Tawny Cypress was born in Point Pleasant, New Jersey. She spent her childhood living in communities along the Jersey Shore, including the towns of Sea Girt, Belmar and Red Bank. She attended Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University. Cypress also attended William Esper Studio, where she was invited to teach in 2020.
Since 2000, she has been actively working in film and television. In 2021, Cypress was cast on Yellowjackets as Taissa Turner, a survivor of a horrific plane crash in the 1990s, now running for the New Jersey State Senate while trying to keep quiet the demons of eighteen months of survival in the Canadian wilderness.
Cypress's mother is of Hungarian descent and her father was black and Native American, a partial descendent of the Accawmacke Nation of the Eastern Shore of Virginia. Cypress still resides in her native New Jersey. Her brother is comic book artist Toby Cypress. Since 2011, she has been married to Tom Dillon. They have one child and reside in New Jersey with their many dogs and cats.

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