Lauren Cohan
Lauren Cohan is an actor, born 1982.
Lauren Cohan is a British-American actress whose career divides cleanly into one enormous job and everything else. The early work was small and mostly genre: a nun in Casanova in 2005, Van Wilder 2, September Jones in Death Race 2, then a run of recurring television parts, Bela Talbot in Supernatural, Rose in The Vampire Diaries, Vivian Volkoff in Chuck.
The Walking Dead started in 2010 and she has now played Maggie for the better part of fifteen years, including The Walking Dead: Dead City from 2023. It is a role that could easily have been a plot function, the farmer's daughter who ends up running things, and what Cohan does with it is refuse to let any of the hardening happen quickly. Her register is exhausted competence: a woman who has run out of reactions and keeps working anyway. The show around her got much worse for several years and the performance did not.
The film career has never really taken. She is Martha Wayne for a couple of minutes in Batman v Superman, Alice Kerr in Mile 22, Greta in the horror picture The Boy, Leila Steinberg in All Eyez on Me. Whiskey Cavalier in 2019 was the closest she has come to a comic lead, and it suggests she is funnier than the casting has allowed. She has also built a small voice sideline, Juliana in Archer, Julia Pennyworth in Catwoman: Hunted, Inge in Twilight of the Gods.
Movies (11)
TV (10)
Where to start with Lauren Cohan
Everything routes through The Walking Dead. That is a very large commitment for one performance, so the honest advice is to start at the second season, where Maggie arrives, and stop whenever the show stops holding you. Cohan's best stretch is the middle years, when the writing gives her almost nothing to react to and she plays the flatness as a decision rather than a limitation.
The Walking Dead: Dead City is the sequel series and a much smaller, meaner show, which suits her. Chuck is the early role worth finding, since Vivian is written as a villain and Cohan plays her as someone who has been handed a job she did not want.
The films are a mixed bag and there is no point pretending otherwise. The Boy is a decent haunted-doll picture that gives her the whole film to carry. Whiskey Cavalier is the one to try if you only know her as grim. Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and Mile 22 are jobs. Twilight of the Gods is a good use of the voice.