Ella Scott Lynch is an Australian actor. Her notable roles include as lawyer Erin O'Shaughnessy in Crownies and its sequel Janet King, Shirley Ryan in the series Love Child, and Melbourne gangland barrister Nicola Gobbo in the Channel Nine mini-series Informer 3838.
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Early life and education
Ella Scott Lynch was born in Sydney's inner western suburbs, to arts executive Michael Lynch and Oscar-nominated film producer, Jane Scott. She attended St Catherine's School, Waverley, in Sydney. While having previously worked on some of her mother's films, it wasn't until after she completed high school, and spent a gap year travelling, that she realised she wanted to pursue acting as a career.
Lynch studied a Bachelor of Dramatic Art in Acting at National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA), graduating in 2004.
Career
In 2005, immediately after graduating from NIDA, Lynch was cast in long-running soap opera Home and Away in the role of Hayley Lawson (previously played by Bec Cartwright), which she played until the end of the 2005 season.
In 2008, Lynch was cast as a regular in All Saints. Her character, nurse Claire Anderson, replaced Jolene Anderson's character Erika. Coincidentally, Kip Gamblin, who played Hayley's love interest Scott Hunter in Home and Away, also joined All Saints at that point. She played the role for two seasons, through 2009.
Lynch had a main role in legal drama series Crownies, in 2011, playing Erin O'Shaughnessy. She followed this with a main role as Senior Constable Camille Alavoine in Underbelly: Badness, the 2012 fifth season of underworld crime series Underbelly. In 2014, she reprised her role as Erin O'Shaughnessy in Janet King, a spin-off of Crownies.
From 2014 to 2016, Lynch had a main role in the first three seasons of drama series Love Child, playing Shirley Ryan, amongst an ensemble cast including Jessica Marais, Mandy McElhinney, Miranda Tapsell, Jonathan LaPaglia and Matthew Le Nevez. In 2016, she played photojournalist Meg Flynn in the second season of drama series The Code. That same year, she appeared in miniseries Brock, based on the life of motor racing driver Peter Brock, playing the role of Bev Brock, alongside Matthew Le Nevez.
Lynch made her second appearance in the Underbelly franchise in 2018, playing Mark "Chopper" Read's second wife, Margaret Cassar in Underbelly Files: Chopper, opposite Aaron Jeffery. Lynch next took on the dual lead roles of Rachel and Sarah in 'psychosexual thriller' feature Pimped, opposite Benedict Samuel. The film had its world premiere at London's FrightFest in 2018, before its Australian premiere at Monster Fest VII the following year.
In 2019, Lynch appeared in the film Standing up for Sunny, alongside Breaking Bad's RJ Mitte and Philippa Northeast, playing Felicity. Beginning in 2019, she also began playing the recurring role of Suzie Flynn, alongside Tim Minchin and Milly Alcock in comedy drama series, Upright, continuing through to the second season in 2022.
In 2020, Lynch starred in her third Underbelly spin-off, Informer 3838 as the titular character, Melbourne gangland lawyer Nicola Gobbo. The miniseries was inspired by the real-life career of Gobbo, who was recruited by Victoria Police in the 1990s as an informer on crime figures, such as drug kingpin Tony Mokbel.
2025 saw Lynch play Doctor Nina Hirsch in the second season of crime drama series Black Snow, alongside Travis Fimmel.
Personal life
Lynch's former partner is actor Toby Schmitz. They share a daughter, who was born in May 2016.
On 15 June 2021, Lynch welcomed her second child, a boy, with partner Steve Toulmin.