Kate Siegel

**Kate Siegel** (born *Kate Gordon Siegelbaum* on August 9, 1982) is an American actress and writer who has become one of the most recognizable faces in contemporary horror cinema. Raised in Silver Spring, Maryland, she graduated from Syracuse University with a BFA in 2004 before launching a career that would quickly intertwine with the genre‑bending vision of director Mike Flanagan, whom she later married. Her early screen work includes a debut in *The Curse of The Black Dahlia* (2007) and a memorable turn in the short film *Knocked Down* (2008), but it was the 2013 psychological thriller *Oculus*—written and directed by Flanagan—that introduced her to a wider audience and earned her the informal title of “scream queen.” Over the following years she expanded her repertoire by co‑writing and starring in the critically acclaimed blind‑heroine thriller *Hush* (2016), and appearing in the supernatural horror *Ouija: Origin of Evil* (2016), both projects that solidified her partnership with Flanagan and highlighted her talent for conveying terror with subtle nuance.

Beyond film, Siegel has become a staple of Netflix’s horror anthology series, delivering a haunting performance as Theodora Crain in *The Haunting of Hill House* (2018) and later reprising a similarly complex role in *The Haunting of Bly Manor* (2020). She continued to explore darker themes in *Midnight Mass* (2021) and *The Fall of the House of Usher* (2023), while also lending her voice to horror podcasts such as *Calling Darkness* and *The NoSleep Podcast*. In 2024 she announced her directorial debut with a segment for *V/H/S/Beyond*, signaling a new creative chapter. Off‑screen, Siegel is openly bisexual, of Russian, Polish, and German Jewish descent, and is the mother of two children with Flanagan, balancing a prolific career with family life and a growing influence as a writer and emerging director.