising Actress	Slums of Beverly Hills
	Teen Choice Awards	Film - Breakout Performance
		Film - Funniest Scene (shared with Marisa Tomei)
2000	Young Hollywood Awards	Best Ensemble Cast	American Pie
2008	Monaco International Film Festival	Angel Award, Best Supporting Female Actor	Tricks of Love
2014	Primetime Emmy Award	Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series	Orange Is the New Black

See also

• The song "Natasha" from Want One by Rufus Wainwright was written for and about Lyonne.