Actor Biography

Director, writer, producer and actor Lake Bell can next be seen opposite Dax Shepard as newlywed Rio in ABC's upcoming single-camera comedy Bless This Mess, which she co-created and co-wrote with Elizabeth Meriwether. She will also serve as an executive producer on the series.

Most recently, Bell starred opposite Reese Witherspoon in Hallie Meyers-Shyer's Home Again. On television, she directed two episodes of the popular Hulu original series Casual and starred in Wet Hot American Summer: First Day of Camp and Wet Hot American Summer: Ten Years Later, a satirical comedy television series follow-up to the 2001 hit film by the same name.

Bell premiered her first film, In a World…, in which she wrote, directed and acted, at the Sundance Film Festival. The film received rave reviews and she won the Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award. Bell also received a number of nominations and awards for the film, including an Independent Spirit Award nomination for Best First Screenplay, the New Voices in Screenwriting Award at the Nantucket Film Festival, an American Comedy Award nomination for Comedic Actress – Film, the Phoenix Film Critics Society Award for Breakthrough Performance Behind the Camera, a Chicago Film Critics Association nomination for Most Promising Filmmaker, and Alliance of Women Film Journalist nominations for Best Woman Director and Best Woman Screenwriter, among others. The film was named one of the Top 10 Independent Films of 2013.

Bell's second directorial project, I Do…Until I Don't, which she also wrote and starred in, premiered in September 2017; and her short film Worst Enemy, which she wrote and directed, played in competition at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival. The film also showed at the 2011 Nantucket Film Festival, winning her Showtime's Tony Cox Award for Screenwriting in a Short Film.

Other film credits include Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, opposite Jake Johnson; Shot Caller, opposite Nickolaj Coster-Waldau; No Escape, opposite Owen Wilson and Pierce Brosnan; The Secret Life of Pets, opposite Kevin Hart; Million Dollar Arm, opposite Jon Hamm and Alan Arkin; Black Rock, opposite Kate Bosworth; No Strings Attached, alongside Natalie Portman and Ashton Kutcher; Nancy Meyers' It's Complicated, starring opposite Meryl Streep, Alec Baldwin and Steve Martin; What Happens in Vegas, opposite Cameron Diaz and Ashton Kutcher; Pride and Glory, opposite Colin Farrell; Over Her Dead Body, opposite Paul Rudd; and the independent film Under Still Waters, opposite Jason Clarke, for which she received the Newport Beach Film Festival Award for Outstanding Performance in Acting.

On television, Bell's other credits include Bojack Horseman, How to Make It in America, Surface, Boston Legal, Miss Match and War Stories" She also appeared on the Emmy® Award-winning Adult Swim series Children's Hospital for seven years and directed several of its most-acclaimed episodes.

Having grown up immersed in the world of European road course racing, Bell was elected to serve as the automotive contributing editor for The Hollywood Reporter in 2011. With her unique brand of humor and experience, she editorialized auto-trends in her "Test Drive" column, reviewing a convoy of high-end luxury vehicles.

Bell completed her four years of drama conservatory training at the Rose Bruford College of Speech and Drama in London. She currently serves as an active board member of Women In Film, a non profit organization whose mission is to promote advocacy and special programs to support the success of female peers in the entertainment industry.

Bell was born in New York City and currently splits her time between New York and Los Angeles. She is married to artist Scott Campbell, with whom she has two children. Above all, Bell spends her days balancing her passion toward her art with her commitment to her family. She also loves classic rock.