Actrice

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A female actor who performs in theatrical productions or films
2. An individual of the female gender engaged in acting for stage, television, or film
3. A woman who portrays characters in dramatic performances or cinematic works

Etymology: The English "actress" is built from "actor" plus the feminine suffix "-ess," and the French form "actrice" is a separate, older-looking route into English that never fully took over. Its ancestor is the Latin "actrix," a feminine agent noun meaning a female doer or performer, formed from the verb "agere," "to drive, do, or act." Because the Latin word was passed into French and then borrowed into English, English ended up with two forms that share a root but arrived by different paths, which linguists call doublets. English speakers used "actrix" directly for a time, and the French "actrice" appears in English as a borrowing of the same Latin ancestor, but the everyday word settled on "actress." The surviving "actrice" now sounds deliberately foreign and is used mainly when a writer wants to signal French theatre or film culture.

Synonyms: actress, female actor, performer, star, thespian