Rise to Fame
The original audition sides for It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia had nothing funny written for Dee. She almost passed. Rob McElhenney talked her into it, promising the character would get worse over time. That turned out to be one of the most accurate pitches in TV history. After training with The Groundlings and grinding through bit parts on Curb Your Enthusiasm and The Drew Carey Show, she took a role most actresses would've considered a liability and built Dee Reynolds into one of TV's great comic monsters.
In the Spotlight
Zero Emmy nominations across 170-plus episodes of It's Always Sunny tells you everything about how the industry overlooked her for two decades. The correction came fast once it started. A recurring guest role on Hacks pulled two Emmy nominations in 2022 and 2024. Then High Potential landed on ABC in 2024 as her first real network lead, a procedural about a single mom solving crimes, and became one of the year's most-watched new shows. Season 2 is confirmed. Drew Carey told her in 2002 she should have her own show. It just took everyone else a while to agree.
Side Notes
She grew up on a farm in Tualatin, Oregon, and fractured her skull in a bicycle accident at 12 that required reconstructive surgery. Her mother runs Earth Mama Organics. None of this maps onto the woman who spent 17 seasons playing one of TV's great anti-heroines. She started secretly dating McElhenney during Season 2 of It's Always Sunny, married him in Malibu in 2008, and they have two sons. Playing opposite your husband while both of your characters are actively terrible people is either a very good arrangement or a very bad one. Apparently it's the former.