Everyone Thinks Alisha Wainwright from 'Raising Dion' Is Related to Alicia Keys

Over the weekend, Netflix dropped Raising Dion, a new series about a young widow and her young son who has superpowers (think X-Men meets Matilda). In the show, Alisha Wainwright plays Nicole, a mother whose world revolves around Dion, her son. Nicole's husband (played by Michael B. Jordan) dies, and Dion is all Nicole has left. She one day discovers Dion has powers when he disappears in front of a car that almost hits him — and reappears in her arms. 

People are loving the show, and they're loving Alisha. Her acting is phenomenal, and she also seems super... familiar. 

One look at Alisha, and you might think, "Is that Alicia Keys's sister?" Both have the same kind eyes and smile, and both have the same name.   So...are the women related? Are they...the same person?

While the two women look a LOT alike, they're definitely not related.. BET told Alisha in an interview that she looks like "a cross between singer Alicia Keys and actress Gugu Mbatha-Raw." Alisha replied with, "That's the nicest compliment, thank you!" 

The 30-year-old Raising Dion star has been in a lot of projects throughout the years, although Raising Dion is her biggest to date. According to IMDb, Alisha played Maia Roberts in Shadowhunters, was briefly in the TV series Rosewood, played a nurse in two episodes of General Hospital, appeared in an episode of Criminal Minds, among other smaller roles. She was initially discovered in 2012 on the YouTube channel Smosh when she appeared in a comedy sketch.

The actress is from Florida and her family is Jamaican and Haitian. According to an interview with W, Alisha studied botany at the University of Florida, and lived in Panama to do research for her PhD. Uninspired by how competitive the field was, she went into acting. 

Alisha told W, "I feel like there aren’t a lot of great positive shows that put a young mother at the forefront and still make her fun and complex. I was raised by a single mother so I know that there’s a lot of drama in that life, and there is a lot to pull from."

Alisha is a talented actress, but she also wants to try producing TV herself. She told W that she worked on a pilot pitch of her own, and that she could see herself, "moving towards producing, and bringing creative minds together to make something."

*Somebody* had to ask, and we're glad BET did it. Alisha responded by saying,

"Well, you know what's funny, my frame of reference for Michael is as a producer. He is one of the most kind and generous people on our producing team, along with Charles King, and all the people at MACRO, and all the folks at Netflix, so for me having his collaborative aspect on the team was really great. I feel like that primarily shaped the way I thought about him, and think about him — as a creative person — but obviously his creative mind is attached to his body [laughter], which people tend to focus on."

So that's like...a maybe. Right? Alisha added that while he's a "beautiful person," she actually sees him more as a role model than a "heartthrob." 

Raising Dion is streaming on Netflix now!