Bianca Amato

Bianca Amato is a South African actress known for her work in American theatre, as a prolific audiobook performer and for her portrayal of Philippa De Villiers in the original cast of the South African soap opera Isidingo.

Career Amato was a member of the original cast of the long running South African soap opera Isidingo, portraying Philippa De Villiers from 1998 to 2001. The character's relationship with mine manager Derek Nyathi (Hlomla Dandala) featured the first interracial kiss, and was the first interracial romance, to be depicted on South African television. The storyline has been described as "groundbreaking and big news in post apartheid South African television". Of the experience Amato said, "It was wonderful to be part of the slow but healthy process that shifted people's attitudes." In 2015, Amato portrayed Delia Alexander in the 2015 PlayStation Network series Powers.

Amato appeared in the original Broadway production of Tom Stoppard's Tony Award-winning trio of plays The Coast of Utopia (2006–07), as well as the 2013–14 Broadway revival of Shakespeare's Macbeth. She also understudied the roles of Hannah Jarvis and Lady Croom in the 2011 Broadway revival of Stoppard's Arcadia. Off-Broadway, Amato has appeared in Bill Irwin's Mr. Fox: A Rumination (2004), and as Emma in Trumpery (2007). She later costarred as Calantha in The Broken Heart in 2012, and played the leading role of Olga Knipper in Neva in 2013. Amato also starred as Amanda in a production of Noël Coward's Private Lives directed by Maria Aitken, first presented in 2012 at the Huntington Theatre Company in Boston, and again in 2014 at the Shakespeare Theatre Company's Lansburgh Theatre in Washington, D. C. In 2014 she also portrayed Regan in the Theatre for a New Audience production of King Lear in New York.

Amato has narrated over 40 audiobooks, She also voiced the 2006 gothic novel The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield, which had risen to No. 1 on The New York Times Best Seller list in its second week of publication.

Television Year Project Role Notes 1996 The Adventures of Sinbad Casendra Episode: "The Village Vanishes" (season 1) 2023 Classified Marsha Brock (4) episodes

Film Year Project Role 2020 The Kissing Booth 3 Linda 2026 How to Make a Killing Cassandra Longfellow

Theatre Year Production Role Notes 2003 Top Girls Marlene Guthrie Theater, Minneapolis, MN 2006–07 The Coast of Utopia (Part 1: Voyage) Miss Chamberlain Vivian Beaumont Theater (Broadway) 2010 The Taming of the Shrew Katharina Chicago Shakespeare Theater (Courtyard Theater, Chicago, IL) 2012 The Broken Heart Calantha Theatre for a New Audience (The Duke on 42nd Street, Off-Broadway) 2013 Neva Olga Knipper Joseph Papp Public Theater (Anspacher Theater, Off-Broadway) 2014 Shakespeare at Fenway Beatrice/Much Ado About Nothing Commonwealth Shakespeare Company (Fenway Park, Boston, MA) 2016Stupid Fucking Bird Emma Arkadina (The Seagull) Pearl Theatre, Manhattan

Audiobooks Year Title Author Notes 2004 The Queen's Fool Philippa Gregory Novel originally printed in 2003 2006 Listening for Lions Gloria Whelan AudioFile Earphones Award, Audie Award; Novel originally printed in 2005 2006 The Boleyn Inheritance Philippa Gregory Abridged (2006) and unabridged (2011) versions 2006 Swan Town Michael Ortiz 2007 The Thirteenth Tale Diane Setterfield Novel originally printed in 2006 2007 A Dangerous Beauty Sophia Nash 2008 The Other Queen Philippa Gregory Abridged version 2008 Sovay Celia Rees 2009 Saturn's Children Charles Stross Novel originally printed in 2008 2009 Her Fearful Symmetry Audrey Niffenegger 2009 The Secret Diaries of Charlotte Brontë Syrie James AudioFile Earphones Award, Audie Award 2010 The Red Queen Philippa Gregory AudioFile Earphones Award 2010 Dracula in Love Karen Essex AudioFile Earphones Award 2011 The Lady of the Rivers Philippa Gregory AudioFile Earphones Award 2011 Death in the Floating City Tasha Alexander 2011 The Women of the Cousins' War Philippa Gregory David Baldwin Michael Jones Non-fiction 2011 Cocktail Hour Under the Tree of Forgetfulness Alexandra Fuller 2011 Steamed Katie MacAlister 2011 Cartwheeling in Thunderstorms Katherine Rundell 2012 The Kingmaker's Daughter Philippa Gregory AudioFile Earphones Award 2012 Changeling Philippa Gregory 2013 The White Princess Philippa Gregory AudioFile Earphones Award 2013 Behind the Shattered Glass Tasha Alexander 2014 The King's Curse Philippa Gregory AudioFile Earphones Award 2014 The Counterfeit Heiress Tasha Alexander 2014 Midnight Thief Livia Blackburne 2015 The Taming of the Queen Philippa Gregory AudioFile Earphones Award 2015 A School for Brides Patrice Kindl 2016 Three Sisters, Three Queens Philippa Gregory 2017 The Last Tudor Philippa Gregory AudioFile Earphones Award 2017 Death in St. Petersburg Tasha Alexander 2018 Uneasy Lies the Crown Tasha Alexander 2019 In the Shadow of Vesuvius Tasha Alexander 2020 Afterland Lauren Beukes 2020 A Pinch of Magic Michelle Harrison 2021 The Joy and Light Bus Company Alexander McCall Smith The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency #22 2024 The Great Hippopotamus Hotel Alexander McCall Smith The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency #25 2025 In the Time of Five Pumpkins Alexander McCall Smith The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency #26

Acclaim Charles Isherwood of The New York Times wrote in his review of 2012's The Broken Heart that "Amato exudes imperial grandeur as Calantha",