Early life

Kazan was born in Los Angeles, the daughter of screenwriters Nicholas Kazan and Robin Swicord. Her paternal grandparents were film and theatre director Elia Kazan and playwright Molly (Thacher) Kazan. Through her paternal grandmother, she is a direct descendant of classicist and college administrator Thomas Anthony Thacher, Yale president Jeremiah Day, and statesman Roger Sherman. Kazan has a younger sister, Maya (born 1986). She has Greek (from her paternal grandfather), English, and German ancestry.

Kazan was educated at the private Wildwood School, Windward School, and also at the Marlborough School, located in Hancock Park, Los Angeles. She attended Yale University (also her grandfather's alma mater—where she was a member of the Manuscript Society), graduating in 2005 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Theatre.

Career

After her film debut in 2003 playing Samantha in Swordswallowers and Thin Men, Kazan went on to play her first professional stage role in the 2006 off-Broadway revival of The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie starring Cynthia Nixon. In 2007 she had a small role in The Savages, which starred Laura Linney and Philip Seymour Hoffman. She also guest appeared in an episode of the supernatural drama Medium as a friend of the main character's younger self. She next appeared in the films Fracture and In the Valley of Elah. In the fall of the same year, she returned to the stage in a The New Group production of 100 Saints You Should Know and Jonathan Marc Sherman's Things We Want, directed by Ethan Hawke.

In January 2008, Kazan made her Broadway debut opposite S. Epatha Merkerson and Kevin Anderson in a revival of William Inge's Come Back, Little Sheba. Ben Brantley of The New York Times called her performance "first-rate", adding, "Ms. Kazan is terrific in conveying the character's self-consciousness." In the fall, she appeared on Broadway as Masha in Anton Chekhov's The Seagull opposite Kristin Scott Thomas and Peter Sarsgaard. The same year she had roles in August, Me and Orson Welles and Revolutionary Road.

Kazan is also a playwright. In 2009, her play Absalom premiered at the Humana Festival of New American Plays in Louisville, KY. The play, about a father's tense relationships with his children, had been extensively read and workshopped since Kazan's junior year at Yale University. She capped off the year playing Meryl Streep's daughter in the Nancy Meyers comedy It's Complicated. She appeared in the Broadway production of A Behanding in Spokane with Christopher Walken and Sam Rockwell until June 6, 2010. She also played a main role in the movies I Hate Valentine's Day and The Exploding Girl, which were both released in 2009.

In 2010, she had a main role in the comedy-drama happythankyoumoreplease as Mary Catherine, the cousin of Josh Radnor's character. She also starred as Millie Gately in 2010 (alongside Paul Dano, playing her husband) in Kelly Reichardt's independent western drama Meek's Cutoff. In the fall, Kazan played Harper Pitt in Signature Theatre Company's 20th Anniversary production of Tony Kushner's Angels in America. On the small screen, Kazan then appeared in four episodes of HBO's Bored to Death as Nina, the love interest of a fictionalized Jonathan Ames played by Jason Schwartzman.

Her play We Live Here, about a dysfunctional family, received its world premiere production from October 12 to November 6, 2011 at the off-Broadway Manhattan Theater Club in New York City. Among the ensemble cast was Amy Irving and the director was 2010 Obie Award winner Sam Gold.

Her next project, for which she wrote the screenplay, was Ruby Sparks, a comedy-romance film directed by Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, and starring Kazan herself, along with Paul Dano, Chris Messina, Antonio Banderas, Annette Bening, Deborah Ann Woll, and Steve Coogan.

In 2014, her third play Trudy and Max in Love opened at the South Coast Repertory and she played the role of Denise Thibodeau in the HBO miniseries Olive Kitteridge.

Personal life

Kazan has been dating actor Paul Dano since 2007.

Filmography

List of film credits

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2003	Swordswallowers and Thin Men	Samantha
2007	Savages, TheThe Savages	Student
2007	Fracture	Mona
2007	In the Valley of Elah	Angie
2008	August	Gal Employee
2008	Me and Orson Welles	Gretta Adler
2008	Revolutionary Road	Maureen Grube
2009	Exploding Girl, TheThe Exploding Girl	Ivy
2009	Private Lives of Pippa Lee, TheThe Private Lives of Pippa Lee	Grace Lee
2009	I Hate Valentine's Day	Tammy Greenwood
2009	It's Complicated	Gabby Adler	National Board of Review Award for Best Cast
2010	happythankyoumoreplease	Mary Catherine
2010	Meek's Cutoff	Millie Gately
2012	Ruby Sparks	Ruby	Also writer Detroit Film Critics Society for Breakthrough Performance Nominated—Saturn Award for Best Actress Nominated—Independent Spirit Award for Best Screenplay
2012	Some Girl(s)	Reggie
2013	The Pretty One	Laurel Audrey
2013	The F Word (What If)	Chantry
2014	In Your Eyes	Rebecca Porter
2015	Our Brand Is Crisis	LeBlanc
2016	My Blind Brother

List of television credits

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2007	Medium	Izzy	Episode: "The Boy Next Door"
2008	Speechless	Stood Up Girl #2	Documentary
2008	After Iraq	Herself	Documentary
2008	HBO First Look	Herself	Episode: "The Making of 'Revolutionary Road'"
2010	Bored to Death	Nina	4 episodes
2011	Showing Up	Herself	Documentary
2014	Olive Kitteridge	Denise Thibodeau	2 episodes Nominated—Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or Movie Nominated—Satellite Award for Best Supporting Actress - Series, Miniseries, or Television Film

Theatre

List of theatre credits

Year	Title	Role	Theater	Notes
2006	The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie	Sandy	Acorn Theatre
2007	100 Saints You Should Know	Abby	Playwrights Horizons
2007	Things We Want	Stella	Acorn Theatre
2008	Come Back, Little Sheba.	Marie	Biltmore Theatre
2008	The Seagull	Masha	Walter Kerr Theatre
2009	Absalom	----	Actors Theatre of Louisville	Playwright
2010	A Behanding in Spokane	Marilyn	Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre
2010	Angels in America	Harper Pitt	Signature Theatre
2011	We Live Here	----	Manhattan Theater Club	Playwright
2013	Clive	Joanne	Acorn Theatre
2014	Trudy and Max in Love	----	South Coast Repertory	Playwright
2014	When We Were Young and Unafraid	Mary Anne	Manhattan Theater Club

[ Source: Wikipedia ]