Kim Cattrall Biography

Kim Victoria Cattrall (born 21 August 1956) is an English-Canadian actress. She is known for her role as Samantha Jones in the HBO romantic comedy series, Sex and the City (1998-2004), for which she received five Emmy Award nominations and four Golden Globe Award nominations, winning the 2002 Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress. She reprised the role in the films Sex and the City (2008) and Sex and the City 2 (2010).

Cattrall made her film debut in Otto Preminger's 1975 film, Rosebud. She went on to star in the following films: Porky's (1982), Police Academy (1984), Big Trouble in Little China (1986), Mannequin (1987), Masquerade (1988), Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country (1991), and Ice Princess (2005). She also starred in the 1986 original Broadway production of Wild Honey. Other stage credits include: Antony and Cleopatra at the Liverpool Playhouse (2010), Private Lives on Broadway (2011), and Sweet Bird of Youth at London's Old Vic (2013). Since 2014, she has starred in the HBO Canada series, Sensitive Skin.

Early life

Cattrall was born in Mossley Hill, Liverpool. Her mother, Gladys Shane (ne Baugh), was a secretary, and her father, Dennis Cattrall, was a construction engineer. When she was three months old, her family migrated to Canada, settling in the city of Courtenay on Vancouver Island in British Columbia. At 11 she returned to England when her grandmother became ill. She took a number of acting examinations with the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA), before returning to Canada at age 16 to finish high school.

Career

Cattrall began her career after graduating from high school in 1972, when she left Canada for New York City. There, she attended the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, and upon her graduation signed a five-year film deal with director Otto Preminger. She made her film debut in Preminger's Rosebud in 1975. A year later Universal Studios bought out that contract and Cattrall became one of the last participants in the contract player system of Universal (also referenced as MCA/Universal during this period) before the system ended in 1980. The Universal system's representative in New York, Eleanor Kilgallen (sister of Dorothy Kilgallen), cast Cattrall in numerous TV guest-star roles. One of the first jobs Kilgallen got her was in a 1977 episode of Quincy, M.E. starring Jack Klugman, whom Kilgallen also represented.

In 1978, Cattrall played the female lead in a two-hour episode of Columbo and also in "Blindfold", an episode of the 1970s TV series Starsky & Hutch, in which Starsky (played by Paul Michael Glaser) is grief-stricken since he accidentally blinded Cattrall's character, young artist Emily Harrison, by a shot of his gun. She starred in The Bastard (1978) and The Rebels (1979), two television mini-series based on the John Jakes novels of the same names. In 1979 she played the role of Dr. Gabrielle White in The Incredible Hulk and would go down in TV Hulk lore as one of the few characters who knew David Banner (alter ego of the title character) was alive and was the creature. Her work in television paid off and she quickly made the transition to cinema. She starred opposite Jack Lemmon in his Oscar-nominated film Tribute in 1980, and in Crossbar, the film about a high jumper who loses his leg and still participates in the Olympic trials, with Cattrall's help. The following year, she appeared in Ticket to Heaven.

In 1982 Cattrall played P.E. teacher Miss Honeywell in Porky's, followed two years later by a role in the original Police Academy. In 1985 she starred in three films: Turk 182, City Limits and Hold-Up, the last with French star Jean-Paul Belmondo. In 1986, she played Kurt Russell's brainy flame in the action film Big Trouble in Little China. In 1987, her lead role in Mannequin proved a huge success with audiences. One of her best-known film roles is that of Lieutenant Valeris in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country; Cattrall assisted in developing the character by designing her own hairstyle and even helped come up with the name. Near the end of filming, Cattrall had a photographer shoot a roll of film on the Enterprise bridge set, in which she wore nothing but her Vulcan ears. After finding out about the unauthorised photo session, Leonard Nimoy had the film destroyed.

Aside from her film work, Cattrall is also a stage actress, with performances in Arthur Miller's A View from the Bridge and Anton Chekhov's Three Sisters and Wild Honey to her credit. In 1997, she was cast in Sex and the City, Darren Star's series which was broadcast on HBO. As Samantha Jones, Cattrall gained international recognition. She capitalised on her success by appearing in steamy television commercials promoting Pepsi One. In addition, she can be heard reading the poetry of Rupert Brooke on the CD Red Rose Music SACD Sampler Volume One.

Her film work continued during Sex and the City when she appeared in the film, Crossroads. Sex and the City ended as a weekly series in spring 2004 with 10.6 million viewers. Cattrall reprised the role of Samantha Jones in the Sex and the City film, released on 30 May 2008. She also appeared in the sequel released in May 2010. For her role in the TV series, she was nominated for five Emmy Awards, and four Golden Globe Awards, winning one in 2002. She also won two ensemble Screen Actors Guild Awards, shared with her co-stars Sarah Jessica Parker, Kristin Davis and Cynthia Nixon. She was ranked number eight in TV Guide's 50 sexiest stars of all-time list in 2005.

In 2005, she appeared in the Disney film Ice Princess, in which she played Tina Harwood, ice skating coach of the film's lead character. She portrayed Claire, a paralysed woman who wants to die, in the West End drama revival of Whose Life Is It Anyway?. In October 2006, she appeared in a West End production of David Mamet's The Cryptogram at the Donmar Warehouse in London. Since late 2005, she has appeared in a number of British television commercials for Tetley Tea. In July 2006, a commercial for Nissan cars, which featured Cattrall as Samantha Jones, was withdrawn from New Zealand television, apparently because of complaints about its innuendo. In 2006, she starred alongside Brendan Gleeson in John Boorman's 2006 film The Tiger's Tail, a black comedy that focuses on the impact of the Celtic Tiger economy on Irish people. On ITV, she starred alongside David Haig, Daniel Radcliffe and Carey Mulligan in My Boy Jack, the story of author Rudyard Kipling's search for his son lost in the First World War.

In early 2009, Kim Cattrall played Amelia Bly in Roman Polanski's well received The Ghost Writer, which was released in 2010. On 16 June 2009, it was announced that Cattrall would receive a star on Canada's Walk of Fame in Toronto. The induction ceremony was held on 12 September 2009. In November 2009 whilst filming Sex and the City 2 in Marrakech, Morocco, she took part in a seminar, 'Being directed' with Director John Boorman as part of the third Edition of the Arts in Marrakech Festival.

On 24 February 2010, Cattrall began a run in the West End of London at the Vaudeville Theatre as leading lady, Amanda, opposite Matthew Macfadyen, in a revival of Nol Coward's play Private Lives. She performed until 3 May 2010. In the same year Cattrall starred as Gloria Scabius (alongside Macfadyen once again) in the critically acclaimed Channel 4 adaptation of William Boyd's Novel Any Human Heart.

Cattrall played Cleopatra in a production of Antony and Cleopatra, directed by Janet Suzman, opposite Jeffery Kissoon as Anthony, in Liverpool at the Playhouse in October 2010, with a subsequent revival at Chichester Festival Theatre (with Michael Pennington as Anthony) in September 2012.

In 2010, Cattrall was named an Honorary Fellow of Liverpool John Moores University in recognition of her contributions to the dramatic arts.

In 2011, Cattrall reprised her role as Amanda in a production of Nol Coward's Private Lives opposite Canadian actor Paul Gross in Toronto, Canada and on Broadway. That year, Cattrall also appeared in "Uptown Downstairs Abbey", the Comic Relief parody of the critically acclaimed historical television dramas Downton Abbey and Upstairs, Downstairs. Playing Lady Grantham, she starred alongside Jennifer Saunders, Joanna Lumley, Victoria Wood, Harry Enfield, Patrick Barlow, Dale Winton, Olivia Colman, Tim Vine, Simon Callow, Michael Gambon and Harry Hill.

From June to August 2013, Cattrall was scheduled to star in the Old Vic's production of Tennessee Williams's Sweet Bird of Youth, directed by Olivier Award-winner Marianne Elliott. In 2014, she starred as Davina Jackson in HBO Canada's Sensitive Skin.

On 17 July 2015, Cattrall was cast in the title role of the play Linda, written by Penelope Skinner, directed by Michael Longhurst, and produced at the Royal Court Theatre in London. She was forced to drop out of that production a few days before the opening, due to "chronic, debilitating insomnia"?. She then returned to New York, and started a program of cognitive behaviour therapy to train herself to be able to sleep better. The therapy was successful; it included developing certain evening rituals, removing electronic devices from her bedroom, and limiting the use of the bed to two activities, one of which would be sleeping. Her part in the play, Linda was recast, her part played by Noma Dumezweni, and it opened in December 2015.

Personal life

Cattrall has been married three times. Her 1977 to 1979 marriage to Larry Davis was annulled. Her second marriage was from 1982 to 1989 to Andre J. Lyson, with whom she lived in Frankfurt and learned to speak German fluently, but admits she has forgotten a lot over the years. From 1998 to 2004 she was married to audio designer and jazz bassist Mark Levinson. The two co-wrote the 2002 book Satisfaction: The Art of the Female Orgasm.

Cattrall also has been linked with former Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau, actor Daniel Benzali, musician Gerald Casale of the new wave group Devo, French public intellectual Bernard-Henri Lvy, and her Whose Life Is It Anyway? co-star, Alexander Siddig.

In 2007, Cattrall revealed that in December 1988 she had been booked on Pan Am Flight 103, which crashed in Lockerbie, Scotland, after a terrorist bomb was detonated during the flight. She cancelled her booking on the flight at the last minute to complete some Christmas shopping in London.

She holds British and Canadian citizenship. In a 2011 interview on the Canadian radio show Q, Cattrall stated that reports that she became a US citizen in 2008 are incorrect. In a 2010 interview with British journalist Sophy Grimshaw, Cattrall also stated, "It's been falsely reported on the net many times that I became an American citizen, which I have not. I love America, I love New York, but I will never give up who I am. I'm not an American."

In August 2009, Cattrall took part in the BBC One documentary series Who Do You Think You Are?, where she discovered some uncomfortable facts about her grandfather, George Baugh. Baugh, who disappeared in 1938, having abandoned his family - including Cattrall's then 8-year-old mother and two younger sisters - turned out to have bigamously married his new wife, Isabella Oliver, the following year in Tudhoe, County Durham, and subsequently had another four children. She was told that in 1961 he emigrated to Australia, where he became a postmaster, retiring in 1972 and dying in Sydney in 1974. Cattrall's mother and aunts had known nothing of their father's life after he left until they heard what the Who Do You Think You Are? researchers had discovered, nor had the family previously seen a clear photograph of him. An edited version of the episode was later shown as a part of the U.S. series of the same name.

Cattrall is a supporter of Liverpool F.C.

Filmography

Film

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1975	Rosebud	Joyce Donnovan
1977	Deadly Harvest	Susan Franklin
1979	Crossbar	Katie Barlow
1980	Tribute	Sally Haines
1981	Ticket to Heaven	Ruthie
1982	Porky's	Miss Lynn "Lassie" Honeywell
1984	Police Academy	Cadet Karen Thompson
1985	Turk 182	Danny Boudreau
1985	City Limits	Wickings
1985	Hold-Up	Lise
1986	Big Trouble in Little China	Gracie Law
1987	Mannequin	Ema "Emmy" Hesire
1988	Masquerade	Brooke Morrison
1988	Midnight Crossing	Alexa Schubb
1988	Palais Royale	Odessa Muldoon
1989	'	Justine de Winter
1989	'	Aunt Eva
1989	Honeymoon Academy	Chris
1990	'	Judy McCoy
1991	Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country	Lieutenant Valeris
1992	Split Second	Michelle McLaine
1994	Breaking Point	Allison Meadows
1995	Above Suspicion	Gail Cain
1995	Live Nude Girls	Jamie
1996	Unforgettable	Kelly
1996	Where Truth Lies	Racquel Chambers
1997	Exception to the Rule	Carla Rainer
1998	Modern Vampires	Ulrike
1999	Baby Geniuses	Robin
2001	15 Minutes	Cassandra
2002	Crossroads	Caroline Wagner
2003	Shortcut to Happiness	Constance Hurry
2005	Ice Princess	Tina Harwood
2006	'	Jane O'Leary
2008	Sex and the City	Samantha Jones
2010	'	Amelia Bly
2010	Meet Monica Velour	Monica Velour
2010	Sex and the City 2	Samantha Jones

Television

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1976	Dead on Target	Secretary	Uncredited; TV film
1977	Good Against Evil	Linday Isley	TV film
1977	Quincy, M.E.	Joy DeReatis	Episode: "Let Me Light the Way"
1977	Logan's Run	Rama II	Episode: "Half Life"
1977	Switch	Captain Judith Pierce	Episode: "Dancer"
1977	What Really Happened to the Class of '65?	Cynthia	Episode: "The Girl Nobody Knew"
1978	'	Marie Claire	2 episodes
1978	Columbo	Joanne Nicholls	Episode: "How to Dial a Murder"
1978	'	Anne Ware	Miniseries
1978	Starsky & Hutch	Emily Harrison	Episode: "Blindfold"
1978	'	Karen Clayton	Episode: "Da Da"
1978	Family	Susan Madison	Episode: "Just Friends"
1979	'	Dr. Gabrielle White	Episode: "Kindred Spirits"
1979	How the West Was Won	Dolores	Episode: "The Slavers"
1979	'	Anne Kent	Miniseries
1979	Vega$	Princess Zara	Episode: "The Visitor"
1979	Charlie's Angels	Sharon Kellerman	Episode: "Angels at the Altar"
1979	'	Regina Kenton	TV film
1979	Crossbar	Katie BArlow	TV film
1979	Trapper John, M.D.	Princess Allya	Episode: "The Surrogate"
1980	Scruples	Melanie Adams	Miniseries; 3 episodes
1980	'	Dina Moran	TV film
1980	Hagen	Carol Sawyer	Episode: "Nightmare"
1982	Trapper John, M.D.	Amy West	Episode: "You Pays Your Money"
1983	Tales of the Gold Monkey	Whitney Bunting	Episode: "Naka Jima Kill"
1984	Sins of the Past	Paula Bennett	TV film
1991	Miracle in the Wilderness	Dora Adams	TV film
1992	Double Vision	Caroline/Lisa	TV film
1993	Wild Palms	Paige Katz	Miniseries; 5 episodes
1993	Running Delilah	Christina/Delilah	TV film
1993	Angel Falls	Genna Harrison	Main cast; 6 episodes
1994	Dream On	Jeannie	Episode: "The Homecoming Queen"
1994	Two Golden Balls	Sydnie	TV film
1995	'	Susan	TV film
1995	Tom Clancy's Op Center	Jane Hood	Miniseries; 2 episodes
1996	Every Woman's Dream	Liz Wells	TV film
1997	'	Rebecca Highfield	Episode: "Re-generation"
1997	Invasion	Dr. Sheila Moran	TV film
1997	Rugrats	Melinda Finster	Voice; episode: "Mother's Day"
1997	Duckman	Tami Margulies	Voice; episode: "The Tami Show"
1998	Creature	Dr. Amanda Mayson
1998-2004	Sex and the City	Samantha Jones	Main cast; 94 episodes
1999	36 Hours to Die	Kim Stone	TV film
2004	'	Chloe Talbot	Voice; episode: "She Used to Be My Girl"
2005	Kim Cattrall: Sexual Intelligence	Herself	Televuision documentary film; also executive producer
2007	My Boy Jack	Caroline Kipling	TV film
2007	'	Herself	Guest host; series 5, episode 13
2009-2011	Producing Parker	Dee	Voice; 26 episodes
2009	Who Do You Think You Are? (UK)	Herself	Episode: "Kim Cattrall"
2009	'	Fourth Simpsons child	Voice; episode: "O Brother, Where Bart Thou?"
2010	Any Human Heart	Gloria Scabius	Miniseries; 2 episodes
2011	Who Do You Think You Are? (US)	Herself	Episode: "Kim Cattrall"
2011	Upstairs Downstairs Abbey	Countess of Grantham	Red Nose Day 2011 telethon sketch
2013-2016	Sensitive Skin	Davina Jackson	Lead Role 12 episodes
2016	The Witness for the Prosecution	Emily French	Miniseries; 2 episodes

Awards and nominations

Year	Award	Category	Work	Result
1982	Genie Award	Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role	Ticket to Heaven
1991	Golden Raspberry Award	Worst Supporting Actress	'
1999	[[Women in Film Crystal + Lucy Awards|Women in Film Crystal + Lucy Award]]	[[Women in Film Crystal + Lucy Awards#Lucy award|Lucy Award]]	Sex and the City
2000	Golden Globe Award	Best Supporting Actress - Series, Miniseries or Television Film	Sex and the City
2000	Primetime Emmy Award	Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series	Sex and the City
2001	Golden Globe Award	Best Supporting Actress - Series, Miniseries or Television Film	Sex and the City
2001	Screen Actors Guild Award	Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series	Sex and the City
2001	Primetime Emmy Award	Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series	Sex and the City
2002	Screen Actors Guild Award	Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Comedy Series	Sex and the City
2002	Screen Actors Guild Award	Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series	Sex and the City
2002	Primetime Emmy Award	Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series	Sex and the City
2003	Golden Globe Award	Best Supporting Actress - Series, Miniseries or Television Film	Sex and the City
2003	Screen Actors Guild Award	Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Comedy Series	Sex and the City
2003	Screen Actors Guild Award	Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series	Sex and the City
2003	Primetime Emmy Award	Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series	Sex and the City
2004	Golden Satellite Award	Best Supporting Actress - Television Series	Sex and the City
2004	Golden Globe Award	Best Supporting Actress - Series, Miniseries or Television Film	Sex and the City
2004	Screen Actors Guild Award	Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series	Sex and the City
2004	Primetime Emmy Award	Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series	Sex and the City
2005	Screen Actors Guild Award	Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series	Sex and the City
2006	Gemini Award	Best Host or Interviewer in a General/Human Interest or Talk Program or Series	Kim Cattrall: Sexual Intelligence
2009	People's Choice Award	Favorite Cast	Sex and the City
2011	Golden Raspberry Award	Worst Actress	Sex and the City 2
2011	Golden Raspberry Award	Worst Ensemble	Sex and the City 2
2011	GLAAD Media Award	Golden Gate Award
2013	Canadian Screen Award	Best Performance in an Animated Program or Series	Producing Parker
2015	International Emmy Award	Best Comedy Series	Sensitive Skin