Emma Thompson - Americola, the celebrity encyclopedia 
Emma Thompson
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Emma Thompson (born April 15, 1959) is an Emmy, BAFTA and two time-Academy Award-winning English actress, comedian, and screenwriter. She is also a patron of the Refugee Council.
Contents
- 1 Biography
- 1.1 Early life
- 1.2 Acting career
- 1.3 Personal life
- 2 Selected filmography
- 3 Footnotes
- 4 External links
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Biography
Early life
Thompson was born in Paddington, London. Her father, Eric Thompson, was an English actor known for narrating the television series The Magic Roundabout. Her mother, Phyllida Law, is a Scottish actress. Thompson's sister is actress Sophie Thompson.
Thompson went to
Camden School for Girls and then read
English Literature at
Newnham College, Cambridge, where she was a member and vice-president of the
Footlights comedy club. While there, Thompson dated Footlights member and future actor,
Hugh Laurie. After completing her education, she came to fame with a leading role in the
West End revival of the musical
Me and My Girl, opposite
Robert Lindsay, followed by the
BBC serial drama,
Fortunes of War.
Acting career
Thompson's first major film role was in a romantic comedy, The Tall Guy (1989). Her career took a more serious turn with a series of critically acclaimed performances and films, beginning with 1992's Howards End (for which she received an Oscar for Best Actress), the part of Gareth Peirce, the lawyer for the Guildford Four, in 1993's In the Name of the Father, The Remains of the Day opposite Anthony Hopkins, and as the British painter Dora Carrington in the film Carrington (1995). She won her next Oscar in 1996, for Best Adapted Screenplay for her screenplay adaptation of Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility, a film in which she also played the Oscar-nominated lead actress role. Consequently, Thompson is the first, and so far only, person to have won Oscars for both acting and writing; she has said that she keeps both of her award statues in her downstairs bathroom, citing embarrassment at placing them in a more prominent place.[1]
One of Thompson's earliest television appearances was in 1984 alongside Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie as guest stars on the sitcom The Young Ones. In 1988, she starred in and wrote the eponymous Thompson comedy sketch series for BBC1; the series was not successful with audiences or critics. Described in Time Out magazine as "very clever-little-me-ish",[citation needed] it has never been repeated in Britain despite her Oscar successes, and Thompson has not returned to the sketch comedy field.
Thompson's recent television work has included a starring role in the 2001 HBO drama Wit, in which she played a dying cancer victim, and 2003's Angels in America, playing multiple roles, including one of the titular angels. Her Emmy Award was as a guest star in a 1997 episode of the show Ellen; in the episode, she played a parody of herself. She also appeared in an episode of Cheers in 1992. Her character, Nanette "Nanny" Gee, was the host of a children's television program and Frasier Crane's first wife.
Most recently, Thompson appeared in supporting roles in films of a lighter nature, including her role as
Sybill Trelawney in
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (
2004) and the comedy
Love Actually (
2003).
The film Nanny McPhee, written by Thompson, was first released in October 2005. Thompson worked on the project for 9 years, having written the screenplay and starred, alongside her mother (who has a cameo appearance). In her most recent film, Stranger Than Fiction, she plays an author planning on killing her main character, who turns out to be a real person.
Personal life
While she was at Cambridge University, Thompson had a romantic relationship with her fellow student, actor Hugh Laurie, who was also a member of the Cambridge Footlights Revue, and now star of the hit show House.
Thompson married Kenneth Branagh, with whom she appeared in Fortunes of War, on August 20, 1989. They appeared together several times, in hit films such as Dead Again, Henry V and Much Ado About Nothing, but were eventually divorced in October 1995. Many Americans were surprised and disappointed to find that, in the UK, many disliked the couple for their overbearing media presence and privileged aura. Sarcastically described as "Ken and Em", they were often dismissed by British critics, particularly in the case of Peter's Friends, seen as the epitome of "luvvies" (self-conscious, affected actors) and parodied as such on Spitting Image and in Private Eye.
In 2003, Thompson married actor Greg Wise (who starred with her in Sense and Sensibility) with whom she has a daughter, Gaia Romilly, born in 1999.
Selected filmography
Footnotes
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