Louise Brealey

Louise Brealey, also credited as Loo Brealey, is an English actress, writer and journalist. She played Molly Hooper in Sherlock,[1], Cass in Back with David Mitchell and Robert Webb, Scottish professor Jude McDermid in Clique, Gillian Chamberlain in A Discovery of Witches and Donna Harman in Death in Paradise.

Louise Brealey
Brealey in 2009
Born (1979-03-27) 27 March 1979
Bozeat, Northamptonshire, England
OccupationActress, writer, journalist
Years active2001–present

Education

Born in Bozeat,[2] Northamptonshire, England, Brealey won a scholarship for Kimbolton School and went on to read history at Girton College, Cambridge. She trained at the Lee Strasberg Institute in New York City and with clown teacher Philippe Gaulier in Paris.

Writing

Brealey has written on cinema, art and music since her teens, contributing reviews and features for magazines including Premiere UK, Empire, SKY, The Face, Neon, Another and Total Film. She is the editor of Anarchy and Alchemy: The Films of Alejandro Jodorowsky (Creation Books, 2007). Until April 2009, Brealey was the deputy editor of Wonderland magazine.[3] A freelance Associate Producer, she has written documentary pitches for BBC Arts. In 2013 her first play Pope Joan[4] was performed by the National Youth Theatre. Her monologue Go Back To Where You Came From was performed as part of Paines Plough Theatre's Come To Where I'm From project in 2018.[5]

Producing

In 2012 Brealey produced, co-wrote and co-starred in The Charles Dickens Show, a children's comedy drama for BBC 2 starring Jeff Rawle, Rupert Graves, Neil Dudgeon, Honeysuckle Weeks, Sam Kelly, Geoffrey Streatfeild, Fiona Button and Mariah Gale.

Acting

Screen

Brealey made her TV debut as Nurse Roxanne Bird in two series of BBC drama Casualty before playing Judy Smallweed in Bleak House. Terry Wogan took Judy and her snaggle-toothed grandfather Smallweed (Phil Davis) to heart, regaling Radio 2 listeners with regular renditions of Davis' catchphrase "Shake me up, Judy!". Brealey followed Bleak House with a comic turn as Anorak, Alistair MacGowan's black-bobbed sidekick, in comedy drama Mayo, described by The Hollywood Reporter as "Agatha Christie does Moonlighting".

Brealey plays pathologist[6] Molly Hooper in all four series of Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss's television drama, Sherlock.[7]

She is often asked to work in accents, recently playing a doughty Yorkshire doctor in Ripper Street, a Cockney ne'er-do-well in Law & Order: UK, a broken Geordie widow in Inspector George Gently and a ball-breaking Edinburgh academic in Clique.

Brealey played a leading role in the ITV drama The Widow, first broadcast in March 2019.

Stage

Brealey has made her name as an accomplished stage actress. Her stage debut was at London's Royal Court in 2001 as 14-year-old Sophie in Max Stafford-Clark's production of Judy Upton's Sliding With Suzanne. The Daily Telegraph called her performance "a perfect poignant study of adolescence".

Her portrayal of child prodigy Thomasina in the Bristol Old Vic production of Tom Stoppard's Arcadia in 2005 was described as "excellent" by The Mail on Sunday, with The Daily Telegraph saying that "the evening belongs to Loo Brealey's Thomasina".

Brealey worked twice with Sir Peter Hall. First in 2007 on Simon Gray's Little Nell, in which she played the title role opposite Michael Pennington and Tim Pigott-Smith. Based on The Invisible Woman, Claire Tomalin's award-winning biography of Charles Dickens's mistress Ellen Ternan, Little Nell followed Ternan's story from 17 to 44 years of age. Critics described Brealey's work as "excellent" (The Daily Mail), "impressive" (The Stage), "highly compelling" (The Independent) and "astounding" (British Theatre Guide). The following year, Hall cast her as Sonya in his critically acclaimed Uncle Vanya, the inaugural production at London's Rose Theatre. The Telegraph called hers "a name to watch" and The Independent compared her to Joan Fontaine in Rebecca. The Spectator said: "Brealey uncovers the pathetic poetry beneath the indolent superficialities. Her big disadvantage is that she’s too attractive for ‘plain’ Sonya, but she disguises this by suggesting a lack of sexual allure with awkward giggles, squirrelly movements and a stupefied beaming naivety. All brilliantly done..."

In 2011 Brealey was the sex-mad, short-frocked daughter of Julian Barratt and Doon Mackichan at the Young Vic in Richard Jones's Government Inspector. She next played three lead roles – Cassandra, Andromache and Helen of Troy – in Caroline Bird's sold-out production of The Trojan Women at London's Gate Theatre.[7] The Times called her performances "electrifying" and The Guardian said she "pulled off a remarkable treble". Brealey talked about the roles in the Evening Standard[8] and wrote a piece for The Times about the experience of going naked on stage, which went viral.[9][10]

In February 2014 she starred as Julie in August Strindberg's Miss Julie at the Citizens Theatre in Glasgow.

More recently she won Best Actress at the Manchester Theatre Awards for her role as Marianne in Constellations, directed by Michael Longhurst and played the lead alongside Anne Marie Duff in Marianne Elliott's Husbands and Sons at the National Theatre.

Audio

Brealey is the narrator of Caitlin Moran's How to Build a Girl and its sequel How to Be Famous, Alex Michaelides’ The Silent Patient, and Kate Mosse's Number One Bestseller Labyrinth. She was Megan in the audiobook edition of The Girl on The Train by Paula Hawkins, which won the 2016 Audie Award for Audiobook of the Year.[11][12]

TV and film credits
List of roles in television and film
Year Title Role Notes
2002–2004 Casualty Roxanne Bird TV series (95 episodes)
2005 Bleak House Judy Smallweed TV series (8 episodes)
2006 Mayo Harriet 'Anorak' Tate TV series (8 episodes); credited as Loo Brealey
2007 Green Abi TV film; credited as Loo Brealey
2008 Hotel Babylon Chloe TV series (Episode: "Episode #3.7")
2010–2017 Sherlock Molly Hooper TV series (12 episodes)
2011 Law & Order: UK Joanne Vickery TV series (Episode: "Tick Tock")
2012 The Charles Dickens Show Nelly Trent/Scrooge/Tiny Tim TV series
2013 Father Brown Eleanor Knight TV series (Episode: "The Mayor and the Magician")
2014 Delicious Stella
2014 Ripper Street Dr Amelia Frayn TV series (7 episodes)
2015 Containment Sally
2015 Inspector George Gently Jo Parker TV series (Episode: "Gently Among Friends")
2017 Clique Jude McDermid TV series (6 episodes)
2017 Back Cass
2018 A Discovery of Witches Gillian Chamberlain
2019 The Widow Beatrix
2019 Gomorrah Leena
2020 Death in Paradise Donna Harman TV series (Episode: "A Murder in Portrait" 9x02)

Theatre credits
List of roles in theatre
Year Title Role Director Theatre
2001 Sliding with Suzanne Sophie Max Stafford-Clark Royal Court Theatre
2005 Arcadia Thomasina Rachel Kavanaugh Bristol Old Vic
2006 After the End Louise Roxana Silbert US and Russian tour, Off-Broadway
2007 Little Nell Nell Peter Hall Theatre Royal, Bath
2008 Uncle Vanya Sonya Peter Hall Rose Theatre, Kingston
2008 Pornography Actor 7 Sean Holmes Traverse Theatre
2009 The Stone Hannah Ramin Gray Royal Court Theatre
2009 The Ones That Flutter Julie Ray Abbey Wright Theatre503
2010 Country Music Lynsey Lisa Blair & Eleanor While West Yorkshire Playhouse
2011 Government Inspector Mayor's daughter Richard Jones Young Vic
2012 The Trojan Women Cassandra/Andromache/Helen of Troy Christopher Haydon Gate Theatre (London)
2013 The Herd Claire Howard Davies Bush Theatre
2014 Miss Julie Miss Julie Dominic Hill Citizens Theatre
2014 Letters Live[13][14][15] Hay Festival, Wales
2015 Letters Live Freemasons' Hall
Husbands & Sons Minnie Gascoigne Marianne Elliott Co-production between National Theatre,London and Royal Exchange, Manchester
gollark: Soon the world shall be covered in ash (dragons).
gollark: I'll add it to the todo list.
gollark: What about an add multiple codes feature?
gollark: It's only really a problem if you get eggs in groups for some reason.
gollark: Basically, it'd be *possible* but slow and unpleasant.

References
  1. Day, Elizabeth (22 January 2012). "Louise Brealey: 'I don't think Molly is really Sherlock's type'". The Observer. Retrieved 11 November 2012.
  2. "Loo Brealey". Holby.tv. Retrieved 16 August 2008.
  3. "LivTyler". Louisebrealey.com. Archived from the original on 3 March 2016. Retrieved 23 January 2014.
  4. Andrew Dickson. "From Sherlock to Pope Joan: actor Louise Brealey on writing her first play | Stage". The Guardian. Retrieved 23 January 2014.
  5. https://www.painesplough.com/play/come-where-im-northampton
  6. "BBC One – Sherlock – Molly Hooper". BBC. Retrieved 2 July 2014.
  7. Urwin, Rosamund (7 November 2012). "Sherlock's Molly: the original Cumberbitch". London Evening Standard. Retrieved 11 November 2012.
  8. "Sherlock's Molly: the original Cumberbitch – London Life – Life & Style". London Evening Standard. 7 November 2012. Retrieved 23 January 2014.
  9. Louise Brealey (11 December 2012). "Louise Brealey: how it feels to be naked on stage". The Times. Retrieved 23 January 2014.
  10. "On Yellow Paper – What Molly Did Next". Onyellowpaper.tumblr.com. 11 December 2012. Retrieved 23 January 2014.
  11. "Meet the Cast: The girls from Paula Hawkins' THE GIRL ON THE TRAIN (Exclusive Audio Clips) | Books on Tape". Retrieved 29 May 2017.
  12. "The Year's Best Audiobooks: 2016 Audie Award Winners". The Booklist Reader. 11 May 2016. Retrieved 29 May 2017.
  13. "Letters Live: Epistolary Joy At Freemasons' Hall". Londonist.
  14. "BBC Sherlock star, X Files actor and a host of other celebrities perform at charity event for the Reading Agency". The Guardian.
  15. "Letters Live at Hay Festival". The Telegraph.
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