Her film debut was made working with director Gregg Araki in the cult-classic Nowhere (1997) which was soon followed up by the blockbuster American Pie (1999), for which she did her own singing, and the five-time Oscar-awarded American Beauty (1999) directed by Sam Mendes, in which she was nominated for a BAFTA Award as Best Supporting Actress. In 2001, as part of the blockbuster franchise, she added American Pie 2 (2001) to that list, and then more than a decade later with American Reunion (2012). She reunited with Jason Biggs in Amy Heckerling’s romantic comedy Loser (2000) and then continued to showcase her range in ability to costar with John Leguizamo in Jonas Åkerlund’s cult-classic Spun (2002) and then alongside Jennifer Aniston in Rob Reiner’s Rumor Has It (2005) and Tony Scott’s Domino (2005).
Mena rounded out her creative pursuits by playing the iconic Black Dahlia in Ryan Murphy’s
television series “American Horror Story” (2011) and continued working in the medium by following up with an arc in the hit series “Chicago Fire” (2013), as well as leading the Amazon pilot “Hysteria” (2014) and WeTv’s mini-series “South of Hell” (2015), executive produced by both Eli Roth and Jason Blum for Blumhouse Productions. Mena most recently wrapped on TV Land’s pilot “American Woman” starring opposite Alicia Silverstone and produced by John Wells.
