Anna Chancellor Biography

Anna Theodora Chancellor (born 27 April 1965) is an English actress of film, television and theatre. She has received nominations for BAFTA and Olivier Awards.

Background and early life

The daughter of John Chancellor and Mary Jolliffe, a daughter of Lord Hylton, Chancellor was brought up in Somerset and educated at St Mary's School, Shaftesbury, a Roman Catholic boarding school for girls in Dorset, but left at sixteen to live in London, later describing her early years there as "quite wild". She became the partner of the poet Jock Scot (1952-2016), and in her early twenties had a daughter, Poppy, whilst still studying at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art. She separated from Scot a few years later. She got her first acting role on television playing Mercedes Page in Jupiter Moon, a BSkyB soap, then came a commercial for the brewery Boddingtons and a part in the film Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994), playing "Duckface" opposite Hugh Grant.

Chancellor is a niece of the journalist Alexander Chancellor, a great-granddaughter of Raymond Asquith (son of the Liberal Prime Minister H. H. Asquith), a first cousin of the model Cecilia Chancellor and a second cousin of the actress Helena Bonham Carter.

Career

Chancellor had a prominent role in the series Kavanagh QC. She has also been noted for her work as Caroline Bingley in the 1995 BBC adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, and as Questular Rontok in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2005). The same year, she joined the cast of the popular BBC One television drama series Spooks as a new regular character, Juliet Shaw. She has also appeared in The Vice, Karaoke, Cold Lazarus, The Dreamers, Tipping the Velvet and Fortysomething, and had a leading role in the satirical black comedy Suburban Shootout. In 2011, she took a supporting role in the BBC thriller serial The Hour, for which she was nominated for the British Academy Television Award for Best Supporting Actress.

In 1997, she received a Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role nomination for her performance in Stanley and in 2013 an Olivier Award for Best Actress nomination for her part in Private Lives.

Charity

She is a patron of the London children's charity Scene & Heard.

Filmography

Year	Film	Role	Notes
1990	Killing Dad or How to Love Your Mother	Barmaid
	Jupiter Moon	Mercedes Page	TV series (50 episodes: 1990-1996)
1992	Inspector Morse	Sally Smith	TV series (1 episode: "Cherubim and Seraphim")
1993	Agatha Christie's Poirot	Virginie Mesnard	TV series (1 episode: "The Chocolate Box")
	Comedy Playhouse	Julia	TV series (1 episode: "The Complete Guide to Relationships")
	Century	Woman in Police Station
1994	Four Weddings and a Funeral	Henrietta (Duckface) - Wedding Two
	Tom and Viv	Woman
	Staggered	Carmen Svennipeg
	Princess Caraboo	Mrs. Peake
	Ellington	Ally Stone	TV film
1995	Pride & Prejudice	Caroline Bingley	TV mini-series (6 episodes)
	Kavanagh QC	Julia Piper	TV series (11 episodes: 1995-1997)
1996	Karaoke	Anna Griffiths	TV mini-series (4 episodes)
	Cold Lazarus	Anna Griffiths	TV mini-series (3 episodes)
1997	FairyTale: A True Story	Peter Pan
	The Man Who Knew Too Little	Barbara Ritchie
1999	The Vice	Dr. Christine Weir	TV series (5 episodes)
	Heart	Nicola Farmer
2000	Longitude	Muriel Gould	TV film
2001	The Cazalets	Diana Mackintosh	TV series (6 episodes)
	Crush	Molly Cartwright
2002	Tipping the Velvet	Diana Lethaby	TV series (2 episodes)
2003	Georgian Underworld	Narrator	TV series (1 episode: "Queer as 18th Century Folk")
	What a Girl Wants	Glynnis Payne
	Doc Martin and the Legend of the Cloutie	Nicky Bowden	TV film
	Fortysomething	Estelle Slippery	TV series (6 episodes)
	The Dreamers	Mother
	Confused		short
2004	Agent Cody Banks 2: Destination London	Lady Josephine Kenworth
	Blue Dove	Maria Bishop	TV series (2 episodes)
	Roman Road	Maddy Bancroft	TV film
2005	The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy	Questular Rontok
	Feeder	Doctor	short
	The Best Man	Dana
	A Waste of Shame: Shakespeare and His Sonnets	Anne Hathaway	TV film
	Spooks	Juliet Shaw	TV series (15 episodes: 2005-2007)
2006	Breaking and Entering	Kate
	Rebus	Amanda Morrison	TV series (1 episode: "Let It Bleed")
	The Secret Life of Mrs Beeton	Elizabeth Dorling	TV film
	Suburban Shootout	Camilla Diamond	TV series (11 episodes: 2006-2007)
2007	Sherlock Holmes and the Baker Street Irregulars	Irene Adler	TV film
	St. Trinians	Miss Bagstock
	Christmas at the Riviera	Diane	TV film
2008	My Family	Zelda Nobbs	TV series (1 episode: "Cards on the Table")
	Agatha Christie's Marple: Murder Is Easy	Lydia Horton	TV film
2009	Law & Order: UK	Evelyn Wyndham	TV series (2 episodes)
2010	Critical Eye	Laura
	Silent Witness	Chief Supt. Karen Somerville	TV series (2 episodes)
	Miranda	Helena	TV series (Series 2 episode 4: "A New Low")
2011	Hustle	Wendy Stanton	TV series (1 episode: "As Good as it Gets")
	Waking the Dead	Lucy Christie	TV series (2 episodes)
	Lewis	Judith Suskin	TV series (1 episode: "The Gift of Promise")
	Hysteria	Mrs Bellamy
	Hidden	Elspeth Verney	TV series (4 episodes)
	The Hour	Lix Storm	TV series (12 episodes) Nominated - British Academy Television Award for Best Supporting Actress Nominated - Broadcasting Press Guild Award for Best Actress
2012	More Afraid of You	Lucy	short
	Pramface	Janet Derbyshire	TV series
	We'll Take Manhattan	Lucie Clayton	TV film
2013	A Touch of Cloth	Hope Goodgirl	TV series (2 episodes)
	How I Live Now	Aunt Penn
	Nol Coward's Private Lives	Amanda Prynne
2014	Death Knight Love Story	Miria	Animated, motion-captured, fan-made Machinima film
	Inside No. 9	Elizabeth	Episode 1, "Sardines"
	Fleming: The Man Who Would Be Bond	Second Officer Monday	TV series (4 episodes)
	Penny Dreadful	Claire Ives	TV series (1 episode)
	Downton Abbey	Lady Anstruther
	Testament of Youth	Mrs. Leighton
	Mapp and Lucia	Emmeline 'Lucia' Lucas	TV series (3 episodes)
2016	The Carer	Milly
	Shetland	Phyllis Brennan	TV series (4 episodes)
	New Blood	Eleanor Davies	TV Series
	Grantchester	Aunt Cece	Christmas special
	This Beautiful Fantastic	Bramble	post-production
2017	Love of My Life	Grace
2017	The Crown	Lady Rosse

Theatre

• Boston Marriage, Donmar Warehouse - March-April 2001; Donmar in the West End - November 2001 - February 2002
• Mammals at the Oxford Playhouse and touring - Lorna, January 2006
• Never So Good, National Theatre - summer 2008
• The Observer, National Theatre - spring 2009
• The Last of the Duchess, Hampstead Theatre - October-November 2011
• Private Lives (playing Amanda), Chichester Festival Theatre, September 2012, and the Gielgud Theatre, London (July-September 2013)
• The Wolf From the Door, Royal Court Theatre, September-November 2014
• The Seagull by Anton Chekhov at National Theatre - summer 2016

Audiobooks

Chancellor has played the role of Ann Smiley in a BBC dramatisation of the John le Carre novels The Honourable Schoolboy and Smiley's People.

Ancestry