Sophie Thompson- Actor of the Week

Sophie Thompson onstage in Clybourne Park

Sophie Thompson is one of my absolute favourite actresses. Her smile and her eyes are so expressive and she seems to truly inhabit every role she is in. She comes from a very talented family, as Emma Thompson is her sister and Phyllida Law is her mother. But she is a force onscreen in her own right.

Sophie Thompson as Lydia in Four Weddings and a Funeral

Bernard: How's it going, Lyds?
Lydia: Bloody awful.
Bernard: Oh dear, what's the problem?
Lydia: I was promised sex. Everybody said it. You'll be a bridesmaid, you'll get sex, you'll be fighting 'em off. But not so much as a tongue in sight.
Bernard: Well, I mean, if you fancy anything, I could always...
Lydia: Oh, don't be ridiculous, Bernard. I'm not that desperate.

Sophie Thompson as Miss Bates in Emma with her mother Phyllida Law as Mrs. Bates

  
Miss Bates: It left us speechless, quite speechless I tell you, and we have not stopped talking of it since.

Sophie Thompson as Mary Musgrove in Persuasion

Mary Musgrove: Are you coming in, Henrietta, or is my cottage insufficiently grand for you?

Sophie Thompson (second from left) as Dorothy in Gosford Park

Dorothy: I believe in love. Not just getting it, but giving it. I think that if you're able to love someone, even if they don't know it, even if they can't love you back, then it's worth it. 

Sophie Thompson as Mafalda Hopkirk in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

She even got a small part in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 as Mafalda Hopkirk. And she also plays Hermione Granger pretending to be Mafalda Hopkirk...oh, it's complicated!

Emma and Sophie Thompson as teenagers

In the old family photo above, you can see that although there is a family resemblance, their eyes are totally different. Sophie has the wide open eyes that gave Lydia from Four Weddings and a Funeral her wonderful look.

Sophie Thompson and Richard Lumsden at the Olivier Awards 2011 (Sophie was nominated)

Sophie lives with her husband Richard Lumsden in London with their sons Ernie and Walter. She met Richard on the set of Sense and Sensibility. He played the coxcomb Robert Ferrars, brother to Hugh Grant's character Edward Ferrars. Her sister Emma married Greg Wise, who played Willoughby in S&S.  Up until recently, she lived on the same street as her mother and her sister. She moved all of a mile away!

I am now going to pop in my recently arrived DVD and see her in The Young Visiters (written by a 9 year old, hence the spelling). Also starring Jim Broadbent and Hugh Laurie, I can't wait to see if she is frumpy or glam. She can do it all!