Amy Sedaris

Amy Sedaris Bio

Amy Louise Sedaris is an American actress, comedian, and writer whose singular comedic voice has made her one of the most distinctive performers in contemporary entertainment. She first gained widespread attention as Jerri Blank in the Comedy Central series Strangers with Candy, a role she co-created and co-wrote that has endured as a cult classic. Her body of work spans acclaimed television comedies, major studio films, voice acting in animated series, published books, and theatrical productions. She is perhaps best known to contemporary audiences for voicing Princess Carolyn in the Netflix animated series BoJack Horseman and as the creator and star of the TruTV series At Home with Amy Sedaris.

Sedaris has built a remarkably varied career, moving fluidly between live-action comedy, voice work, writing, and stage performance. She has appeared in popular films including Elf and Maid in Manhattan, and taken memorable roles in series such as Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, The Mandalorian, and The Book of Boba Fett. She has also written two books, including I Like You: Hospitality Under the Influence, which spent more than twelve weeks on The New York Times bestseller list. She resides in Greenwich Village, Manhattan, New York City.

Early Life and Background

Amy Louise Sedaris was born in Endicott, New York, the fourth of six children in a Greek Orthodox household. Her father, Louis Harry “Lou” Sedaris, was born in Cortland, New York to immigrants from Apidea in Greece, and her mother, Sharon Elizabeth Sedaris (née Leonard), was Anglo-American from Binghamton, New York. Her paternal grandmother did not speak English and owned a shoe shining store in New York. Her mother died of lung cancer in 1991, and her father died in 2021.

When she was four years old, Sedaris’s family moved to Raleigh, North Carolina, where she grew up with her five siblings: Lisa, David, Gretchen, Tiffany, and Paul. Her sister Tiffany died by suicide in 2013. Sedaris has recalled feeling out of place in Raleigh, where her family stood apart from Southern culture and continued to observe Greek traditions. As a child, she enjoyed playing dress-up and staging plays for her family, and her brother David noted in his book Me Talk Pretty One Day that she frequently assumed characters to play pranks on family members. She attended Jesse O. Sanderson High School and was a Girl Scout until her graduation.

At the age of twenty, Sedaris worked alongside her mother making and selling spanakopita. During that period, she was dating a man from Greece who suffered a brain aneurysm, and she spent the following three years caring for him before they ultimately separated. After that chapter ended, Sedaris relocated to Chicago with her brother David and studied at Second City and the Annoyance Theatre, also working as a waitress at Zanies Comedy Club. The training and community she found in Chicago’s improv scene provided the direct foundation for her professional career in comedy.

Path to Comedy

Sedaris’s entry into professional comedy came in the late 1980s, when she was hired to perform with Second City’s touring company. It was on tour that she met Paul Dinello and Stephen Colbert, both of whom would become essential collaborators over the course of her career. Sedaris and Dinello initially found Colbert difficult to work with, but the three grew into close friends while touring together after discovering a shared comic sensibility. Sedaris left Second City in 1993 and moved to New York City to pursue opportunities in television and theatre.

In 1995, Sedaris made her television debut on the Comedy Central sketch series Exit 57, performing alongside Dinello and Colbert. The series ran for two seasons, and her work earned a CableACE Award nomination for Best Comedy Actress. That same year, she and Dinello began developing what would become Strangers with Candy, drawing inspiration from Sedaris’s comedic impression of 1970s-era motivational speaker Florrie Fisher. The show’s concept eventually evolved into a full Comedy Central series, which premiered in 1999 and cemented Sedaris’s reputation as an original comedic talent. Alongside her screen work, Sedaris also collaborated with her brother David as a playwright, co-writing several plays credited to “The Talent Family” beginning in 1993.

Amy Sedaris Career

Early Career (1995–2003)

Sedaris’s early television work centered on Exit 57, the Comedy Central sketch series she launched with Dinello and Colbert in 1995. The show’s two-season run gave her a platform to develop her distinctive characters and earned her a CableACE Award nomination for Best Comedy Actress. In 1999, she achieved her first major creative breakthrough when she co-created and began starring as Jerri Blank in Comedy Central’s Strangers with Candy. The series, which ran for three seasons, was based on Sedaris’s impersonation of Florrie Fisher and followed a middle-aged woman returning to high school. The show developed a devoted cult following and became a defining work of early 2000s alternative comedy.

In the theatre, Sedaris appeared in Paul Rudnick’s The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told and Douglas Carter Beane’s The Country Club in 1998. Her performance in The Country Club earned her a Drama Desk Award nomination for Outstanding Featured Actress in a Play. In 2002, she co-authored the picture book Wigfield alongside Dinello and Stephen Colbert. The following year, she published I Like You: Hospitality Under the Influence, a comedic guide to entertaining that remained on The New York Times bestseller list for more than twelve weeks.

Breakthrough (2002–2020)

The early 2000s marked Sedaris’s transition into mainstream film and television. She appeared in the romantic comedy Maid in Manhattan in 2002, followed by roles in School of Rock, the holiday comedy Elf, and the fantasy comedy Bewitched, all released in 2003. That same year, she also voiced Foxy Loxy in Disney’s animated Chicken Little and Cinderella in Shrek the Third. In 2005, she co-wrote and starred in the film Strangers with Candy, which served as a prequel to the Comedy Central series and represented her first leading film role. The mid-2000s further expanded her filmography with supporting performances in Full Grown Men, Snow Angels, Jennifer’s Body, Old Dogs, and The Best and the Brightest.

From 2007 onward, Sedaris’s voice acting career grew substantially. She voiced Gravity in Space Buddies in 2009 and Jill in Puss in Boots in 2011, and lent her voice to characters in numerous animated television series, including American Dad!, SpongeBob SquarePants, Steven Universe, Star vs. the Forces of Evil, and F is for Family. From 2014 to 2020, she voiced Princess Carolyn in the Netflix animated series BoJack Horseman, a role that critics widely regard as among the finest voice performances in recent television. During the same period, she played Rita in the Hulu series Difficult People, Pam in Comedy Central’s Broad City, and Mimi Kanasis in Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, earning a Gold Derby Award nomination for the latter role.

In 2017, Sedaris reached a creative milestone by creating, writing, and starring in the TruTV series At Home with Amy Sedaris. The surrealist comedy series, which focused on crafts, cooking, and eccentric character work, ran for three seasons and received two consecutive Primetime Emmy Award nominations for Outstanding Variety Sketch Series. Sedaris also took on the recurring role of Peli Motto in the Disney+ series The Mandalorian, which she continued through 2023, and reprised the role in The Book of Boba Fett in 2022. In 2025, she voices the sentient book Jaunty in Smurfs, adding another animated credit to an already extensive voice acting portfolio.

Notable Works and Milestones

Among the most significant accomplishments of Sedaris’s career is the creation and performance of Jerri Blank in Strangers with Candy, a role that originated as an impression and grew into one of the most beloved cult comedy properties of its era. The series ran for three seasons, spawned a feature film that Sedaris co-wrote, and has maintained a loyal audience in the decades since its conclusion. Her portrayal of Princess Carolyn in BoJack Horseman from 2014 to 2020 earned widespread critical acclaim and is frequently cited as the signature role of her career. The creation of At Home with Amy Sedaris and its two Primetime Emmy nominations further demonstrated her ability to develop and sustain original comedic programming.

Amy Sedaris Award Nominations

Amy Sedaris has received five verified major award nominations across her career in television and theatre. Her first recognition came with a CableACE Award nomination for Best Comedy Actress in 1995 for her work on Exit 57. She earned a Drama Desk Award nomination for Outstanding Featured Actress in a Play in 1998 for her performance in Douglas Carter Beane’s The Country Club. In 2015, she received a Gold Derby Award nomination for Best Comedy Guest Actress for her portrayal of Mimi Kanasis in Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. Most prominently, At Home with Amy Sedaris earned two consecutive Primetime Emmy Award nominations for Outstanding Variety Sketch Series, reflecting the creative control and vision she brought as the show’s creator, writer, and star.

Amy Sedaris Awards Won

No major competitive award wins have been verified for Amy Sedaris to date. Her creative projects, most notably At Home with Amy Sedaris, have earned critical recognition and industry award nominations, reflecting the high regard in which her work is held by her peers.

Amy Sedaris Family

Amy Sedaris was born the fourth of six children to Louis Harry Sedaris and Sharon Elizabeth Sedaris (née Leonard). Her father was the son of Greek immigrants from Apidea, Greece, and her mother was Anglo-American from Binghamton, New York. Her paternal grandmother did not speak English and owned a shoe shining store in New York. Sedaris had five siblings: Lisa, David, Gretchen, Tiffany, and Paul. Her sister Tiffany died by suicide in 2013. Her mother died of lung cancer in 1991, and her father died in 2021.

Personal Life

Amy Sedaris was in a romantic relationship with Paul Dinello, her frequent creative collaborator, from 1987 to 1995. After their separation, the pair remained close friends, and Sedaris is the godmother to Dinello’s two children. Sedaris has stated publicly that she has never desired to marry or have children. She runs a small business called Dusty Food Cupcakes out of her home kitchen, named after her pet rabbit. She has also been an advocate for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, appearing as her Strangers with Candy character in an anti-fur public service campaign. She lives in Greenwich Village, Manhattan, New York City.