Melanie Jayne Lynskey (born May 16, 1977 in New Plymouth, New Zealand) is an actress from New Zealand.
She is best known for her roles in movies such as Heavenly Creatures, Detroit Rock City, Coyote Ugly, Ever After, Rose Red, But I'm a Cheerleader, Sweet Home Alabama, The Informant!, and Don't Look Up and as well as the TV show Two and a Half Men where she played the neighbor who was more than a little obsessed with Charlie. On Yellowjackets, she plays the adult version of Shauna, one of the survivors of a plane crash. On Candy (2022), she plays Betty Gore. She appears in The Last of Us (2023) as Kathleen, a revolutionary.
She voices Beatrice in Over the Garden Wall, Danny's mother on Future-Worm!, Pearl The Penguin in Jake And The Neverland Pirates, and the Sun in Summer Camp Island.
Related tropes:
- Career Resurrection: In the 2000s, particularly after Two and a Half Men pigeonholed her as a sitcom actress, she drifted away from the limelight towards independent films (while still receiving critical acclaim). The 2020s saw her getting more recognition with the likes of Yellowjackets, Don't Look Up and The Last of Us.
- Cute and Psycho: Unlike that of her Heavenly Creatures costar Kate Winslet, her career has been dominated by this trope. Still, it has led to some pretty memorable characters.
- Doing It for the Art: She backed out of her contract on Two and a Half Men after two years because she felt that a sitcom would limit her acting options, even though staying on would likely have netted her tens of millions of dollars.
- Dyeing for Your Art: She was on a heavy diet and exercise regimen for Coyote Ugly, like most of her co-stars. She, however, had it the worst."It was ridiculous. I was already starving myself and as thin as I could possibly be for this body, and I was still a [size] four. Just the feedback was constantly like, 'You're not beautiful. You're not beautiful. In your early 20s, so much of it is about beauty, and how people respond to you, and do people want to fuck you?"
- Fake American: She's from New Zealand. However, the vast majority of her roles employ an American accent and she's able to pull it off flawlessly, to the point where people are surprised to hear her in interviews.
- Fake Australian: She plays an Australian in But I'm a Cheerleader, and is quick to correct people when they say she uses her own accent in it.
- Friendship on the Set: On But I'm a Cheerleader, she became good friends with Clea Duvall and Natasha Lyonne.
- Real-Life Relative: She's done three films with her second husband, Jason Ritter.
- Romance on the Set: She met her first husband, Jimmi Simpson, while filming Rose Red, and her second while filming The Big Ask.
- Wag the Director: A Yellowjackets episode would have Shauna stealing Callie's underwear before a date with Adam. As the pilot had already shown her masturbating in her daughter's room, Melanie had it changed, not wanting it to be a recurring thing.
- What Could Have Been: She auditioned for Rose on Two and a Half Men as a guest star, but they liked her so much they promoted her to regular.
- Apparently, she was an early choice for Willow from Buffy the Vampire Slayer in the original pilot. She also reauditioned after the part had to be recast.
