Kiernan Brennan Shipka (born November 10, 1999 in Chicago, Illinois) is an American actress.
Shipka's first major role in film and television was that of Sally Draper —daughter of Jon Hamm's Don— on the AMC series Mad Men, which she portrayed for close to a decade until its conclusion in 2015.
In addition to her onscreen career, Shipka is notable for a number of voice acting roles, namely as Jinora in The Legend of Korra, Oona in Sofia the First, and Marvel Comics character Spider-Woman in the Avengers Academy mobile game.
She also portrayed Cathy Dollanganger in Lifetime's 2014 adaptation of the controversial novel Flowers in the Attic.
In 2017, Shipka was cast as the classic Archie Comics character Sabrina the Teenage Witch for Netflix's adaptation of the Chilling Adventures of Sabrina comic book series.
Selected filmography:
- Mad Men (2007 — 2015) as Sally Draper
- Carriers (2009) as Jodie
- Cats & Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore (2010) as Little Girl
- Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23 (2012) as herself
- The Legend of Korra (2012 - 2014) as Jinora (voice)
- Sofia the First (2013 - 2018) as Oona (voice)
- Flowers in the Attic (2014) as Cathy Dollanganger
- When Marnie Was There (2014; English dub) as Marnie
- Avengers Academy (2016) as Jessica Drew / Spider-Woman (voice)
- Feud: Betty & Joan (2017) as B. D. Hyman
- Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (2018 — 2020) as Sabrina Spellman
- Riverdale (2021)
- Let It Snow (2019) as The Duke (Angie)
- White House Plumbers (2023) as Kevan Hunt
- Totally Killer (2023) as Jamie Hughes
Tropes associated with her work:
- Acting in the Dark: As she was so young in the first few seasons of Mad Men (she was six in Season 1), she had no idea what the show was even about, and didn't watch it until she was into her teens.
- Actor-Shared Background: She loves ballet, just like Cathy in Flowers in the Attic.
- Adaptational Modesty: In Flowers in the Attic, she's wearing clothes or underwear for all of the scenes where Cathy was nude in the book, most likely because she was actually fourteen at the time.
- The Cast Show Off: She's demonstrated her singing in Family Guy and Sabrina.
- Contractual Purity: Inverted! She's been attached to so many dark roles like Mad Men, Flowers in the Attic and Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, it's rare to see her doing anything remotely light.
- Dawson Casting:
- Downplayed in Chilling Adventures of Sabrina. She was eighteen playing Sabrina at sixteen. It makes her the first teenage actor to actually play the character.
- Averted for Flowers in the Attic; she was fourteen, the same age as her character Cathy.
- Dyeing for Your Art: Although she's a natural blonde, she had long brown hair when auditioning for Chilling Adventures of Sabrina. She went back blonde and bobbed her hair to match how Sabrina looks in the comics; however, from the second half of the first season on, she wore a platinum blonde wig.
- The Fashionista: Is known for her love of fashion.
- Lost in Character: This apparently happened a lot while filming Flowers in the Attic, particularly in scenes with Ellen Burstyn.
- The Other Darrin: For the Petals on the Wind adaptation, Cathy is now played by Rose McIver, due to Kiernan being too young to play her as an adult.
- Promoted to Opening Titles: She was a guest star in Mad Men until Season 4, when she was upgraded.
- Serendipity Writes the Plot: Salem has less of a presence on Chilling Adventures of Sabrina than in the comics or the previous adaptations, because Kiernan is allergic to cats. They briefly considered giving him an Adaptation Species Change to a dog.
- Star-Making Role: Before Mad Men she mainly did commercials, uncredited roles and small parts.
- Tomboyish Name: Kiernan is traditionally a boys' name and literally translates as "son of a lord".
- Typecasting: Amusingly enough she's ended up in a lot of 1950s and 60s period pieces. Chilling Adventures of Sabrina may also count, as it's in an Ambiguous Time Period while also being a Genre Throwback to 60s and 70s Folk Horror.
- Underage Casting: In Feud, she was seventeen playing BD well into her twenties.
