 natasha bianca lyonne braunstein (born april 4, 1979), better known as natasha lyonne, is an american actress. she is best known for her role as jessica in the american pie series and her appearances in the films everyone says i love you, slums of beverly hills, but i'm a cheerleader, and blade: trinity. she currently portrays nicky nichols in the netflix series orange is the new black, for which she received a nomination for the 2014 primetime emmy award for outstanding guest actress in a comedy series. ==early life== lyonne was born in new york city, new york, the daughter of ivette braunstein (nÃ©e buchinger) and aaron braunstein, a boxing promoter and radio host, who was distantly related to cartoonist al jaffee. lyonne's mother was born in france; both of lyonne's maternal grandparents were holocaust survivors. lyonne sometimes darkly jokes that her family consists of "my father's side, flatbush, and my mother's side, auschwitz." her grandmother ella came from a large jewish hungarian family but only she and her two sisters and two brothers 
1979_births 20th-century_American_actresses 21st-century_American_actresses Actresses_from_New_York_City American_child_actresses American_emigrants_to_Israel American_film_actresses American_people_of_Hungarian-Jewish_descent American_television_actresses American_voice_actresses Jewish_American_actresses Living_people People_from_Manhattan Ramaz_School_alumni