Gus Birney

Birney made her professional stage debut in 2016 as Rosa in Tennessee Williams’ The Rose Tattoo at the Williamstown Theatre Festival. She also appeared in the Off-Broadway production of Connected as Girl Making Out, Jill and Shireen at 59E59 Theatres.

Her screen career began with the short film Bloody Mary (2012). She appeared in an episode of Chicago Med in 2015 as Ashley Cole before taking on the role of Alex Copeland in The Mist (2017), appearing in 10 episodes. Her film credits include Here and Now (2018), Whiteboy (2018), Swallow Grass Snakes (2018), Afterdeath (2019), Darcy (2020), I’m Thinking of Ending Things (2020), The Man in the Woods (2020), Plan B (2021), Giving Birth to a Butterfly (2021), Happiness for Beginners (2023), Asleep in My Palm (2023) and Three Birthdays (2023).

Her television credits include Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (2017), Instinct (2018), Bull (2018), Jessica Jones (2019), Blue Bloods (2019), Insatiable (2019), Dickinson (2019–2021), The Blacklist (2020), Shining Vale (2022–2023), Black Rabbit (2025), The Last Frontier (2025) and Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen (2026). On Dickinson, she portrayed Jane Humphreys in 17 episodes. She appeared as Gaynor Phelps in 16 episodes of Shining Vale and received a 2022 Saturn Award nomination for Best Young Actor in a Television Series for the role. In Black Rabbit, she played Mel Whitney, while her credits on The Last Frontier included Vivian Pike in the episodes “Blue Skies” and “American Dream.” In 2026, she appeared as Portia Cunningham in eight episodes of Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen.

In 2023, Birney appeared as Gloria Parodus in the Off-Broadway revival of Lorraine Hansberry’s The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, opposite Oscar Isaac and Rachel Brosnahan. The production transferred to Broadway at the James Earl Jones Theatre, marking her Broadway debut. She also performed in a reading of Hamish Linklater’s Paris, ACTORS! at the Williamstown Theatre Festival in 2023.

In 2024, Birney appeared as Dora in the Brooklyn Academy of Music production of Tadeusz Slobodzianek’s Our Class. She received a 2024 Outer Critics Circle Award nomination for Outstanding Featured Performer in an Off-Broadway Play for the production.

In 2026, Birney appeared as Nico in Eli Rarey’s Seagull: True Story at The Public Theater.