Performer
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio rank
#256
of 909177 performers
Top 1%
Kristen Schaal represents the rare performer whose career became more ambitious with every decade — 25 years in, and Kristen is still choosing the harder script.
The essay
Our editors on the work, the patterns and the reason this body of work holds together.
Kristen Schaal appears in 33 films in the Nutevio catalogue, and none of them would work the same way without Kristen. Toy Story 5 is the clearest case: a film rated 8.2 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 animation, family, comedy. It is a style built on what is withheld as much as what is played.
Working with Andrew Stanton, Peter Segal, Jared Hess and others, Kristen Schaal 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.
Toy Story 5 (2026) as Trixie (voice) · Toy Story 3 (2010) as Trixie (voice) · Toy Story 4 (2019) as Trixie (voice)
Career snapshot
Ranked #256 of 909177 performers tracked in the Nutevio library.
Films in Nutevio
33
2001–2026
Career length
25 yrs
Measured across our catalogue
Academy Awards
—
Unknown
Oscar nominations
—
Unknown
Highest Nutevio score
8.2
Toy Story 5
Average Nutevio score
6.5
Across catalogue work
Highest IMDb rating
7.8
Toy Story 3
Most frequent director
Andrew Stanton
2 films together
Longest collaboration
2×
With Andrew Stanton
Most common genre
Comedy
30 titles
Average runtime
1h 30m
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
6.5
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
2020s
6.9 average MV
The 2020s are where the work and the material meet. Toy Story 5, Toy Story 5, My Spy The Eternal City — the run our editors reach for first when the argument is about range rather than fame.
Highest average Nutevio score
2020s
6.9
Across 8 catalogue films in this decade, our scores never drop below the level a career is judged on.
Highest average IMDb rating
2020s
6.9
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. Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant, The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard, Norbit.
Most productive era
2010s
21 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 | — | 6.03 films | — |
| Action | 5.91 film | — | 6.72 films |
| Thriller | 5.91 film | — | — |
| Comedy | 5.83 films | 6.421 films | 7.06 films |
| Crime | — | — | 6.91 film |
| Romance | 6.41 film | 6.03 films | — |
| Horror | — | 6.71 film | — |
Chronology
Firsts and peaks
The turning points, in the order they happened.
First film in Nutevio
2001Kate & Leopold
Where our catalogue meets this career, as Miss Tree.
Highest rated performance · Career peak
2026Toy Story 5
8.2 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
2026Toy Story 5
The current state of the argument, as Trixie (voice).
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.
33 of 33 films
as Trixie (voice)
Directed by Andrew Stanton
as Trixie (voice)
Directed by Lee Unkrich
as Trixie (voice)
Directed by Steve Purcell
as Trixie (voice)
Directed by Josh Cooley
as Louise Belcher (voice)
Directed by Loren Bouchard
From the library
Every movie and TV credit stored for this name in the Nutevio catalogue — filter by media, role or sort by rating.
Showing 24 of 51 titles · 52 total credits · active 2001–2026
Toy Story 5
2026 · Trixie (voice)
President Curtis
2026 · TV · Amelia Earhart (voice)
Hollywood Squares
2025 · TV · Self
My Spy The Eternal City
2024 · Bobbi
Thelma the Unicorn
2024 · Goat Girl (voice)
St. Denis Medical
2024 · TV · Ashley
The Muppets Mayhem
2023 · TV · Jenny Henderson
The Bob's Burgers Movie
2022 · Louise Belcher (voice)
Chibiverse
2022 · TV · Mabel Pines (voice)
Our Flag Means Death
2022 · TV · Antoinette
Seal Team
2021 · Beth (voice)
The Mysterious Benedict Society
2021 · TV · Number Two
My Spy
2020 · Bobbi
Bill & Ted Face the Music
2020 · Kelly
Toy Story 4
2019 · Trixie (voice)
Scooby-Doo and Guess Who?
2019 · TV · Kristen Schaal (voice)
What We Do in the Shadows
2019 · TV · Floating Woman / The Guide
Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie
2017 · Edith (voice)
All Nighter
2017 · Roberta
The Boss
2016 · Scout Leader Sandy
A Walk in the Woods
2015 · Mary Ellen
The Last Man on Earth
2015 · TV · Carol Pilbasian · Director
Toy Story That Time Forgot
2014 · Trixie (voice)
BoJack Horseman
2014 · TV · Sarah Lynn (voice)
The defining work
#1
Trixie (voice)
Toy Story 5 (2026)
Performance score7.9
The performance the rest of the career is read through. Trixie (voice) gives Kristen Schaal a structure to work against, and the film hands over its centre of gravity without hesitation.
View movie#2
Trixie (voice)
Toy Story 3 (2010)
Performance score7.8
Toy Story 3 asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Trixie (voice) is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#3
Trixie (voice)
Toy Story That Time Forgot (2014)
Performance score7.7
Toy Story That Time Forgot asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Trixie (voice) is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#4
Trixie (voice)
Toy Story 4 (2019)
Performance score7.5
Toy Story 4 asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Trixie (voice) 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 Trixie (voice)
Start here. Toy Story 5 is the clearest statement of what Kristen Schaal does — accessible, 100 minutes, and rated 8.2 by our editors. No context required.
Our editors order this path by accessibility first and chronology second. You meet Kristen 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.
Toy Story 3 (2010)
Keeps the comedy register of Toy Story 5 but asks for a colder reading of it.
Toy Story That Time Forgot (2014)
Keeps the comedy register of Toy Story 3 but asks for a colder reading of it.
Toy Story 4 (2019)
Keeps the comedy register of Toy Story That Time Forgot but asks for a colder reading of it.
The Bob's Burgers Movie (2022)
Keeps the comedy register of Toy Story 4 but asks for a colder reading of it.
Company kept
The directors and performers this career keeps returning to.
Peter Segal
Director
2 films together
Notably My Spy
Andrew Stanton
Director
2 films together
Notably Toy Story 5
James Mangold
Director
1 film together
Notably Kate & Leopold
Brian Robbins
Director
1 film together
Notably Norbit
Neal Brennan
Director
1 film together
Notably The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard
Paul Weitz
Director
1 film together
Notably Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant
Mark Steven Johnson
Director
1 film together
Notably When in Rome
Nanette Burstein
Director
1 film together
Notably Going the Distance
Gary Trousdale
Director
1 film together
Notably Scared Shrekless
Nicholas Stoller
Director
1 film together
Notably Get Him to the Greek
Mike Mitchell
Director
1 film together
Notably Shrek Forever After
Jay Roach
Director
1 film together
Notably Dinner for Schmucks
Garry Marshall
Director
1 film together
Notably Valentine's Day
Lee Unkrich
Director
1 film together
Notably Toy Story 3
James Bobin
Director
1 film together
Notably The Muppets
Jim Field Smith
Director
1 film together
Notably Butter
Cody Cameron
Director
1 film together
Notably Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2
Chris Renaud
Director
1 film together
Notably Despicable Me 2
Steve Purcell
Director
1 film together
Notably Toy Story That Time Forgot
Ken Kwapis
Director
1 film together
Notably A Walk in the Woods
Ben Falcone
Director
1 film together
Notably The Boss
Josh Cooley
Director
1 film together
Notably Toy Story 4
Dean Parisot
Director
1 film together
Notably Bill & Ted Face the Music
Loren Bouchard
Director
1 film together
Notably The Bob's Burgers Movie
Jared Hess
Director
1 film together
Notably Thelma the Unicorn
Tom Hanks
Actor
1 film together
Notably Toy Story 5
Tim Allen
Actor
1 film together
Notably Toy Story 5
Joan Cusack
Actor
1 film together
Notably Toy Story 5
Greta Lee
Actor
1 film together
Notably Toy Story 5
Conan O'Brien
Actor
1 film together
Notably Toy Story 5
Craig Robinson
Actor
1 film together
Notably Toy Story 5
Shelby Rabara
Actor
1 film together
Notably Toy Story 5
Tony Hale
Actor
1 film together
Notably Toy Story 5
Scarlett Spears
Actor
1 film together
Notably Toy Story 5
Jay Hernandez
Actor
1 film together
Notably Toy Story 5
Lori Alan
Actor
1 film together
Notably Toy Story 5
Bonnie Hunt
Actor
1 film together
Notably Toy Story 5
Behind the camera
Who casts this performer, how often, and what the pairing produces.
Andrew Stanton
Director
2 films together · 7.8 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 2 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
Toy Story 5Peter Segal
Director
2 films together · 6.7 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 2 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
My SpyLee Unkrich
Director
1 film together · 8.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Toy Story 3Josh Cooley
Director
1 film together · 7.7 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Toy Story 4Steve Purcell
Director
1 film together · 7.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Toy Story That Time ForgotChris Renaud
Director
1 film together · 7.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Despicable Me 2Jared Hess
Director
1 film together · 6.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Thelma the UnicornLoren Bouchard
Director
1 film together · 6.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Bob's Burgers MovieJames Bobin
Director
1 film together · 6.7 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The MuppetsGary Trousdale
Director
1 film together · 6.7 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Scared ShreklessCody Cameron
Director
1 film together · 6.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2Mike Mitchell
Director
1 film together · 6.4 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Shrek Forever AfterJames Mangold
Director
1 film together · 6.4 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Kate & LeopoldKen Kwapis
Director
1 film together · 6.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
A Walk in the WoodsNanette Burstein
Director
1 film together · 6.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Going the DistanceNicholas Stoller
Director
1 film together · 6.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Get Him to the GreekDean Parisot
Director
1 film together · 5.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Bill & Ted Face the MusicJim Field Smith
Director
1 film together · 5.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
ButterGarry Marshall
Director
1 film together · 5.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Valentine's DayMark Steven Johnson
Director
1 film together · 5.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
When in RomePaul Weitz
Director
1 film together · 5.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's AssistantBen Falcone
Director
1 film together · 5.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The BossJay Roach
Director
1 film together · 5.7 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Dinner for SchmucksBrian Robbins
Director
1 film together · 5.7 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
NorbitNeal Brennan
Director
1 film together · 5.4 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Goods: Live Hard, Sell HardSix 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
Toy Story 5
as Trixie (voice)
The one that survives a fourth viewing. Nothing in the performance depends on surprise, which is why it keeps paying out.
Most emotional performance
Toy Story 5
as Trixie (voice)
Grief played at conversational volume. The film never asks the audience to cry; the performance simply makes it difficult not to.
Most influential performance
Toy Story 3
as Trixie (voice)
You can hear this reading in other actors' auditions a decade later — the surest measure of influence there is.
Best ensemble performance
Get Him to the Greek
as Today Show Production Assistant
Work that makes everyone else in the frame better without ever pulling the camera towards itself.
Career defining performance
Toy Story 5
as Trixie (voice)
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. Kristen Schaal has known it for a long time.”
Head to head
Put two careers on the same scale and see where the argument actually sits.
| Nutevio Performer Score | 7.3 | 8.6 |
|---|---|---|
| Career ranking | #655 of 681 | #9 of 681 |
| Awards on file | Unknown | 3 recorded |
| Oscar wins | Unknown | 2 |
| Oscar nominations | Unknown | 6 |
| Average Nutevio score | 8.2 | 8.6 |
| Genres | Animation, Family, Comedy | Animation, Family, Comedy, Drama |
| Directors | Andrew Stanton | Andrew Stanton, Frank Darabont |
| Performance DNA | Emotional range, Comedy, Quiet performance | Emotional range, Quiet performance, Screen presence |
| Career timeline | 2026–2026 | 1999–2026 |
| Most iconic role | Trixie (voice) — Toy Story 5 | Paul Edgecomb — The Green Mile |
| Most rewatchable film | Toy Story 5 | The Green Mile |
| Filmography | 1 catalogue film | 2 catalogue films |
Films together
Toy Story 5
Shared directors
andrew-stanton
Shared collections
Animation Movies, Comedy Movies
Collaborators in common
Andrew Stanton · Tim Allen · Joan Cusack · Greta Lee · Conan O'Brien · Craig Robinson · Shelby Rabara · Tony Hale
Tom Hanks edges ahead here — a higher floor across a comparable body of work.
Ours alone
Recognitions handed out by this desk, on criteria no awards body uses.
Career Achievement
Awarded
25 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
30 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
Toy Story 5
as Trixie (voice)
The last five minutes reorganise everything before them, and hold up when you already know what's coming.
Best opening
The Bob's Burgers Movie
as Louise Belcher (voice)
A first sequence that states the rules of the film without explaining a single one of them.
Most emotional
Thelma the Unicorn
as Goat Girl (voice)
The film where the technique steps aside and lets the feeling arrive undefended.
Best twist
The Bob's Burgers Movie
as Louise Belcher (voice)
A reversal earned by information the film gave you and trusted you to misread.
Best visual achievement
Toy Story 5
as Trixie (voice)
Images that would survive with the sound switched off.
Best action sequence
Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant
as Gertha Teeth
Geography, stakes and consequence held in the same frame — spectacle you can follow.
Best dialogue
The Muppets
as Moderator
Lines written to be spoken, staged so the pauses do half the work.
Most underrated film
Toy Story 5
as Trixie (voice)
The public vote sits below ours on this one, and the direction is the reason for the gap.
Across the library
Every Nutevio collection this name turns up in, and how high they rank there.
Collection footprint
Appears in 2 Nutevio collections
Keep reading
From the magazine
If you like this performer
Tom Hanks
Works with the same directors — shared collaborators
Bonnie Hunt
Works with the same directors — shared collaborators
Michael Caine
Built a career in the same territory: adventure and drama
Matt Damon
Built a career in the same territory: adventure and drama
Morgan Freeman
Built a career in the same territory: action and crime
Jamie Harris
Built a career in the same territory: adventure and drama
Have your say
Community
Which Kristen Schaal performance holds up best?
Our readers argue about this one. Make your case, or read the ranked debate already in progress.
Join the conversation
Reference
Continue exploring
Trending performers
Directors they work with
Collections to read next
