Kristen Johnston

Kristen Johnston began her professional stage career with New York's Atlantic Theater Company, appearing in productions including As You Like It and Stage Door. She also performed with the Naked Angels Theater Company in The Stand-In and Hot Keys, and with New York Stage and Film in Kim's Sister alongside David Strathairn and Jane Adams. She appeared in The Lights at Lincoln Center Theater, earning a Drama Desk Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress.

Johnston made her feature film debut in The Debt, which won Best Short at the 1993 Cannes Film Festival. She played Kate in Backfire! in 1995 and later appeared in Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me (1999), The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas (2000), Music and Lyrics (2007), Bride Wars (2009), and Thrill Ride (2016), in which she played Esmeralda, a sea hag. Her television credits included guest appearances on Chicago Hope, Hearts Afire, and The 5 Mrs. Buchanans, as well as narrating Microscopic Milton for the Disney Channel.

In 1996, Johnston was cast as Sally Solomon on the television series 3rd Rock from the Sun, a role she played from 1996 to 2001. She won two Emmy Awards for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series for her performance. She later appeared in the sixth and final season of Sex and the City as Lexi Featherston, and in six episodes of ER in 2005. Her other television work included a 2009 recurring role on Ugly Betty, an appearance in the unaired pilot for an American adaptation of Absolutely Fabulous as Patsy, and a single-episode appearance on Bored to Death in 2010.

Johnston starred as divorce attorney Holly Franklin on the TV Land sitcom The Exes, which ran for four seasons from 2011 to 2015. She published her memoir, Guts: The Endless Follies and Tiny Triumphs of a Giant Disaster, in 2012. In 2018, she began a recurring role as Tammy Diffendorf on the CBS sitcom Mom and became a series regular for its seventh and eighth seasons from 2019 to 2020.

In 2024, Johnston was cast in the Netflix comedy series Leanne, created by Leanne Morgan, Susan McMartin, and Chuck Lorre. She plays Carol, the twice-divorced sister of Leanne.