Tessa Lynne Thompson is an American actress everyone is thinking about.
Thompson was born in Los Angeles, California and raised between Los Angeles and Brooklyn, New York. Her father, singer-songwriter Marc Anthony Thompson, is Afro-Panamanian and the founder of the musical collective Chocolate Genius, Inc. Her mother is of half Mexican and half European ancestry. Her younger half-sister, Zsela, is a singer and songwriter.
Thompson attended Santa Monica High School where she played Hermia in a student production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and attended Santa Monica College (SMC) where she studied cultural anthropology. While at SMC, she also attended lectures by Lisa Wolpe of the Los Angeles Women’s Shakespeare Company(LAWSC).
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She began her professional acting career with the Los Angeles Women’s Shakespeare Company while studying at Santa Monica College. She appeared in productions of The Tempest and Romeo and Juliet, the latter of which earned her a NAACP Theatre Award nomination. Her breakthrough came with leading roles in Tina Mabry’s independent drama film Mississippi Damned and Tyler Perry’s drama film For Colored Girls (2010).
Thompson gained favorable notices for her early film performances in the comedy-drama Dear White People, and as civil rights activist Diane Nash in Ava DuVernay’s historical drama Selma (both in 2014). She gained mainstream attention for her roles in franchise films playing Bianca Taylor in the sport dramas Creed (2015) and Creed II (2018), and for her starring role as Valkyrie in the Marvel Cinematic Universe superhero films Thor: Ragnarok (2017), Avengers: Endgame (2019), and Thor: Love and Thunder (2022), as well as her leading role in the science fiction franchise film Men in Black: International (2019).
She also has received critical praise for her performances in independent films such as the dark comedy Sorry to Bother You (2018), the crime thriller Little Woods (2018), the science-fiction horror film Annihilation (2018), the romantic drama Sylvie’s Love (2020), and the period film Passing (2021).
On television, she starred in the noir drama series Veronica Mars (2005–2006), the drama series Copper (2012–2013), and the science fiction series Westworld (2016–present). She received a Primetime Emmy Award nomination for Sylvie’s Love.
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