Phoebe Nicholls
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Phoebe Nicholls (born 1958 in London, England), is an English actress best-remembered for her performance as Lady Cordelia Flyte, the youngest child of the Marchmain family, in the classic TV miniseries Brideshead Revisited .
She is the daughter of thespians Anthony Nicholls (died 1977) and Faith Kent, and is the younger sister of Kate Nicholls, who was also a stage actress in England in the 1970’s and 1980’s. As a child, she appeared frequently in movies with her parents under her given name Sarah Nicholls, including The Pumpkin Eater , Our Mother’s House, and Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors, and at 12, she had a minor role as Oliver Reed’s daughter in Women in Love.
An undiagnosed dyslexic, she was mainly educated by a governess before attending school. She attended the Central School of Speech and Drama in London, and first attracted attention co-starring with Tom Conti in the original stage production of “Whose Life Is It Anyway?” (1979).
A year later, she again appeared with Conti in the Dennis Potter telepic, “Blade on the Feather”, where she portrayed a character who was a snotty, arrogant rich girl who eventually receives her comeuppance. She also portrayed Joseph Merrick’s mother in the David Lynch's The Elephant Man (1980).
In 1979, she was cast in what was originally intended to be a made-for-television movie based on Evelyn Waugh’s classic novel, Brideshead Revisited. Shortly after filming started, a labor action shut down the set for several months, leading to the hiring of a new director, Charles Sturridge, who decided to reshoot the production as a miniseries, extending the production for two years. Nicholls drew notice in that illustrious cast for portraying her character from pre-adolescence into early-spinsterhood, and drawing out a role that seemed little more than an afterthought in the book. During the production, Sturridge and Nicholls fell in love, and were married in 1985.
She followed up Brideshead with her first significant film role in The Missionary (1982). In 1987, she portrayed the wife of a closeted homosexual aristocrat in the Merchant Ivory film adaptation of the E.M. Forster novel, Maurice. Since then, she has carved out a distinguished career in West End theatre and on British television. She recently made appearances in Prime Suspect 6, Second Sight, Hawking and Foyle's War. She has also appeared in several of her husband’s later movies, including the adaptation of Gulliver’s Travels (1996), Fairy Tale: A True Story (1997) and as the title character’s long-suffering wife in Shackleton (2002). She portrayed a government scientist who leaks an incriminating memo concerning global warming to a terrorist group in the season finale of Spooks (2006), and starred in the More4 black comedy, The Trial of Tony Blair (2007), portraying Cherie Blair.
She and her husband live in West London, where they have three children, Tom, Matilda and Arthur. Tom Sturridge, her oldest son, recently appeared opposite Annette Bening in Being Julia (2004), where he received outstanding reviews portraying the son of an English stage diva.
[edit] Films and TV
- The Trial of Tony Blair (2007) - Cherie Blair
- Spooks (TV series)
- Episode 10 (2006) - Janet Wheeler
- The Brief (TV series)
- Children (2004) - Sally Graydon
- Hawking (2004 TV movie) - Isobel Hawking
- Foyle's War (TV series)
- The Funk Hole (2003) - Amanda Reece
- Prime Suspect (2003)
- Episode 6 - The Last Witness - Shaw
- Midsomer Murders (TV series)
- A Tale of Two Hamlets (2003) - Laura Smythe-Webster
- I'm Alan Partridge (TV series)
- Bravealan (2002) - Karen Colman
- Shackleton (2002 TV movie) - Emily Shackleton
- People Like Us (TV series)
- The Vicar (2001)
- The Miracle Maker (2000) - voice
- Second Sight (1999 TV movie) - Judith Bendrix
- FairyTale: A True Story (1997) - Polly Wright
- May and June (1997 TV movie) - May Thrace
- Gulliver's Travels (1996 TV movie) - Empress of Lilliput
- Persuasion (1995) - Elizabeth Elliott
- Kavanagh QC (TV series)
- Heartland (1995) - Jackie Jarvis
- Heart of Darkness (1994 TV movie) - The Intended
- Drowning in the Shallow End (1990 TV movie) - Sarah
- Maurice (1987) - Anne Durham
- Gentry (1987) - Susannah
- Ordeal by Innocence (1984) - Tina Argyle
- To the Camp and Back (1983 TV movie) - Christine
- Party Party (1983) - Rebecca
- The Missionary (1982) - Deborah Fitzbanks
- Tales of the Unexpected (TV series)
- Brideshead Revisited (1981 TV mini-series) - Cordelia Flyte
- Pictures (1981 TV mini-series) - Babs
- Blade on the Feather (1980 TV movie) - Christabel Cavendish
- The Elephant Man (1980) - Merrick's Mother
- Bless Me Father (TV series)
- The Heart of a Curate (1979) - Nurse Owen
- Father Neil's First Miracle (1979) - Nurse Owen
- Telford's Change (TV series)
- Episode #1.8 (1979)
- Secret Orchards (1979 TV movie) - Stella
- Van der Valk (TV series)
- Gold Plated Delinquents (1977) - Treesje
- Alternative 3 (1977 TV movie) - Harry's girlfriend
- Women in Love (1969) - Winifred Crich (as Sarah Nicholls)
- Our Mother's House (1967) - Gerty Hook (as Sarah Nicholls)
- Dr. Terror's House of Horrors (1965) - Carol Rogers (as Sarah Nicholls)
- The Pumpkin Eater (1964) - Child (as Sarah Nicholls)
[edit] External links
- Phoebe Nicholls at the Internet Movie Database
- Lacey, Hester. "How We Met: Phoebe Nicholls and Charles Sturridge", The Independent, February 22, 1998.