Early life

Wiig was born in Canandaigua, New York, the daughter of Jon Wiig, who ran a lake marina in Western New York, and Laurie Johnston, an artist. Her father has Norwegian and Irish ancestry and her mother English and Scottish. The name Wiig comes from the area of Sogn og Fjordane in Norway. Wiig moved with her family to Lancaster, Pennsylvania, at the age of three, and attended Nitrauer Elementary School. She later moved to Rochester, New York, where she attended the prestigious Allendale Columbia School for ninth and tenth grade and graduated from Brighton High School.

She left for her first try at college, seeking fun and, eventually, soul-searching. Not finding what she wanted, she returned to Rochester, attended community college, and did a three-month outdoor living program. She had no performing ambitions at this time. Wiig attended the University of Arizona, majoring in Art. When she took an acting class in college to fulfill a course requirement, the teacher suggested she continue to act. She expected to start out a job at a plastic surgery clinic drawing pictures of people's post-surgery bodies, but decided to move to LA and act.

Career

Early career

Kristen dropped out of school at 19 and relocated to Los Angeles to act while working odd jobs to support herself. She performed with Empty Stage Comedy Theatre and with The Groundlings. She felt improv was a better fit than acting, and being a part of the comedy group improved her skills. In 2003, she appeared in the Spike TV show The Joe Schmo Show, a spoof of reality television, in which she played "Dr. Pat", a quack marriage counselor.

While at The Groundlings, Wiig's manager encouraged her to submit an audition tape to Saturday Night Live.

Television

Wiig debuted on SNL shortly into Season 31, on November 12, 2005. She survived an SNL budget cut, becoming a full member of the repertory cast at the beginning of Season 32 in 2006 and up until 2012.

Wiig was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series for her work on Saturday Night Live (2009, 2010, 2011, 2012). In December 2009, she headlined in the Christmas special SNL Presents: A Very Gilly Christmas, which featured new sketches with her character Gilly and highlights of older SNL clips. Wiig was featured in Entertainment Weekly's list of 15 Great Performances for her various impersonations on Saturday Night Live (December 2008) and in EW's list of the 25 Funniest Women in Hollywood (April 2009). As of 2011, she voiced Lola Bunny in the series The Looney Tunes Show.

Her final performance as a cast member on Saturday Night Live was Season 37, Episode 22, which aired on May 19, 2012. The show was hosted by Mick Jagger. The closing celebration of her time on the show included SNL alumni Amy Poehler, Chris Kattan, Chris Parnell, Will Forte and Rachel Dratch, as well as Steve Martin and Jon Hamm. She returned to host the program on May 11, 2013. On February 19, 2014, Wiig appeared on the second episode of fellow SNL alumnus Jimmy Fallon's run on The Tonight Show from 30 Rockefeller Plaza in New York City. In what appeared to be an unscripted spoof, she played the role of ideal boy band One Direction member Harry Styles. She returned as a special guest to appear in the monologue and several sketches of SNL again alongside host Bill Hader on October 14, 2014. Wiig's SNL comedic style has been widely praised, but also criticized for leaving "little room for her female contemporaries to shine."

At the 2015 Grammy Awards, Wiig joined with child-dancer Maddie Ziegler to give a concert dance performance alongside songwriter / recording artist, Sia, who sang her 2014 single "Chandelier".

Film

Wiig made her film debut in the 2006 Christmas movie Unaccompanied Minors. The following year, she appeared in Judd Apatow's comedy Knocked Up as a passive-aggressive assistant and performed in Jake Kasdan's Walk Hard, another Apatow-produced film. In 2008, she had small roles in several films, including Forgetting Sarah Marshall and David Koepp's Ghost Town. In 2009, Wiig had supporting roles in Greg Mottola's Adventureland, Mike Judge's Extract, and Whip It, Drew Barrymore's directorial debut. In 2010, she appeared in the films MacGruber, the animated comedies Despicable Me and Despicable Me 2, and Andrew Jarecki's All Good Things. Wiig had her first lead role as Ruth Buggs in Greg Mottola's comedy Paul in 2011.

Later in 2011, she starred in the film Bridesmaids, which she co-wrote with fellow Groundlings performer Annie Mumolo. Universal Pictures, released the film on May 13, 2011. The film became both a critical and box office success, receiving two nominations for Best Picture-Musical or Comedy and Wiig was nominated for Best Actress-Motion Picture, Musical or Comedy at the 69th Golden Globe Awards. The film also received two Academy Award nominations, including Best Original Screenplay, for which Wiig and Mumolo were nominated. The second nomination was for Best Supporting Actress for co-star Melissa McCarthy. The film grossed over $280 million worldwide.

In 2014, Wiig starred with Saturday Night Live alumnus Bill Hader in The Skeleton Twins. In 2015, she starred in Nasty Baby, as Polly, a family practitioner who is more interested in having a baby than having a man. The film was directed by Chilean filmmaker Sebastián Silva. Wiig also starred in Welcome to Me, a comedy-drama directed by Shira Piven which premiered at the 2014 Toronto International Film Festival.

In 2014, news outlets reported that Wiig and Mumolo were writing a new comedy, which will see Wiig making her debut as a director. The name of the film and release date are yet to be confirmed. In January 2015, Wiig became one of the leading roles in the planned reboot of Ghostbusters with co-stars Melissa McCarthy, Leslie Jones and Kate McKinnon. She will be starring alongside Fan Bingbing in the fantasy film Neverland.

Personal life

Wiig was married to actor Hayes Hargrove from 2005 to 2009.

Filmography

Film

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2006	Unaccompanied Minors	Carole Malone
2007	Knocked Up	Jill
2007	Meet Bill	Jane Whitman
2007	Brothers Solomon, TheThe Brothers Solomon	Janine
2007	Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story	Edith Cox
2008	Semi-Pro	Bear Handler
2008	Forgetting Sarah Marshall	Yoga Instructor
2008	Pretty Bird	Mandy
2008	Ghost Town	Surgeon
2009	Adventureland	Paulette
2009	Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs	Pudgy Beaver Mom (voice)
2009	Whip It	Maggie Mayhem
2009	Extract	Suzie Reynolds
2010	How to Train Your Dragon	Ruffnut (voice)
2010	Date Night	Haley Sullivan
2010	MacGruber	Vicki St. Elmo
2010	Despicable Me	Miss Hattie (voice)
2010	All Good Things	Lauren Fleck
2011	Paul	Ruth Buggs
2011	Bridesmaids	Annie Walker	Also writer and producer
2012	Friends with Kids	Missy
2012	Revenge for Jolly!	Angela
2013	Girl Most Likely	Imogene	Also executive producer
2013	Despicable Me 2	Agent Lucy Wilde (voice)
2013	Her	SexyKitten (voice)
2013	The Secret Life of Walter Mitty	Cheryl Melhoff
2013	Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues	Chani
2014	Hateship, Loveship	Johanna Parry
2014	The Skeleton Twins	Maggie
2014	How to Train Your Dragon 2	Ruffnut (voice)
2014	Welcome to Me	Alice Klieg	Also producer
2015	The Diary of a Teenage Girl	Charlotte
2015	Nasty Baby	Polly
2015	The Martian	Annie Montrose
2016	Zoolander 2	Alexanya Atoz / Katinka
2016	Sausage Party	Brenda (voice)
2016	Ghostbusters	Erin Gilbert	Post-production
2016	Masterminds	Kelly
2017	Downsizing		Filming

Television

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2003	Joe Schmo Show, TheThe Joe Schmo Show	Dr. Pat	9 episodes
2004	I'm with Her	Kristy	Episode: "The Heartbreak Kid"
2004	Drew Carey Show, TheThe Drew Carey Show	Sandy	Episode: "House of the Rising Son-in-Law"
2005-2012	Saturday Night Live	Various	135 episodes
2007	30 Rock	Candace Van der Shark	Episode: "Somebody to Love"
2009	Flight of the Conchords	Brahbrah	Episode: "Love Is a Weapon of Choice"
2009-2010	Bored to Death	Jennifer Gladwell	3 episodes
2010	Ugly Americans	Tristan (voice)	Episode: "So, You Want to Be a Vampire?"
2010	Cleveland Show, TheThe Cleveland Show	Mrs. Stapleton (voice)	Episode: "The Curious Case of Jr. Working at The Stool"
2011-2014	Looney Tunes Show, TheThe Looney Tunes Show	Lola Bunny (voice)	25 episodes
2011	Simpsons, TheThe Simpsons	Calliope Juniper (voice)	Episode: "Flaming Moe"
2011	SpongeBob SquarePants	Madame Hag Fish (voice)	Episode: "The Curse of the Hex"
2012	Portlandia	Gathy	Episode: "Cat Nap"
2013	Simpsons, TheThe Simpsons	Annie Crawford (voice)	Episode: "Homerland"
2013	Saturday Night Live	Herself (host)	Episode: "Kristen Wiig/Vampire Weekend"
2013	Arrested Development	Young Lucille Bluth	7 episodes
2013	Drunk History	Patty Hearst	Episode: "San Francisco"
2014	The Spoils of Babylon	Cynthia Morehouse	6 episodes
2015	A Deadly Adoption	Sarah Benson	Television film
2015	The Spoils Before Dying	Delores O’Dell	6 episodes
2015	Wet Hot American Summer: First Day of Camp	Courtney	3 episodes

Video games

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2014	Scooby Doo and Looney Tunes: Cartoon Universe	Lola Bunny (Video)

Awards and nominations

Main article: List of awards and nominations received by Kristen Wiig

• She was named one of PETA's Sexiest Vegetarian Celebrities of 2011.
• She is part of Time's 2012 list of The 100 Most Influential People in the World.

[ Source: Wikipedia ]