Emma Thompson
Born: April 1959
Where, London, UK
The double Oscar-winning actress is at home writing as much as she is in front of the camera.
Successes have included Howard's End (best actress Oscar) and Sense and Sensibility (best screenplay Oscar).
Thompson was a vice president of the Cambridge Footlights comedy team which boasted among its members Eric Idle, Hugh Laurie and Stephen Fry.
The daughter of actress Phyllida Law and Magic Roundabout creator Eric Thompson, she created The Woman's Hour - the first all-women Cambridge revue.
She made her TV debut in Friday Night, Saturday Morning and was rarely off the screen throughout the Eighties.
Roles included The Crystal Cube and The Young Ones before she wrote and starred in her own BBC series Thompson.
Her feature film debut came in 1988 when she starred opposite Jeff Goldblum in The Tall Guy and then she played Katherine in Kenneth Branagh's movie directing debut Henry V.
She went on to star opposite Branagh - her future husband - in three of his subsequent directorial efforts - Dead Again, Peter's Friends and Much Ado About Nothing.
In 1992, she appeared in her first Merchant-Ivory production as Margaret Schlegel in Howard's End.
Her peformance netted her a BAFTA, LA Film Critic's Award, New York Film Critic's Award, Golden Globe and eventually an Oscar.
Other films include The Remains of the Day, In The Name Of The Father alongside Daniel Day Lewis, Junior, Carrington and Maybe Baby.
Thompson also won an Academy Award for her adaptation of Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility, which was directed by Ang Lee.
She voiced Amelia the cat in Disney's underrated Treasure Planet and also starred opposite Al Pacino in TV-movie special Angels In America.
In 2003, she delivered a BAFTA-winning role in Richard Curtis' Love Actually and she also starred opposite Antonio Banderas in the widely derided Imagining Argentina.
Thompson joined the rest of British cinema's usual suspects when she took on the role of Professor Sybil Trelawney in Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban.
In 2004, she starred in and scripted the enjoyable children's yarn Nanny McPhee alongside Colin Firth.
Recent work includes a novelist with writer's block in the warm-hearted romantic comedy Stranger Than Fiction with Will Ferrell.
