Kelly Reilly is an English actress.
Her performance in After Miss Julie at the Donmar Warehouse made her a star of the London
stage and earned her a nomination for a Laurence Olivier Theatre Award for Best Actress of
2003.
Early life Reilly was born and brought up in Surrey,
England, the daughter of a hospital receptionist mother, and Jack Reilly, a police officer.
Her grandparents were Irish.
Reilly left home at age 16 to waitress until gaining professional roles.
Career Reilly wrote to the producers of the television
drama Prime Suspect to ask for work, and six months later she auditioned for a role in
an episode Prime Suspect 4: Inner Circle which aired on ITV on May 7, 1995.
Six years later, she again appeared alongside Helen Mirren in the film Last Orders.
Her first professional role was followed by a series of parts on the English stage.
She worked with Terry Johnson in four productions: Elton John’s Glasses, The London Cuckolds,
The Graduate and Piano/Forte.
Johnson wrote Piano/Forte for her and said, "Kelly is possibly the most natural, dyed-in-the-wool,
deep-in-the-bone actress I've ever worked with."
Reilly has stated that she learned the most as an actor from Karel Reisz, who directed
her in The Yalta Game in Dublin in 2001.
She said, "He was my masterclass.
There is no way I would have been able to do Miss Julie if I hadn't done that play."
By 2000, Reilly felt she was being typecast in comedy roles and she actively sought out
a role as the young Amy in Last Orders, directed by Fred Schepisi.
This was followed by a role in the Royal Court's 2001 re-run of Sarah Kane's Blasted.
The Times called her "theatrical Viagra".
In 2002, Reilly starred alongside Audrey Tautou and Romain Duris as Wendy, an English Erasmus
student, in the French comedy L'Auberge espagnole.
She resumed her role in the 2005 sequel, Les Poupées russes.
Also in 2005, Reilly had roles in such films as Mrs. Henderson Presents and Pride & Prejudice.
Reilly's first lead role came in 2008 in the horror film Eden Lake and, in 2009, she had
a high-profile role on prime time British television in Above Suspicion.
Reilly also appeared in three major films: Sherlock Holmes, Triage, and Me and Orson
Welles.
In 2011, Reilly reprised her role as Mary Watson in Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows.
In 2012, Reilly appeared opposite Sam Rockwell in A Single Shot and had a leading role in
Robert Zemeckis' Flight opposite Denzel Washington.
In 2014, Reilly starred with Greg Kinnear in the film Heaven is for Real and in the
John Michael McDonagh film Calvary.
In 2014, Reilly starred in the short-lived ABC-TV series Black Box, as Catherine Black
- a famed neuroscientist who explores and solves the mysteries of the brain while hiding
her own bipolar disorder from the world.
Awards and nominations Reilly's performance in After Miss Julie at
the Donmar Warehouse made her a star of the London stage and earned her a nomination for
a Laurence Olivier Theatre Award for Best Actress of 2003.
Aged 26, she was the youngest person ever nominated for that award.
In 2005, she won Best Newcomer Award at the Cannes Film Festival for her role as Wendy
in The Russian Dolls.
In 2006, Reilly won the Empire Award for Best Newcomer for her role in the British comedy
film, Mrs Henderson Presents.
She was nominated once again for an Olivier award for her performance as Desdemona in
the acclaimed production of Othello at The Donmar Warehouse in 2009.
Reilly was nominated for Best Supporting actress at the British Independent film awards for
Eden Lake in 2010.
She won the Spotlight award at the 2012 Hollywood Film festival, for her performance as Nicole
in Flight.
Personal life Reilly married Kyle Baugher, a financier,
in 2012.
Filmography Film
Television References
External links Kelly Reilly at the Internet Movie Database