Tess Frazer

Raised in a family of actors in New York City, Tess Frazer began performing on stage as a child in the Upper West Side and Hell's Kitchen neighborhoods. She attended the Professional Performing Arts School before graduating from the Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music and Art and Performing Arts, a specialized public institution known for cultivating professional talent in the performing arts. Frazer subsequently trained at the Maggie Flanigan Studio, where she studied the Meisner Technique, and at Circle in the Square Theatre School; she also pursued improv and comedy training at IO Theater in Chicago and at The PIT, Magnet Theater, and Upright Citizens Brigade in New York City. Her screen debut came in 2015 with the television movie Fan Girl, in which she portrayed Claire Bovary opposite Meg Ryan and Kiernan Shipka. The following year, Frazer appeared in Woody Allen's ensemble period piece Café Society (2016), set against the backdrop of 1930s Hollywood and New York high society. In April 2016, she originated the role of Lorna in the world premiere of Tracy Letts's Mary Page Marlowe at Steppenwolf Theatre Company in Chicago, a production directed by Anna D. Shapiro that received critical acclaim; she reprised the role in the New York premiere at Second Stage Theater in the summer of 2018 under the direction of Lila Neugebauer. Frazer's breakthrough came in 2017 as a series regular on the Netflix limited series Godless, playing Callie Dunne, a former prostitute turned schoolteacher in a mining town populated largely by women. The performance placed her alongside Michelle Dockery, Merritt Wever, and Jeff Daniels in the Emmy Award-winning Western drama. Subsequent work included Write When You Get Work (2018), in which she appeared opposite Emily Mortimer, and guest roles on network television including FBI: Most Wanted (CBS). Frazer has continued to build her theatrical résumé with world premiere productions such as The Perplexed by Richard Greenberg at Manhattan Theatre Club and workshop development of Love All by Anna Deavere Smith, alongside Off-Broadway credits including The Winter's Tale, Dracula, and All My Sons. She remains active in both screen and stage work, balancing dramatic roles with her continuing interest in comedy performance.