Lorraine Toussaint

Lorraine Toussaint ( born April 4, 1960) is a Trinidadian-American actress. She is the recipient of various accolades, including a Black Reel Award, a Critics' Choice Television Award and a Screen Actors Guild Award.

Toussaint began her career in theatre, before supporting performances in films such as ''Breaking In'' (1989), ''Hudson Hawk'' (1991), and ''Dangerous Minds'' (1995). As lead actress, she is best known for her role as Rene Jackson in the critically acclaimed Lifetime television drama series ''Any Day Now'', from 1998 to 2002, and her recurring role as defense attorney Shambala Green in the NBC legal drama ''Law & Order''. She later appeared as a regular cast member in the NBC police procedural ''Crossing Jordan'' (2002–03) and the TNT crime drama ''Saving Grace'' (2007–10).

Toussaint received critical acclaim and an Independent Spirit Award nomination for her performance in the 2012 drama film ''Middle of Nowhere'', written and directed by Ava DuVernay. In 2014, she played the role of Yvonne "Vee" Parker, the main antagonist in the second season of the Netflix comedy-drama series ''Orange Is the New Black'', for which she received critical acclaim and a Critics' Choice Television Award for Best Supporting Actress in a Drama Series. She also played the role of Amelia Boynton Robinson in the 2014 historical drama film ''Selma'', directed by Ava DuVernay. Toussaint later co-starred in the ABC fantasy-drama series ''Forever'' (2014–15), the Fox comedy-drama ''Rosewood'' (2015–17), the AMC drama ''Into the Badlands'' (2018–19), NBC drama ''The Village'' (2019) and CBS crime drama ''The Equalizer'' (2021–present). Additionally, she appeared in films ''Fast Color'' (2018), ''Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark'' (2019), ''The Glorias'' (2020) and ''Concrete Cowboy'' (2020). Provided by Wikipedia