Helen Mirren

Profession: Actress
Place/Date of Birth: Chiswick, London, 26 July 1945

Watching her at the ceremony was her husband Taylor Hackford, her sister Kate Mirren and her neice Natalie Fitzgerald.

Raising Helen - 04/02/03
Docklands lady Helen Mirren is set to star in a supportive role to Kate Hudson in a new Hollywood film called - funnily enough ’Raising Helen’.

However this slightly misleading title has nothing to do with our Helen - the film is based on Kate’s character having to suddenly cope with raising three small children after the death of her sister. Our Helen’s role will be as Kate’s boss. in the film that is naturally!

Helen rewarded - 11/03/02
It’s all go for Helen Mirren at the moment. She has won the best supporting actress 2002 Screen Actors’ Guild Award for her part below the stairs in Gosford Park, beating competition from Dame Judi Dench and eight-year-old Dakota Fanning - who starred in I Am Sam - and the youngest SAG nominee to date.

DCI Tennyson is back - 14/02/02
Helen Mirren has confirmed that award winning Prime Suspect will be returning to ITV. Producers have chosen a writer to pen a new series and filming will begin later this year. The actress plays DCI Jane Tennyson in the crime thriller and revealed last month that she was in talks to revive her role after taking a break.

Another Oscar nomination for Helen - 13/02/02
Helen Mirren has received another Oscar nomaination. Her role as a coolly efficient housekeeper in Robert Altman’s acclaimed "Gosford Park" has lead to the Academy nominating her for Best Supporting Actress. The list is packed with British thesps such as Kate Winslet, Dame Maggie Smith, Sir Ian McKellan and Jim Broadbent.

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Biography

Helen Mirren was born on July 26, 1945 in London as Ilyena Lydia Mironoff. Her father was a member of an aristocratic Russian military family who happened to be stationed in England at the time of the Russian Revolution. A former violinist with the London Philharmonic Orchestra, her father worked as taxi driver, freelance musician and driving instructor.

After a brief attempt to accommodate her parents’ wishes by attending teachers’ training college, Helen quit to join the prestigious Royal Shakespeare Company and went on to play many of the Bard’s heroines. Helen is now an acclaimed and much-loved and respected actress who is perhaps best known as Detective Chief Inspector Jane Tennison, in the award winning British television series Prime Suspect.

She co-starred with Bob Hoskins in the British gangster film "The Long Good Friday" (1980) and was a seductively evil Morgana in John Boorman’s "Excalibur" (1981). She recently teamed up with Hoskins once again in the acclaimed British movie "Last Orders".

Helen won a Best Supporting Actress Oscar and Best Actress nomination at Cannes for her role in the film "The Madness of King George".

She currently divides her time between America with hubby Director/Producer Taylor Hackford and her home in Wapping.
February 2008