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Viola Davis
Acting
Biography
Viola Davis (/vaɪˈoʊlə/ vy-OH-lə; born August 11, 1965) is an American actress and film producer. Her accolades include both the Triple Crown of Acting and EGOT. Time named her one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2012 and 2017. The New York Times ranked her ninth on its list of the greatest actors of the 21st century (2020). Davis received the Cecil B. DeMille Award in 2025.
A graduate of Juilliard, Davis began her career in Central Falls, Rhode Island, appearing in small stage productions. She made her Broadway debut in the August Wilson play Seven Guitars (1996) for which she earned her first Tony nomination. She would later win two Tony Awards, both for Wilson plays. H…
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Viola Davis (/vaɪˈoʊlə/ vy-OH-lə; born August 11, 1965) is an American actress and film producer. Her accolades include both the Triple Crown of Acting and EGOT. Time named her one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2012 and 2017. The New York Times ranked her ninth on its list of the greatest actors of the 21st century (2020). Davis received the Cecil B. DeMille Award in 2025. A graduate of Juilliard, Davis began her career in Central Falls, Rhode Island, appearing in small stage productions. She made her Broadway debut in the August Wilson play Seven Guitars (1996) for which she earned her first Tony nomination. She would later win two Tony Awards, both for Wilson plays. Her first win was for Best Featured Actress in a Play playing the titular character Tonya, a woman grappling with trauma and loss in King Hedley II (2001), followed by her second win for Best Actress in a Play playing Rose Maxson, a working class mother in Fences (2010). She won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for reprising her role in the 2016 film adaptation of Fences. She was Oscar-nominated for playing a complex mother in Doubt (2008), a 1960s housemaid in The Help (2011) and Ma Rainey in Ma Rainey's Black Bottom (2020). On television, she became the first black actress to win the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series for her role as lawyer Annalise Keating in the ABC legal drama series How to Get Away with Murder (2014–2020). Davis joined the DCEU playing Amanda Waller starting with Suicide Squad (2016). She has also starred in the crime drama Widows(2018), and historical action film The Woman King (2022). Davis and her husband are founders of the production company JuVee Productions, and she is also widely recognized for her advocacy and support for human rights and women of color. She became a L'Oréal Paris ambassador in 2019. The audiobook narration of her 2022 memoir Finding Me won her the Grammy Award for Best Audio Book, Narration & Storytelling Recording. Description above from the Wikipedia article Viola Davis, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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BODY OF WORK
Viola Davis's Filmography
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Children of Blood and Bone
as Mama Agba
Portrait of an Artist: Stephen Curry
as Self
W.E.B. Du Bois: Rebel With a Cause
as Narrator (voice)
G20
as President Danielle Sutton
The Ebony Canal: A Story of Black Infant Mortality
as Narration
Kung Fu Panda 4
as The Chameleon (voice)
Predator or Prey: Making The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes
as Self
The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes
as Dr. Volumnia Gaul
Air
as Deloris Jordan
Food 2050
as Self - Narrator (voice)
Black Adam
as Amanda Waller (uncredited)
The Woman King
as Nanisca
Oprah + Viola: A Netflix Special Event
as Self
The Unforgivable
as Liz Ingram
The Suicide Squad
as Amanda Waller
Ma Rainey's Black Bottom
as Ma Rainey
Giving Voice
as Self
Live in Front of a Studio Audience: "All in the Family" and "Good Times"
as Florida Evans
On Broadway
as Self (archive footage)
A Touch of Sugar
as Narrator
Troop Zero
as Miss Rayleen
Widows
as Veronica Rawlings
Beyond Boundaries: The Harvey Weinstein Scandal
as Self (archive footage)
Fences
as Rose Maxson
Suicide Squad
as Amanda Waller
Custody
as Martha Schulman
Lila & Eve
as Lila Walcott
August Wilson: The Ground on Which I Stand
as Self
Blackhat
as Carol Barrett
The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby: Her
as Professor Lillian Friedman
The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby: Him
as Professor Lillian Friedman
Get On Up
as Susie Brown
The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby: Them
as Professor Lillian Friedman
Ender's Game
as Major Gwen Anderson
Prisoners
as Nancy Birch
Love, Marilyn
as Self
Beautiful Creatures
as Amma Treadeau
Won't Back Down
as Nona Alberts
Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close
as Abby Black
Dark Girls
as Self
The Help
as Aibileen Clark
It's Kind of a Funny Story
as Eden Minerva
Trust
as Gail Friedman
Eat Pray Love
as Delia Shiraz
Knight and Day
as CIA Director Isabel George
Beyond All Boundaries
as Hortense Johnson
Law Abiding Citizen
as Mayor April Henry
State of Play
as Dr. Judith Franklin
Doubt: Stage to Screen
as Self
Madea Goes to Jail
as Ellen
Doubt
as Mrs. Miller
Nights in Rodanthe
as Jean
Jesse Stone: Sea Change
as Molly Crane
Disturbia
as Detective Parker
The Architect
as Tonya Neely
Life Is Not a Fairytale: The Fantasia Barrino Story
as Diane Barrino
World Trade Center
as Mother in Hospital
The Best of The Tony Awards: The Plays
as Tonya (segment "King Hedley II")
Jesse Stone: Death in Paradise
as Molly Crane
Jesse Stone: Night Passage
as Officer Molly Crane
Syriana
as CIA Chairwoman
Get Rich or Die Tryin'
as Grandma
Stone Cold
as Molly Crane
Antwone Fisher
as Eva May
Solaris
as Gordon
Far from Heaven
as Sybil
Kate & Leopold
as Policewoman
Ocean's Eleven
as Parole Board Interrogator (voice) (uncredited)
The Shrink Is In
as Robin
Amy & Isabelle
as Dottie
Traffic
as Social Worker
Grace & Glorie
as Rosemary Allbright
Out of Sight
as Moselle
The Pentagon Wars
as Sgt. Fanning
Miss Apprehension and Squirt
as Sharon Hughes
The Substance of Fire
as Nurse
No Poster
Small Great Things
No Poster
The Personal History of Rachel DuPree
as Rachel Dupree
No Poster
I Almost Forgot About You
as Dr. Georgia Young
Operation Othello
as Narrator
No Poster
Two Butterflies
No Poster
House of Games
No Poster
Ally Clark
as Ally Clark