Kirby Enthusiasm

From BARRY to THE GOOD PLACE to the upcoming VERONICA MARS revival, this British actress is making a serious invasion.

- Derek Lawrence

Kirby Howell-Baptiste is in a good place—and not just the show. In 2018, the 31-year-old London native was virtually impossible to miss if you had a television, achieving a feat that no one else in Hollywood could claim: simultaneously costarring on three of the year’s most acclaimed shows.

“It’s quite surreal now when I look back,” she says of appearing on three Golden Globe- and Emmy-nominated series—the BBC America thriller Killing Eve, the HBO hitman dramedy Barry, and NBC’s philosophically bent sitcom The Good Place. “There was no thought in my mind that I was strategically going to be on the best shows. I was picking roles that I would enjoy playing and watching.”

To audiences, it may seem like Howell- Baptiste came out of nowhere to dominate their TV screens, but she dismisses the notion of overnight success. “There’s years and years of hard work, rejection, and gritting your teeth that have come before the final product, which is getting to be on cool shows!”