Imelda Staunton Biography

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Birth Date: January 9, 1956

Birth Place: London, England, UK

Imelda Staunton has starred in numerous feature films, including the much-lauded Vera Drake, her first collaboration with Mike Leigh, in which she plays the title role and for which she received an Academy Award nomination and Golden Globe Award nomination for Best Actress. She won the Best Actress Bafta Award for her role. She also starred in the Oscar-winning Shakespeare in Love and Sense and Sensibility, as well as Crush, Much Ado About Nothing and Peter's Friends. Recent television roles include the Queen Mother in Cambridge Spies and Mrs Micawber in David Copperfield.

For her stage work, Imelda Staunton has won two Oliviers, the UK's most prestigious theatre award; one for The Corn is Green at the Old Vic and a joint award for Alan Ayckbourn's A Chorus of Disapproval at the National Theatre and Stephen Sondheim's Into the Woods. She has appeared regularly at the National Theatre, most notably as Miss Adelaide in Richard Eyre's production of Guys and Dolls.

At the National, she also worked with Eyre on The Beggar's Opera and Schweyk in the Second World War, and with Matthew Warchus on Life X 3. Other London stage appearances include three productions with the Royal Shakespeare Company; as Sonya in Michael Blakemore's production of Uncle Vanya at the Vaudeville Theatre; in Sam Mendes' production of Habeas Corpus at the Donmar Warehouse; and Michael Hastings' Calico at the Duke of York's Theatre.