Everyone seemed to fall in love with Alison Brie the moment they saw their first episode of Community. Since then Brie has remained working in both film and TV and has consistently shown herself to be one of the most versatile actors working, easily stepping out of her “America’s Sweetheart” wheelhouse and consistently seeking challenging work that defies stereotyping.
Viewers are currently being charmed by Brie’s latest collaboration with husband Dave Franco, Somebody I Used to Know. Here are some of her best performances on film and TV.
10. Happiest Season
Brie’s character Sloan, the uber-competitive older sister of Happiest Season‘s protagonist, Harper, is more or less an unmitigated jerk through most of this queer retelling of the home for Christmas trope but you can tell she’s having a blast playing the neurotic sibling’s perfectionism to the extreme. While it provides some long-overdue representation, Happiest Season doesn’t really reinvent any wheels but Brie is a hilarious mess in it.
9. Sleeping With Other People
This upending of the “friends with benefits who catch feelings” formula throws in plot elements of love/sex addiction and a story of two people who are determined NOT to sleep with each other at all costs (even down to using a safe word). Though it never really goes further with its premise than providing a new situation, both Brie and co-star Jason Sudeikis manage to keep things likable and fun if not entirely fresh.
8. The Five-Year Engagement
While The Five-Year Engagement is ostensibly a vehicle for stars Jason Segel and Emily Blunt, Brie comes close to stealing every scene she’s in as Blunt’s sister (complete with better-than-passable English accent). The 2012 Judd Apatow film, unfortunately, didn’t fare as well at the box office as some of his prior efforts but Brie is a gem in the show whether acting with Blunt or her film husband Alex (played by a pre-hunk era Chris Pratt). The Elmo and Cookie Monster scene alone is worth the rental.
7. The Rental
Brie’s no stranger to the horror genre, having appeared in the 2008 indie Parasomnia and even in the fourth installment of the Scream franchise but The Rental may be her most disturbing effort to date. In the film, which was the directorial debut of Brie’s husband, Dave Franco, Brie stars alongside Dan Stevens, Sheila Vand, and The Bear‘s Jeremy Allen White as a pair of couples who rent a coastal property for a weekend getaway and come to suspect they are being watched. Don’t watch if you’re planning on renting an Air BnB anytime soon.
6. Somebody I Used to Know
Brie was even more deeply involved with Franco’s next directorial project Somebody I Used to Know, sharing co-writing duties on the film with him. The movie, released on Prime Video just two weeks ago, does a good job of reinventing the staid “protagonist returns home after a setback” and “old flames reignite at a wedding” boilerplate without straying too far from the formulas. There’s no doubt that a lot of the movie’s success is due to Brie’s charisma and it provides even more proof she can carry a film.
5. Mad Men
Brie only appeared in 36 episodes as Pete Campbell’s wife Trudy but ended up having one of the more dramatic story arcs of any of the minor characters in the multi-award-winning series. Brie easily turns in some of her most dynamic acting in the show taking Trudy from an easily dominated “traditional” wife of the early sixties to an independent mother and forceful personality fully capable of putting Pete into his (much-needed) place.
4. Horse Girl
Produced by Brie and the Duplass Brothers and directed by Jeff Baena — who directed Brie in The Little Hours — Horse Girl may be Brie’s most ambitious project to date, a psychologically thrilling and ambiguous exploration of sanity and paranoia focusing on a woman who appears to have lost everything. You can rarely spot exactly where the character is heading in Horse Girl but Brie makes you want to keep watching.
3. Promising Young Woman
Promising Young Woman provides very few easy answers and takes a hard look at internalized misogyny in one of the movie’s most uncomfortable scenes. Brie, playing Madison, girlbosses all over the place with brags about how well life has treated her but things get very uncomfortable when she’s asked to face her own complicity for denying a classmate’s rape claims years ago. One of Brie’s biggest advantages is her inherent likability but this scene shows she’s fully capable of turning in incredible work without relying on it.
2. GLOW
There’s probably nothing about Brie’s prior claims to fame that screamed “Lady Wrestler” before she helmed the Netflix series based on the 1980s syndicated women’s pro-wrestling program Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling, but that didn’t stop her from stepping into the ring and delivering a performance that completely leveled her up from her sitcom success in Community. The show drew wide critical acclaim for her performance as Ruth Wilder but sadly, fans never got the series finale they deserved due to Covid.
1. Community
There’s no doubt about it, Brie’s performance in Community is absolutely worthy of its hype. The series’ blend of meta-humor and deep-dive movie parody and satire gave Brie something to sink her teeth into every week and absolutely put her on the map. Brie consistently stood out in a show that swam with new talent. Thankfully for her fans, she’ll soon return to the role that made her famous. She’s currently waiting for principal shooting to begin on the long-awaited Community movie.