Helen Elizabeth McCory (August 17, 1968-April 16, 2021) was an English actress.
Early Life[]
McCrory was born on August 17, 1968 in Paddington, London. Her mother, Ann (née Morgans), is a Welsh physiotherapist, and her father, Iain McCrory (born March 29, 1940), is a diplomat from Glasgow; they were married in 1968. She was the eldest of three children.
She was educated at Queenswood School near Hatfield, Hertfordshire, then spent a year living in Italy. Upon her return to Britain, she began studying acting at the Drama Centre in London.
Career[]
McCrory won third prize at the Ian Charleson Awards for her 1993 performance as Rose Trelawny in Trelawny of the 'Wells' at the National Theatre. In 2002, she was nominated for a London Evening Standard Theatre Award for Best Actress (for playing Elena in Chekhov's Uncle Vanya at the Donmar Warehouse). She was later nominated for a 2006 Laurence Olivier Theatre Award for her role as Rosalind in As You Like It in the West End. In April 2008, McCrory made a "compelling" Rebecca West in a production of Ibsen's Rosmersholm at the Almeida Theatre, London. She appeared in Charles II: The Power and The Passion (2003), as Barbara Villiers, Countess of Castlemaine and in supporting roles in such films as Interview with the Vampire (1994), Charlotte Gray (2001), The Count of Monte Cristo (2002) and Casanova (2005). In The Queen (2006), she played Cherie Blair, a role she reprised in Peter Morgan's follow-up The Special Relationship (2010).
McCrory speaking at the unveiling of a statue of suffragist Millicent Fawcett in Parliament Square, London in 2018.
She appeared in a modernized television adaptation of Frankenstein (2007). Her first pregnancy forced her to pull out of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007), in which she had been cast as Bellatrix Lestrange (she was replaced by Helena Bonham Carter). McCrory was later cast as Bellatrix's sister Narcissa Malfoy in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, released in July 2009. She reprised her role in the final films, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1 and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2. She also played the principal villain role of Rosanna Calvierri in the 2010 episode "The Vampires of Venice" of the BBC television series Doctor Who.
McCrory starred in The Last of the Haussmans at the Royal National Theatre, which began June 12, 2012. The production was broadcast to cinemas around the world on October 11, 2012 through the National Theatre Live programme. In 2013, McCrory narrated poetry for The Love Book App, an interactive anthology of love literature developed by Allie Byrne Esiri. Again in 2013, she played Lady Macbeth in Macbeth at the Little Angel Theatre. The same year, she started playing Polly Gray in Peaky Blinders. In 2014, McCrory played the title role in the National Theatre's production of Medea, directed by Carrie Cracknell. Also in 2014, she made a guest appearance on the TV series Penny Dreadful. She returned as a regular for the show's second season, playing the main antagonist. In August 2016, McCrory was confirmed to play Emma Banville in ITV drama series Fearless, which began airing in June 2017.
In 2019, McCrory appeared as Kathryn Villiers in Tom Rob Smith’s MotherFatherSon alongside Richard Gere and Billy Howle. It averaged 2.69 million viewers.
Personal Life[]
On July 4, 2007, McCrory married actor Damian Lewis; the couple had a daughter, Manon, and a son, Gulliver. Their main home was in Tufnell Park, North London, and they had another near Sudbury in Suffolk.
McCrory served as an honorary patron of the London children's charity Scene & Heard. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she and her husband supported Feed NHS, a programme to give food from high-street restaurants to NHS staff, and had raised £1 million for the charity by early April 2020.
Warner Bros. Appearances[]
| Year | Film | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1994 | Interview with the Vampire | 2nd Whore | |
| 2009 | Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince | Narcissa Malfoy | |
| 2010 | The Special Relationship | Cherie Blair | |
| Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1 | Narcissa Malfoy | ||
| 2011 | Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2 |
| Year | Show | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2019-2020 | His Dark Materials | Stelmaria (voice) |
