“I always want comedy to be the focus of my work, because it’s the thing I feel most connected to.”

Ella Stiller

After discovering a knack for comedy at Juilliard, Ben Stiller’s 23-year-old daughter is now starring alongside Lisa Kudrow in the third and final season of The Comeback

By Paulina Prosnitz

In her first year at Juilliard, in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic in 2020, Ella Stiller auditioned for the part of Lady Percy in the school’s production of Henry IV. She was cast instead as Falstaff, Prince Hal’s buffoonish companion. “I was humiliated,” says Stiller, who was 19 at the time. “I cried when I found out I had to do it…. All I wanted was to feel cool and sexy and like I’m becoming a woman. And they cast me as the ugly, old, drunk, fat guy.”

It’s not surprising that, as the daughter of actors Ben Stiller (Zoolander, Meet the Parents) and Christine Taylor (Dodgeball, The Wedding Singer), she found herself—however unwillingly—in a humorous role. Despite her initial distress, the actress eventually embraced her talents, becoming “the token comedian” of her Juilliard class. “I [felt] so proud of that. [I realized] I always want comedy to be the focus of my work, because it’s the thing I feel most connected to.”