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All About Brenda
After twenty years of hard work on stage and both television and stage, there are not many other
actresses who deserved the success, recognition and stardom which Brenda Blethyn has now achieved.
Born in 1946 in
Ramsgate in Kent, England, she started her career at British Rail in the 1960s. Saving money during her time there, she took
a risk and enrolled herself at the at The Guildford School of Acting in Guildford, Surrey, England and then left her British
Rail years behind. Her risk had paid off, by the mid-1970s she was working on stage, eventually joining the National Theatre
Company in 1975.
It was the 1980s, however that saw Brenda move onto the small screen when she appeared in a BBC2 Playhouse
presentation called _Grown-Ups (1980) (TV)_ , playing the character Gloria. Other work in television quickly followed and
this kept her working throughout the 1980s.
She still remained relatively unknown with the viewing public during the 1980s, despite her consistent work
and superb acting abilities. It was not until the dawn of the 90s that her career took off. In 1990, she played the supporting
cast member role of Mrs Jenkins in film based on the Roald Dahl novel The Witches (1990), with Anjelica Huston, Jane Horrocks and Mai Zetterling. Film work now became the order of the day in the early 90s, appearing in both A River Runs Through It (1992) and the television film The Bullion Boys (1993) (TV). It was then back to a TV series in 1994, with "Outside Edge" (1994), working on this production for its two year run.
It is without a doubt that 1997 will be remembered
as her biggest year to date. She was cast by her old friend Mike Leigh in the film Secrets & Lies (1996) as Cynthia Rose Purley, opposite highly talented Marianne Jean-Baptiste. The film received storming reviews and Blethyn won a BAFTA Film Award and subsequently received an Academy Award nomination for her role, along with Jean-Baptiste.
Although Brenda came home from the Oscars empty handed,
her profile in Hollywood and Britain soared as a result of the nomination and her appearance on The 69th Annual Academy Awards (1997) (TV).
Film roles then came thick and fast following Secrets & Lies (1996). Brenda was nothing short of superb in Little Voice (1998). A second Academy Award nomination followed but once again she was the bridesmaid rather than the bride at the Oscars. Since 1996, she
has found a new home in film and she has worked consistently in the medium.
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