Who played Zisa in Power Book III: Raising Kanan? Lou-Lou's discovery is a real singer with her own album — no dubbing
Zisa in Power Book III: Raising Kanan is played by Paulina Singer, a working recording artist who sings every one of the character's tracks herself.
The voice that made Lou-Lou believe in his label wasn't studio trickery — Starz hired an actual working musician and let her sing every note herself.
With Raising Kanan closing out its final season on Starz, rewatchers keep circling back to one of the show's tenderest, cruelest storylines — Lou-Lou Thomas and Zisa, the singer he signed, believed in, and lost — and to one question: who is that, and is she really singing?
The answer to both: Paulina Singer, and yes, every note.
An actual musician, not a lip-syncing actress
The surname is not a bit — Singer is a working recording artist, producer, and songwriter alongside her screen career. Born in Exeter, New Hampshire, to an African American father and a mother of Ukrainian heritage, she trained in improv at the Upright Citizens Brigade at 19, then stacked a decade of screen credits before Dodge... before Queens came calling:
- TV: Jessie Tyler on Freeform's Dead of Summer, the recurring role of Detective Josie Mac on Gotham, plus Person of Interest, The Affair, and Blue Bloods.
- Film: The Intern opposite Robert De Niro, and The Wilde Wedding with Glenn Close and John Malkovich.
- Music: her own releases as an independent artist — she records and produces under her own name (and the handle Zuzusilk), including the 2024 single "LUCKY GIRL (Everything Works Out For Me)" with Cobrayama.
Read more: Who Killed Krystal in Raising Kanan? The Reveal Comes in the Very First Minute of One Episode
The proof of the no-dubbing claim is right on the official record: when Lionsgate Records put out the Raising Kanan season 2 soundtrack EP, four of its five tracks — "Bruised (Remix)," "You & I," "Play a Little Game," and "No One Ever" — were credited to Paulina Singer performing as Zisa. The only track she didn't carry was the original "Bruised," sung by castmate Hailey Kilgore, whose remix Zisa records in the story.
Casting directors usually solve a "character who can sing" problem with a soundalike in a booth. Raising Kanan solved it by hiring a musician who happens to act — which is why Zisa's studio scenes feel like documentary footage.
Why the character still stings
Zisa arrived in season two as the raw talent who made Lou-Lou's label dreams feel legitimate — his discovery, his artist, his proof he could be more than a drug operation's money man. Then the show did what Power shows do: Zisa was murdered by Sal Boselli's mobsters, and the two men who killed her were later shot in the head in Lou-Lou's retaliation — vengeance that avenged her and hollowed him out in the same stroke. The final season premiered June 12, 2026, and Lou-Lou's endgame still carries the shape of that loss.
Singer, meanwhile, kept doing what her character never got to: releasing music, under her own name, on her own terms.
Earlier we wrote: What Is Power Book III: Raising Kanan About? Power's Coldest Villain Gets a 1990s Origin Story