Helen Mirren
Dame Helen Mirren,
DBE (born
Elena Lydia Mironova on
26 July 1945) is an
English stage, television and movie
actress. She is particularly well-known for her role as the female
detective Jane Tennison in the
Prime Suspect series of television
dramas, and for her numerous roles in film including
2010: Odyssey Two,
The Long Good Friday,
The Madness of King George and
Calendar Girls.
Mirren was born in
England to a Russian father and an English mother; her paternal grandfather, a Russian noble and diplomat, was negotiating an arms deal in England and was stranded there, along with his family, after the
Russian Revolution. Following appearances on stage during her school years at St Bernard's School for Girls in
Westcliff-on-Sea,
Essex, her first starring role was in 1965 as
Cleopatra for the
National Youth Theatre. This led to her joining the
Royal Shakespeare Company, playing
Cressida in
Troilus and Cressida, and
Lady Macbeth in the production by
Trevor Nunn.
In 1972 she joined
Peter Brook's International Centre for Theatre Research, and joined the group's tour across North Africa which created
The Conference of the Birds. The "sexy" image she acquired in her youth has — in the opinion of some — been little affected by encroaching age; she did nothing to detract from it by appearing nude on the cover of the
Radio Times for her fiftieth birthday.
She married
film director Taylor Hackford, her
domestic partner since 1986, on his 53rd birthday on
31 December 1997, in the Scottish Highlands.
She appeared in Belfast-born director
Terry George's film
Some Mother's Son, which was about the
1981 Hunger Strikes in
Northern Ireland, opposite
Irish actress
Fionnuala Flanagan.
She is a two-time
Academy Award nominee, for
The Madness of King George in 1994 and
Gosford Park in 2002.
She was invested as a
Dame Commander of the British Empire on
5 December 2003. In 1996 she had
declined a CBE.
She also played
Elizabeth I in 2005 in
a television movie for
Channel 4, receiving an
Emmy nomination for her performance. Recently, she provided the voice for the supercomputer "
Deep Thought" in the film adaptation of
Douglas Adams'
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, released on
29 April 2005.
|
Mirren aged 24 in Age of Consent (1969) |
Age of Consent (
1969)
O Lucky Man! (
1973)
Blue Remembered Hills (
1979)
Caligula (
1979)
The Long Good Friday (
1980)
Excalibur (
1981)
2010: The Year We Make Contact (
1984)
White Nights (1985)
*The Mosquito Coast (1986)
*The Cook, The Thief, His Wife & Her Lover (1989)
*Where Angels Fear to Tread (1991)
*Prime Suspect (1991–)
*The Madness of King George (1994)
*Painted Lady (1997)
*The Prince of Egypt (1998)
*Teaching Mrs. Tingle (1999)
*Last Orders (2001)
*Gosford Park (2001)
*No Such Thing (2001)
*Calendar Girls (2003)
*The Clearing (2004)
*Pride (2004)
*Raising Helen (2004)
*The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2005)
*Elizabeth I (2005) (2 two-hour TV dramas)
*Shadowboxer (2006)
*The Queen'' (
2006)
*
Helen Mirren Biography*
The Helen Mirren Appreciation Society*
Helen Mirren at the
MBC Encyclopedia of Television
