Personal details
Born:
- Birthday: 1964-09-16
- Born Place: Shaker Heights, Ohio, USA
Molly Shannon
Molly Shannon (born September 16, 1964) is an acclaimed American actress and comedian who rose to fame as a standout cast member on Saturday Night Live from 1995 to 2001. During her tenure at SNL, she created iconic characters such as the eccentric Catholic schoolgirl Mary Katherine Gallagher—later the subject of the spin-off film Superstar (1999)—and the energetic 50-year-old dancer Sally O'Malley. A graduate of New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, Shannon has built a prolific career across television and film, earning critical praise for her dramatic range in projects like the independent film Other People (2016), for which she won an Independent Spirit Award, and her recurring role in the HBO series Divorce. Her extensive filmography also includes commercial hits like How the Grinch Stole Christmas, Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby, and the Hotel Transylvania animated franchise. In recent years, Shannon has continued to be a mainstay on prestige television, appearing in hit series such as The White Lotus, The Other Two, and Only Murders in the Building, the latter of which earned her a Screen Actors Guild Award in 2024. Looking ahead to 2026, she is part of the ensemble cast for the Netflix romantic comedy People We Meet on Vacation, scheduled for release on January 9. Additionally, she is set to reunite with her former SNL co-star Will Ferrell in an upcoming untitled Netflix golf comedy series, where she will play the character Stacy. Outside of her acting work, Shannon is a published author, having released the children's book Tilly the Trickster and her best-selling 2022 memoir, Hello, Molly!.
