Born on June 1, 1977 in La Grange, IL, the one-year-old Sarah Anne Callies moved to Honolulu, HI with her brood after there was a death in the family. Callies, who learned to speak basic Hawaiian, participated in school plays at the local Punahou School, which fueled her desire to become a performer. After moving thousands of miles east to study Feminist Studies and Indigenous Theology at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire, Callies next attended Denver’s National Theater Conservatory where she received her Masters of Fine Arts.
Not long after, she made the big move to New York in order to pursue her acting dreams. Callies dropped her middle name (Anne) and added her mother’s maiden name (Wayne) for her stage moniker. She appeared on “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit” (1999-) and landed a regular role in the short-lived Oliver Platt series “Queens Supreme” (2003), but it was as Jane Porter, now a police officer, in the WB’s version of “Tarzan” that the plum role was finally landed. Despite a media blitz for the series and solid performances from the show’s cast members, “Tarzan” failed to catch on with viewers, becoming one of the 2003’s season’s first casualties. But the exposure from such a hyped production did the trick. In that same year, Callies was named as one of L’Oreal’s New Faces.
In 2005, Callies landed her biggest role to date – this time, on a show that actually lived up to the hype – on the Fox drama “Prison Break” – a serialized drama, not unlike the network’s successful “24” (2001-). While Callies returned for the series’ sophomore year, she also found time for big screen roles, being cast in the films “The Celestine Prophecy” (2006) and “Whisper” (2007), a kidnap thriller starring Josh Holloway.