Laura Slade Wiggins
Laura Slade Wiggins is an American actress and singer. Wiggins began her career with guest appearances on television series such as CSI: Crime Scene Investigation and Private Practice before her breakthrough role as the self-destructive teenager Karen Jackson on the television series Shameless from 2011 to 2013, appearing as a part of the main cast in seasons one and two, and a recurring role in season three.
Following Shameless, Wiggins notably had a recurring role on the science fiction television series The Tomorrow People. In film, Wiggins has appeared in Starving in Suburbia, 20th Century Women, Rings, Nancy Drew and the Hidden Staircase, and Stand!. As a singer, Wiggins made her debut with the EP Clementine.
Early life
Wiggins is the daughter of Kathy Wiggins and prominent Athens attorney Mark Wiggins. She has one brother.Career
She has guest starred in various shows including Eleventh Hour, and in an episode of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation titled "World's End". She also played a pregnant teenager in an episode of the fourth season of Private Practice called "The Hardest Part". She had a recurring role in the 2013 series The Tomorrow People. From 2011 to 2013, Wiggins appeared in her first significant role as a series regular in the Showtime black comedy series Shameless as the troubled promiscuous teenager Karen Jackson, the daughter to agoraphobic Sheila and a love interest to Lip Gallagher. Wiggins was a part of the main cast in seasons one and two, and had a recurring role in season three. On the frequent nudity featured throughout Shameless and Karen’s promiscuous characterization, Wiggins stated, “One of the things I like about Shameless is that the women are extremely sexual and up front with their emotions.”In 2012, Wiggins was cast as the co-lead in William D. MacGillivray’s coming of age drama film Hard Drive, which premiered in 2014. She portrays Debs, a runaway harboring a secret past. Wiggins subsequently had a leading role as a girl struggling with an eating disorder in the Lifetime television film Starving in Suburbia.
In 2014, Wiggins appeared in the Law & Order: Special Victims Unit episode "Comic Perversion" as Carly Rydell. In 2017, Wiggins appeared in the horror film Rings, the third installment of the Ring franchise. In 2019, she played a supporting role in the Nancy Drew and the Hidden Staircase.
Wiggins had a leading role as Rebecca Almazoff in the Canadian musical film Stand!, a film adaptation of the stage musical Strike!. On the film’s themes, Wiggins stated, "The story is very much needed in the States right now because we’re really having a hard time understanding that we were all immigrants once. We have this immigrant-phobia now. This story is about how all people should be treated the way you would want to be treated." Neil Weisensel of The Globe and Mail praised Wiggins' performance in a "complex ingenue role."