Alexandra Billings

Alexandra Scott Billings (born March 28, 1962) is an American actress, singer, and teacher.

In the early 1980s, Billings worked under the stage name Shanté at the famed Baton Show Lounge in Chicago, Illinois, where she impersonated Barbra Streisand, Judy Garland, and Liza Minnelli.

Winning a series of beauty contests, she was named Miss Wisconsin, Miss New York, Miss Chicago, Miss Illinois, and Miss Florida.

She performed in a pair of Billy Bermingham-written satirical farces at the Torso Theatre during the 1990s titled Shannen Doherty Shoots a Porno: A Shockumentary and Cannibal Cheerleaders on Crack, starring in the latter.

Billings is also a professional singer who performs in theaters and nightclubs throughout the United States.

She also served as a judge of the Miss Continental pageant in 2000 and 2001.

Most of Billings' professional work has been in Chicago theaters, most notably The Bailiwick Theater, Light Opera Works, Court Theatre, and Steppenwolf Theatre.

She has collaborated on plays with such notable authors as Larry Kramer, Tina Landau, and Jamie Pachino.

She has received one Joseph Jefferson Award and five After Dark Awards for her work in Chicago Theatre.

Her one-person autobiographical show toured to Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles and off Broadway.

She is a former artistic associate of About Face Theatre.

She recorded her second CD, The Story Goes On, in 2003.

She was a recipient of the New York MAC Hanson Award for Cabaret Artist of the Year in 2004.

Billings has appeared in an autobiographical show, "S/He and Me".

Billings, a trans woman, played one of TV's first openly transgender characters in 2005 made-for-TV movie Romy and Michele: In the Beginning.

She is also known for portraying the recurring character Davina in the Amazon series Transparent and has played transgender characters in ER, Eli Stone, How to Get Away with Murder, Grey's Anatomy and The Conners.

Billings was born in Illinois into a multiracial family; she is of European American, African American, and Native American ancestry.

Billings's father, Robert Billings, was a music teacher at Los Angeles Harbor College and the musical director for the Los Angeles Civic Light Opera, which influenced her interest in theater.

She assisted, working backstage with Carol Burnett and Yul Brynner.

She also appeared in Jesus Christ Superstar and The Roar of the Greasepaint—the Smell of the Crowd.

In her early adult life, Billings struggled with homelessness and cocaine and opioid addiction, and for a time participated in sex work.

She has appeared in the 2005 made-for-TV movie Romy and Michelle: A New Beginning.

She has also played transgender characters in episodes of Karen Sisco, ER, Eli Stone and Grey's Anatomy.

In 2009, PBS produced and aired a documentary about Billings' life and career, entitled Schoolboy to Showgirl: The Alexandra Billings Story.

In 2010, Billings appeared in the film FAUX, in which she commented on gay marriage spurring the economy.

The character was introduced in an early episode of season one in 2014 as a transgender friend of a recently out trans woman, and appeared throughout the show's run, including in its feature-length finale, Musicale Finale.

In 2015, Billings appeared on season two, episode six of How to Get Away with Murder as Professor Jill Hartford.

In 2017, transgender actors and actresses, including Billings, were part of a film aimed at Hollywood producers, written by Jen Richards, asking for more and improved roles for transgender people.

In fall 2018, she also appeared in The Nap at Manhattan Theatre Club, and is one of the first openly trans people to be cast in a trans role on Broadway.

In 2018, Billings played a recurring role as judge Martha Wallace in the second season of Goliath.

Billings received wider recognition for her role as Davina in the Amazon series Transparent.

In September 2019, it was announced that Billings would play the role of Madame Morrible in the Broadway musical Wicked.

She is the first openly transgender person to star in the show.

After the closure of Broadway during the COVID-19 pandemic, Billings appeared with several other performers on Good Morning America in fall 2021 to announce the return of several shows to Broadway, including Wicked.

Billings resumed performing the role of Morrible when Wicked reopened on Broadway on September 14, 2021, and stayed in the show until 2023.

From 2020, Billings appeared in a recurring role as Robin, a transgender supervisor at Wellman Plastics and mentor to Darlene Conner on ABC's The Conners.

She had a recurring role as Inspector Ainsley Lowbeer in the 2022 Amazon Prime Video science fiction series The Peripheral.

She appeared in the 2023 film Queen Tut, for which she received a Canadian Screen Award nomination for Best Lead Performance in a Comedy Film at the 12th Canadian Screen Awards in 2024.

She has taught Viewpoints, a theater method, at the Steppenwolf Summer School.

She also taught at Lewis University, The University of Chicago, University of Illinois, the Illinois Theatre Convention, Act One Studios, and classes and workshops around the Chicago area, as well as the Steppenwolf School West in Los Angeles California.