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More Emily Mortimer Bios & Profiles

 

The most recent Emily Mortimer biography is published on the main page.
 


Biography #2 (for A Foreign Affair)

This summer British actress Emily Mortimer was seen in the highly anticipated film LOVELY AND AMAZING, that was the toast of last year's Toronto Film Festival. It is a comical, bittersweet tale of four hapless but resilient women and the lessons they learn in keeping up with the hectic demands of their individual neuroses. Emily stars as Elizabeth, a self-doubting actress whose career is beginning to take off and who compulsively takes home stray dogs - saving them whether or not they need to be saved. The film, also starring Catherine Keener and Brenda Blethyn, opened the LA Film Festival in June to great critical acclaim and was released by Metrodome in UK in August 2002. The LA Times said of her performance .. the one performance that I have seen this summer that should be a no-brainer come awards time is Emily Mortimer's heartbreakingly insecure actress in Nicole Holofcener's LOVELY AND AMAZING.

Last year Emily starred opposite Samuel L. Jackson in the highly successful 51ST STATE. Directed by acclaimed Hong Kong action director Ronny Yu, 51ST STATE is the story of Elmo McElroy (Jackson), a streetwise American master chemist who heads to England to sell his special new formula - a powerful, blue concoction guaranteed to take you to the 51ST STATE, to provide a feeling 51 times more powerful than any thrill, any pleasure, any high in history. But his plans for a quick, profitable score go awry when he gets stuck in Liverpool with an unlikely escort and becomes entangled in a bizarre web of double-dealing and double-crosses. Mortimer stars as the assassin Dakota, a tough beauty with a sniper rifle sent to track McElroy down. The film also starring Robert Carlyle, Meat Loaf, Rhys Ifans, Ricky Tomlinson and Sean Pertwee, was released at the end of last year in the UK and will be released as FORMULA 51 in the US on October 18th.

Mortimer recently completed filming YOUNG ADAM, an independent production by first time feature writer/director David Mackenzie. Set in 1950s Glasgow, the film, adapted from Trocchi's novel of the same name, tells the story of Joe (Ewan McGregor), a rootless barge-worker who witnessed the accidental drowning of his ex-lover Cathie played by Emily. Joe remains silent about his crime even when an innocent man is put on trial for Cathie's murder and is ultimately sentenced. This dark, erotic piece also stars Tilda Swinton and Peter Mullan. It will be released in the UK in 2003 by Warner Bros.

Her other feature film credits include THE KID opposite Bruce Willis for Disney; the award winning NOTTING HILL, Wes Craven's SCREAM 3, Kenneth Branagh's LOVE'S LABOUR'S LOST and David Keating's THE LAST OF THE HIGH KINGS for Miramax; Shekhar Kapur's award-winning ELIZABETH; and Phillip Noyce's THE SAINT; Stephen Hopkins' THE GHOST AND THE DARKNESS for Paramount; and Guy Jenkin's THE SLEEPING DICTIONARY, opposite Bob Hoskins and Jessica Alba.

Mortimer has also starred in a range of television roles including John Irvin's telepic Noah's Ark for NBC/Hallmark. Other roles include Giles Foster's Coming Home; BBC1's A Dance to the Music of Time, Mike Barber's Silent Witness, and Roger Bamford's No Bananas also for BBC; Guy Jenkins' Lord of Misrule and A Very Open Prison for Hat Trick; Jeremy Silberston's Midsomer Murders for ITV; and Sarah Hellings The Glass Vergin for Festival

Emily's theatre credits include the productions of The Merchant of Venice for the Lyceum Theatre and The Lights for the Royal Court.

While studying English at Oxford University, Mortimer had starring roles in numerous stage productions, including: Ophelia in Hamlet at Oxford Shakespeare Festival, Gertrude in Hamlet and Lady Nijo/Winn in Top Girls at the Edinburgh festival 1992, Miss Burstner/Leni in The Trial at the Oxford Playhouse, and Helena in A Midsummer Nights Dream at the Old Fire Station, Oxford. She also devised, directed and acted in a production of Don Juan, which was a Drama Cupper's Winner in 1990.

Emily Mortimer returned to the UK in November to commence principle photography for BRIGHT YOUNG THINGS directed by Stephen Fry. Emily will star as Nina Blount, a society girl, part of a party fast set in which genuine relationships are difficult to maintain. Based on the Evelyn Waugh classic, VILE BODIES, the film will also star Jim Broadbent and Judi Dench.

She divides her time between London and Los Angeles.

Bio courtesy Black & White Films for "A Foreign Affair" (16-Jan-2004)