EMILY WATSON Biography - Actors and Actresses

 
 

Biography » actors and actresses » emily watson

EMILY WATSON

Name: Emily Anita Watson                                                           
Born: 14 January 1967 London, England                                               
                                                                                   
Emily Anita Watson (born 14 January 1967) is a two-time Academy Award-nominated,   
Screen Actors Guild Award-winning English actress known for her acclaimed debut     
film performance in Lars von Trier's Breaking the Waves.                           
                                                                                   
Watson was born in Islington, London, England, the daughter of an architect         
father and an English professor mother. She was raised in the Anglican             
religion. Watson trained at Drama Studio London and holds a BA (1988, English)     
as well as an MA (2003, honorary) from Bristol University, UK. Watson married       
Jack Waters, whom she had met at the Royal Shakespeare Company, in 1995; their     
daughter, Juliet, was born in autumn 2005.                                         
                                                                                   
Watson was virtually unknown until director Lars von Trier chose her to star in     
his controversial Breaking the Waves after the first choice, Helena Bonham         
Carter, dropped out over the uncompromisingly bleak eroticism and the graphic       
nudity demanded for the role. Her performance as Bess McNeill was her first in     
front of a camera, and became the most critically acclaimed of 1996. She won the   
Los Angeles, London and New York Critics Circle Awards, the US National Society     
of Film Critics Award for Best Actress, and ultimately an Oscar nomination.