Performer
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio rank
#1617
of 909177 performers
Top 1%
Tracie Thoms works on versatility rather than volume, and the catalogue keeps proving that the quieter choice was the correct one.
The essay
Our editors on the work, the patterns and the reason this body of work holds together.
Tracie Thoms appears in 13 films in the Nutevio catalogue, and none of them would work the same way without Tracie. The Devil Wears Prada is the clearest case: a film rated 7.7 by our editors, where the performance carries weight the script only implies.
The recognisable elements are versatility, transformation, quiet performance. Watch two of these films back to back and the method separates from the material — the same instrument, tuned differently for comedy, drama, horror. It is a style built on what is withheld as much as what is played.
Working with David Frankel, Chris Rock, Swanthula Boulet and others, Tracie Thoms helped set a standard other performers now audition against. Awards bodies have been slower than the work, which is usually the sign of a career built on choices rather than campaigns.
The Devil Wears Prada (2006) as Lily · Jerry & Marge Go Large (2022) as Maya · The Devil Wears Prada 2 (2026) as Lily
Career snapshot
Ranked #1617 of 909177 performers tracked in the Nutevio library.
Films in Nutevio
13
2006–2026
Career length
20 yrs
Measured across our catalogue
Academy Awards
—
Unknown
Oscar nominations
—
Unknown
Highest Nutevio score
7.7
The Devil Wears Prada
Average Nutevio score
6.3
Across catalogue work
Highest IMDb rating
7.4
The Devil Wears Prada
Most frequent director
David Frankel
3 films together
Longest collaboration
3×
With David Frankel
Most common genre
Comedy
8 titles
Average runtime
1h 48m
Across catalogue work
Golden Globe wins
—
Unknown
Nutevio metric
Ten weighted categories, applied identically to everyone we cover.
Nutevio Performer Score
6.8
out of 10
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio metric
Cultural impact and legacy, measured separately from craft — how far the work travelled once it left the cinema.
Nutevio Influence Score
6.3
out of 10
A quieter influence — felt inside the films rather than across the industry.
How far the work travelled past the people who saw it first.
What survives once the release-week conversation has burned off.
Institutional acknowledgement, weighted but never decisive.
Years of chosen, relevant work rather than years merely employed.
Statuettes, read as evidence rather than verdict.
Roles named without needing the film named alongside them.
Directors who wrote parts because this performer existed.
The reading other performers now have to answer.
Actor DNA
A fingerprint derived from the roles themselves — register, range and the kind of film they carry.
The shape of a career
Every performance plotted in time. Hover a point to read the title behind it.
Peak years
Where the scores, the awards and the sheer volume of work agree with each other.
Best decade
2000s
7.2 average MV
The 2000s are where the work and the material meet. Death Proof, Grindhouse, The Devil Wears Prada — the run our editors reach for first when the argument is about range rather than fame.
Highest average Nutevio score
2000s
7.2
Across 3 catalogue films in this decade, our scores never drop below the level a career is judged on.
Highest average IMDb rating
2000s
7.1
The public agrees most strongly about this stretch — useful context, and occasionally a decade behind our own reading.
Most awarded era
2000s
0 Academy Awards
Statuettes for the films themselves, which is the honest way to read an ensemble career. Death Proof, Grindhouse, The Devil Wears Prada.
Most productive era
2020s
6 films
The busiest stretch of the catalogue — volume that reads as appetite rather than availability.
Range, mapped
Genres down the side, decades across the top. Warmer cells mean stronger titles.
| Genre | 2000s | 2010s | 2020s |
|---|---|---|---|
| Drama | 7.71 film | 6.21 film | 4.93 films |
| Action | 6.92 films | 6.72 films | — |
| Thriller | 6.92 films | 6.72 films | — |
| Comedy | 7.71 film | 6.72 films | 5.75 films |
| Romance | — | — | 6.91 film |
| Horror | 7.01 film | — | 5.31 film |
Chronology
Firsts and peaks
The turning points, in the order they happened.
First film in Nutevio · Highest rated performance · Career peak
Where our catalogue meets this career, as Lily. 7.7 on the Nutevio scale, the top of the catalogue for this performer. Weighing billing against the film's own quality, this is the point where everything aligned at once.
Most recent film
2026Misty Green
The current state of the argument.
Our order
Every performance in the catalogue, ordered by Nutevio Score.
Every title
Filter by genre or decade, and compare any two titles side by side.
13 of 13 films
as Dr. Larson
Directed by Unknown
From the library
Every movie and TV credit stored for this name in the Nutevio catalogue — filter by media, role or sort by rating.
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The defining work
#1
Lily
The Devil Wears Prada (2006)
Performance score7.5
The performance the rest of the career is read through. Lily gives Tracie Thoms a structure to work against, and the film hands over its centre of gravity without hesitation.
View movie#2
Sandra
Boy Genius (2019)
Performance score7.3
Boy Genius asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Sandra is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#3
Lily
The Devil Wears Prada 2 (2026)
Performance score7.2
The Devil Wears Prada 2 asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Lily is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#4
Maya
Jerry & Marge Go Large (2022)
Performance score7.2
Jerry & Marge Go Large asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Maya is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movieStart here
A guided path through the work, ordered so each film explains the next.
Best entry point
as Lily
Start here. The Devil Wears Prada is the clearest statement of what Tracie Thoms does — accessible, 109 minutes, and rated 7.7 by our editors. No context required.
Our editors order this path by accessibility first and chronology second. You meet Tracie at the most legible performance, then move forward in time so each film reads as a response to the one before it rather than a repetition of it.
Boy Genius (2019)
Keeps the comedy register of The Devil Wears Prada but asks for a colder reading of it.
Straight Up (2020)
Same director as Boy Genius, different problem to solve. Watching them in order shows how much of the effect was the collaboration.
Jerry & Marge Go Large (2022)
Keeps the comedy register of Straight Up but asks for a colder reading of it.
The Devil Wears Prada 2 (2026)
Same director as Jerry & Marge Go Large, different problem to solve. Watching them in order shows how much of the effect was the collaboration.
Company kept
The directors and performers this career keeps returning to.
David Frankel
Director
3 films together
Notably The Devil Wears Prada
Quentin Tarantino
Director
2 films together
Notably Grindhouse
Daniel Espinosa
Director
1 film together
Notably Safe House
Rian Johnson
Director
1 film together
Notably Looper
Will Gluck
Director
1 film together
Notably Annie
Miguel Arteta
Director
1 film together
Notably YES DAY
Swanthula Boulet
Director
1 film together
Notably The Boulet Brothers' Holiday of Horrors
Chris Rock
Director
1 film together
Notably Misty Green
Behind the camera
Who casts this performer, how often, and what the pairing produces.
David Frankel
Director
3 films together · 7.5 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 3 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
The Devil Wears PradaQuentin Tarantino
Director
2 films together · 6.9 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 2 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
GrindhouseRian Johnson
Director
1 film together · 6.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
LooperMiguel Arteta
Director
1 film together · 6.7 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
YES DAYDaniel Espinosa
Director
1 film together · 6.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Safe HouseWill Gluck
Director
1 film together · 6.2 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
AnnieSwanthula Boulet
Director
1 film together · 5.3 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Boulet Brothers' Holiday of HorrorsChris Rock
Director
1 film together · 0.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Misty GreenSix degrees
Follow the thread outward — director, film, co-star, and the film after that.
Categories of our own
Six editorial categories we apply to every performer we cover.
Most rewatchable
The Devil Wears Prada
as Lily
The one that survives a fourth viewing. Nothing in the performance depends on surprise, which is why it keeps paying out.
Most emotional performance
Straight Up
as Dr. Larson
Grief played at conversational volume. The film never asks the audience to cry; the performance simply makes it difficult not to.
Most influential performance
The Devil Wears Prada
as Lily
You can hear this reading in other actors' auditions a decade later — the surest measure of influence there is.
Best ensemble performance
Jerry & Marge Go Large
as Maya
Work that makes everyone else in the frame better without ever pulling the camera towards itself.
Career defining performance
The Devil Wears Prada
as Lily
If the career had to be argued in a single scene, our editors would pick one from this film and rest the case.
In their films' words
“You can build a whole film around a performer who knows when not to speak. Tracie Thoms has known it for a long time.”
Head to head
Put two careers on the same scale and see where the argument actually sits.
Ours alone
Recognitions handed out by this desk, on criteria no awards body uses.
Career Achievement
Awarded
20 years of relevant work — not merely a long career, but a long career of choices.
Modern Classic Performer
Awarded
Defining performances delivered inside the last twenty-five years, in films already being taught rather than merely remembered.
Comedy Legend
Awarded
8 catalogue titles in comedy, each one a reference point for the films that followed.
Our desk
Best ending, best opening, best twist and the rest — categories we apply to everyone we cover.
Best ending
The Devil Wears Prada
as Lily
The last five minutes reorganise everything before them, and hold up when you already know what's coming.
Best opening
Grindhouse
as Kim (segment "Death Proof")
A first sequence that states the rules of the film without explaining a single one of them.
Most emotional
Straight Up
as Dr. Larson
The film where the technique steps aside and lets the feeling arrive undefended.
Best twist
Death Proof
as Kim
A reversal earned by information the film gave you and trusted you to misread.
Best visual achievement
Grindhouse
as Kim (segment "Death Proof")
Images that would survive with the sound switched off.
Best action sequence
Death Proof
as Kim
Geography, stakes and consequence held in the same frame — spectacle you can follow.
Best dialogue
Jerry & Marge Go Large
as Maya
Lines written to be spoken, staged so the pauses do half the work.
Most underrated film
The Devil Wears Prada
as Lily
The public vote sits below ours on this one, and the direction is the reason for the gap.
If you like this performer
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Built a career in the same territory: drama and thriller
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Tom Hanks
Built a career in the same territory: family and comedy
Bonnie Hunt
Built a career in the same territory: family and comedy
Cillian Murphy
Built a career in the same territory: drama and thriller
Have your say
Community
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Reference
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