Background and career
Kathryn Felicia Day (born June 28, 1979) is an American actress, singer, writer, and web series creator. She is the creator and star of the web series The Guild (2007–2013), a show loosely based on her life as a gamer. She also wrote and starred in the Dragon Age web series Dragon Age: Redemption (2011). She is a founder of the online media company Geek & Sundry, best known for hosting the show Critical Role between 2015 and 2019. Day was a member of the board of directors of the International Academy of Web Television from December 2009 until August 2012. On television, Day has played Vi in the series Buffy the Vampire Slayer (2003) and Dr. Holly Marten in Eureka (2011), and had a recurring role as Charlie Bradbury on Supernatural (2012–2015, 2018–2020). She has also acted in films such as Bring It On Again (2004), as well as the Internet musical Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog (2008). In April 2017, she began appearing as Kinga Forrester in Mystery Science Theater 3000.
Day was born in Huntsville, Alabama. She began her acting career at the age of seven when she starred as Scout in a local production of To Kill a Mockingbird. She studied operatic singing and ballet professionally, performing at concerts and competitions nationwide. Home-schooled throughout much of her childhood, she began college at the age of sixteen. She was a National Merit Scholar (1995) and graduated as valedictorian of her class. An accomplished violinist, Day was accepted to the Juilliard School of Music but chose to attend the University of Texas at Austin on a full scholarship in violin performance. She double majored in mathematics and music performance, and graduated at the age of nineteen in the top 4% of her class. She is also an avid player of a wide variety of video game genres. Much of her work on The Guild web series was based on her personal experience with video games, especially when she played World of Warcraft.
After graduation, Day moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career in acting. She landed several roles in various short and independent films as well as commercials and guest spots on television shows, including Undeclared and Maybe It's Me. These parts propelled her to larger roles: a part in the film Bring It On Again, the starring role in June, and a recurring guest spot as potential Slayer Vi on television's Buffy the Vampire Slayer, a recurring role that is still occasionally used in that show's eighth season comic book series. In HBO's 2005 biopic of Franklin D. Roosevelt, Warm Springs, Day's singing was featured when her wheelchair-using character serenaded a dinner group with "I Won't Dance".
Day is the creator, writer, and star of The Guild, a web series which aired from 2007 to 2013 and explored the MMORPG gaming subculture. The first season was primarily hosted on YouTube, where it garnered millions of views. Its second season premiered on Microsoft's three major video channels, Xbox Live, MSN Video and The Zune Marketplace, after Microsoft made a deal with The Guild, allowing Day, her cast and her crew to be paid for their work. Day also created a song and music video called "(Do You Wanna Date My) Avatar", featuring the cast dressed up as their in-game personae. The final moments of the music video itself also detailed that the release date for the third season of Day's The Guild would be August 25, 2009. A second song and Bollywood style video "Game On" was released prior to the premiere of the fourth season of The Guild. A third and final music video, called "I'm the One That's Cool", features the members of the cast in the guise of an alternative band performing at a local venue, intercut with scenes of the cast as younger versions of their characters experiencing bullying at the hands of "cooler" and more popular kids while at school.
The Guild has won multiple awards, including the Greenlight Award for Best Original Digital Series Production at the South by Southwest festivals, several IAWTV Awards, including Best Comedy Series, the YouTube Video Award for Best Series, the Yahoo! Video Award for Best Series, and 2009 Streamy Awards for Best Comedy Web Series, Best Female Actor in a Comedy Web Series, and Best Ensemble Cast in a Web Series.
In March 2012, Day announced that she would be launching a premium YouTube channel, "Geek & Sundry", on April 2. Geek & Sundry took over production of The Guild for Season 6. Day hosted several shows on Geek & Sundry, most notably The Flog, Vaginal Fantasy, Felicia's Ark, and Co-Optitude (which co-stars Felicia's brother Ryon Day.) In 2012, Day created the web series Tabletop with Wil Wheaton. She was an executive producer for the series and appeared regularly as a guest. In the same vein, in 2015, she suggested to the original cast of Critical Role to begin streaming their tabletop home game as a show. In 2013, Geek & Sundry and Atlas Games worked together to release a promotional pack for the card game Gloom for TableTop Day 2013 with a Felicia Day, Guild Goddess card. In August 2014, Geek and Sundry was acquired by Legendary to produce content alongside of Chris Hardwick's Nerdist Industries, with Day retaining creative control. On January 11, 2016, Chinese conglomerate Wanda Group announced that it concluded an agreement with shareholders to acquire Legendary Entertainment for $3.5 billion. In 2016, Day left Geek & Sundry after growing "fatigued in a less creative, more managerial role in the company". Day said "I gave it my heart and my soul. When I realized I had given as much as I could, I needed to move on".
