Odessa Young

Odessa Young (born 11 January 1998) is an Australian actress. She is known for her roles in the 2015 feature films Looking for Grace and The Daughter, the latter of which earned her an AACTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role. She won further accolades for her performance in the web series High Life in 2017. In 2018, she starred in the films Assassination Nation and A Million Little Pieces. That year, she also made her off-Broadway debut in Days of Rage. In 2020, she starred as Frannie in the post-apocalypse miniseries The Stand, based on the 1978 novel of the same name by Stephen King, and opposite Elisabeth Moss in Shirley (2020), a film about the novelist Shirley Jackson. Early life and education Young grew up in Australia, where her father is a musician and her mother a writer. She attended a performing arts high school in Sydney, taking part in theatre productions. Within two days of turning 18, she relocated from Sydney to Los Angeles, California. Two years later, Young moved to Williamsburg, Brooklyn, New York. Career Odessa Young started acting professionally at the age of 11, when she was cast through her drama teacher in the Australian children's show My Place. She acted in television series such as Wonderland and Tricky Business before making the transition into feature film work. In 2015, she co-starred in the film The Daughter with Geoffrey Rush and Sam Neill. She was cast as "the daughter" after modifying her take on the character to seem less mature than in her first audition. Also in 2015, she acted alongside Radha Mitchell in Looking for Grace, where she played the titular role. Later that year, she was dubbed "Australia's brightest rising star" by Elle Magazine. For her role in The Daughter, Young attracted considerable critical acclaim and won Best Actress in a Leading Role at the 2016 AACTA Awards. Her performance in The Daughter also earned her an award for Best Actress from the Australian Film Critics Association.