Lesley Manville

Manville was born, on 12 March 1956, in Brighton, East Sussex,^[3] the daughter of Norma (known as Jean) Edwards, a former ballet dancer, and Ron Manville, a taxi driver.^[4][5] She was brought up in nearby Hove, the youngest of three daughters.^[6][7] Training as a soprano singer from age 8, she was twice under-18 champion of Sussex.^[6] She began acting as a teenager, appearing in television series such as King Cinder. At age 15, she gained a place at the Italia Conti Academy of Theatre Arts.^[8][9]

After turning down teacher Arlene Phillips's invitation to join her new dance troupe Hot Gossip, she was taught improvisation by Italia Conti teacher Julia Carey.^[6][7][9] She made her professional stage debut in the 1972 West End musical I and Albert directed by John Schlesinger. She paid for her first flat by landing a part in the ITV soap opera Emmerdale Farm (1975–76), in which she appeared in 80 episodes.^[6]

Manville built a career as a distinctive theatre actress; from 1978 she appeared in new plays at the Royal Shakespeare Company's Warehouse and Royal Court Theatre.^[10] She met Mike Leigh in 1979, when he was looking for RSC actors who could improvise.^[7]

In the 1980s, her work for the Royal Court included Andrea Dunbar's Rita, Sue and Bob Too (1981) and Caryl Churchill's Top Girls (1982), and Serious Money (1987). She also starred in the Top Girls Off-Broadway production in the US in 1983. For the RSC, she starred in As You Like It (1985) and Les Liaisons Dangereuses (1985–86).

She made her film debut in 1985 with Dance with a Stranger, directed by Mike Newell, and telling the story of Ruth Ellis, the last woman to be hanged in Britain. She also appeared in Sammy and Rosie Get Laid (1987) directed by Stephen Frears, and High Season (1987). Back on the stage, she starred in The Cherry Orchard at the Aldwych Theatre in 1989, directed by Sam Mendes, and in Three Sisters at the Royal Court in 1990.

In 1994, Manville starred in the first series of the BBC sitcom Ain't Misbehavin'. For her work in the 2000 miniseries Other People's Children, and the 2002 TV film Bodily Harm, she received nominations for Best Female Actor at the Royal Television Society Awards.^[11][12]

Her extensive television credits include prominent roles in the dramas Holding On (1997), Real Women (1998–99), The Cazalets (2001), North & South (2004) and Cranford (2007).^[13] She also starred in Cards on the Table, a 2006 feature-length episode of Agatha Christie's Poirot.

Since 2005, Manville has starred in several National Theatre productions, including His Dark Materials (2005), The Alchemist (2006), and Her Naked Skin (2008). She also starred in The Old Vic productions of All About My Mother (2007) and Six Degrees of Separation (2010). In 2009, she played Margaret Thatcher in the Channel 4 drama The Queen.

Manville has appeared in eight Mike Leigh films throughout her career: Grown-Ups (1980), High Hopes (1988), Secrets & Lies (1996), Topsy-Turvy (1999), All or Nothing (2002), Vera Drake (2004), Another Year (2010), and Mr. Turner (2014).^{[citation needed]} In 2002, she won the London Film Critics' Circle Award for British Actress of the Year.^[14]

For Another Year, she also won the National Board of Review Award for Best Actress, and was nominated for the British Independent Film Award for Best Supporting Actress and the European Film Award for Best Actress, as well as the Chicago Film Critics Award for Best Actress.^[15][16] She won Best Supporting Actress from the San Diego Film Critics Society.^[17] On 18 January 2011, she received a BAFTA nomination in the Best Supporting Actress category.^[18] On 7 February 2011, former Charlie's Angels stars Jaclyn Smith and Cheryl Ladd presented the Best Actress Award to her at the "Movies for Grownups Awards".^[19]

In 2011, Manville starred in Mike Leigh's play Grief at the Royal National Theatre, which earned her a Best Actress Olivier Award nomination.^[20] For her role as Helene Alving in the 2013 revival of the Ibsen play Ghosts, she won the 2014 Olivier Award for Best Actress and the Critics' Circle Theatre Award for Best Actress.^[21][22] She also appeared in the films Romeo and Juliet (2013) and Maleficent (2014).

In 2015, she starred opposite Stellan Skarsgård in the BBC drama River, which earned her a nomination for the 2016 BAFTA TV Award for Best Supporting Actress. She starred opposite Peter Mullan in the BBC sitcom Mum, for which she was nominated for the BAFTA TV Award for Best Female Comedy Performance in 2017 and 2019.^[23] In 2017, Manville played Lydia Quigley, the ruthless madam of a posh brothel with clients from the judiciary, nobility, and upper echelons of Georgian society, in the BBC series Harlots.

In Paul Thomas Anderson's 2017 period film Phantom Thread, Manville played Cyril Woodcock, the sister of the dressmaker Reynolds Woodcock, played by Daniel Day-Lewis. For her role, she was nominated for the Academy Award and BAFTA Award for Best Supporting Actress.^[24] In 2020, she played the villainous and intimidating matriarch of an 'off the grid' family in the neo-western thriller Let Him Go, opposite Diane Lane and Kevin Costner. During that year, she was cast as Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon for the final two seasons of The Crown.^{[25][26][27][28]}

Manville was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2021 New Year Honours for services to drama and charity.^[29]

In 2022, Manville starred in the Anthony Horowitz murder mystery series, Magpie Murders,^[30] alongside Daniel Mays, Alexandros Logothetis, Jude Hill, and Claire Rushbrook.^{[31][32][33][34]} Manville also played the role of the titular character in Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris. She received a nomination for the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Comedy or Musical for her performance in this film.^[35]

In January 2023, it was announced that Manville was added to the cast of the Amy Winehouse biopic Back to Black (2024) and would be playing Winehouse's grandmother Cynthia Winehouse.^[36]

In 2024, she played Jocasta in Oedipus at Wyndham's Theatre, directed by Robert Icke.^[37] For her performance, she won the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actress. Manville made her Broadway theatre debut when the production transferred to Studio 54 in October 2025.^[38][39] She is described in this role as embodying contradiction, simultaneously feeling deeply and burying the feelings, while evoking a taut, dramatic silence in the audience.^[40] Manville won the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Lead Performance in a Play and also received the Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play for her performance.^[41][42]

Manville's first boyfriend was actor and former Blue Peter presenter Peter Duncan whom she met at stage school while attending Italia Conti.^[43]

Her first husband was actor Gary Oldman. The pair split in 1989, three months after their son, Alfie (b. 1988), was born.^[7][44] Her second marriage was to actor Joe Dixon, whom she divorced in 2007.^[7] In 2007, Manville was living with her son in East Grinstead, West Sussex.^[9] Since 2019 Manville has lived on her own in West London.^[45]

Manville's sister Brenda, nine years her senior, died of a brain tumour. Her sister's husband and two daughters died of Huntington's disease.^[46]

In 2020, she delivered a monologue for the Equity Benevolent Fund to support fellow actors during the COVID-19 pandemic.^[47]

Manville was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2015 Birthday Honours for services to drama,^[48] and promoted to Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2021 New Year Honours for services to drama and charity.^[49][50]

In February 2024, she was the guest on BBC Radio 4's Desert Island Discs, selecting "Over the Rainbow" recorded by Eva Cassidy, a botanical encyclopaedia and a bed with linen, duvet and pillows as her chosen favourite record, book and luxury item respectively.^[46]

• List of Academy Award winners and nominees from Great Britain
• List of actors in Royal Shakespeare Company productions
• List of actors with Academy Award nominations
• List of British actors
• List of Royal National Theatre Company actors