Tracie Thoms

Tracie Thoms trained for the stage and keeps going back to it, most visibly as Charlotte in the Broadway revival of Falsettos. Born in Baltimore in 1975, she broke through on television first, as Mahandra McGinty in the short-lived Wonderfalls and then as Detective Kat Miller across years of Cold Case.

The mid-2000s handed her three roles in quick succession that still define her. She played Joanne Jefferson in the 2005 film of Rent and again in the filmed Broadway performance released in 2008. She was Lily, the friend who tells Andy the truth in The Devil Wears Prada. And she was Kim in Death Proof, the member of the second trio who refuses to be intimidated and talks like a person rather than a genre.

Her register is bluntness delivered warmly. She plays women who say the thing everyone else is avoiding and stay likeable while doing it, which is why she works as well in an action beat as in a scene of ordinary friendship. Film has used her sparingly since, in Looper, Safe House, Annie and Jerry and Marge Go Large.

Television is where the steady work is. She has played Karen Wilson on 9-1-1 since 2018 and, separately, Dr. Diane Lewis on Station 19, with further runs in Truth Be Told and UnREAL. She returns as Lily in The Devil Wears Prada 2 in 2026.