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Join today<\/a><\/p>\n \n Already a member? When Lesley Manville<\/a> was 23, she met Mike Leigh<\/a> \u2013 and her future immediately came into focus. Just three years before, she\u2019d been a soap star, appearing on Emmerdale<\/a> as teenager Rosemary Kendall, but she decided to branch out to see what other roles she could find. \u201cI wanted to be a character actor,\u201d Manville tells me, ensconced in a cosy screening room at Chiswick Cinema. Well, mission very much accomplished. Through Leigh \u2013 a defining British filmmaker known for his realistic portrayals of working-class life \u2013 she was granted the chance to play roles she never dreamed possible. \u201cAge 16 to 23 was fine, but it didn\u2019t enter my head to play characters; I just played me and I was doing alright. But once I met Mike and we started working together, I loved it.\u201d <\/p>\n Manville has worked with Leigh on eight films in total \u2013 more than any other actor \u2013 but this just scrapes the surface of a vibrant career that\u2019s traversed stage and screen, big and small, with the actor always bringing a commanding, lived-in aura to her roles, be they icy, fragile, menacing or warm-hearted.<\/p>\n She is a prolific theatre star too: she originated Caryl Churchill and Andrea Dunbar roles in the 1980s, and starred in, among other productions, Ghosts, Long Day\u2019s Journey Into Night and Oedipus. For the latter \u2013\u00a0her Broadway debut \u2013\u00a0she won a prestigious Tony Award. To mark the release of her new film, the thriller Winter of the Crow, we\u2019re here to talk about all aspects of her career for interview series Life in Pictures<\/a> \u2013 cutting her teeth on stage, through to her defining working relationships, being headhunted for Phantom Thread by Hollywood maestro Paul Thomas Anderson<\/a>, her Oscars<\/a> experience and the TV role she gets stopped for the most. You can watch the full interview here<\/a>.<\/p>\n Lesley Manville on\u2026 starting out on Emmerdale in the 1980s<\/p>\n \u201cIt was Emmerdale Farm then. It was on twice-weekly at lunchtime. We shot the exteriors on the same kind of film that Paul Thomas Anderson would use to shoot Phantom Thread. I learnt so much about filming with a single camera. This was a great, great time for me. It was my first time living away from my home in Brighton \u2013 and I made some money! It allowed me, aged 19, to get my first flat, and that is not to be sniffed at. When I left, I remember they all said, \u2018Why are you going? It\u2019s so hard out there.\u2019 But I knew I had to move on. I had lots more parts to play. It was a really good job. I had my first screen kiss\u2026 in a cowshed. I\u2019ve had better screen kisses since then, obviously.\u201d <\/p>\n On… her early theatre work<\/p>\n \u201cMy relationship with the Royal Court<\/a> started from a Mike Leigh film for television that I made called Grown-ups when I was 23. It went out on the BBC<\/a> and the next day, I was this new actress on the block, even though I\u2019d been working since I was 16. I was at the Royal Court for a while. I did the original Top Girls. The original Rita Sue and Bob Too (both 1982). It was just an amazing time. It\u2019s where I met Gary [Oldman, who she was married to from 1987 to 1989]. Everything was great at the Royal Court. You felt like you were at the cutting edge of things. Over about 12, 13 years, I did about 10 plays there, and now I think how lucky I was. Any young actor who would be able to mirror that situation now would be very lucky.\u201d<\/p>\n On… working with Mike Leigh eight times<\/p>\n \u201cI owe it all to him. Everything. I honestly don\u2019t know where I\u2019d be if I hadn\u2019t met him. He liberated me to play characters that weren\u2019t like me. You create a character one-to-one with him for months, then he\u2019ll start to get you involved with other people, and then the improvisations start. You\u2019ll do them in real time \u2013 for example, with the barbecue in Another Year (2010), we did a real-time improvisation of that at an afternoon party for five hours. And then it gets distilled into a scene. I\u2019ve done big parts with him, small parts, as do all of his repertoire of actors. But he\u2019s going to get you to play a character that you\u2019ve never played before. I can\u2019t express enough what I owe him.\u201d<\/p>\n On… working in Hollywood for the 2014 film Maleficent <\/p>\n \u201cYou get paid more and the catering\u2019s better! Maleficent was the early days of motion capture. We had to wear what you\u2019d wear for deep-sea diving, except it would have hundreds of cameras on it. You\u2019d wear a helmet with two antennae cameras in your face, and cameras strapped to your body. Imelda Staunton, Juno Temple and I played pixies and we had the Cirque de Soleil people harnessing us up. We were quite literally flying around the studio at Pinewood! We had to do intensive pilates training to get ready for it. It was great fun. When we did Maleficent: Mistress of Evil, which was quite some years later, the technology had come on so far, we did it all with a grey T-shirt, no makeup and like 500 cameras in a semicircle all the way around us. We were on the first film for ages; the second film, I think we did in three afternoons. I wouldn\u2019t like to do a whole big shoot that\u2019s all green screen. I\u2019m not that kind of girl.\u201d<\/p>\n On… being chosen by Paul Thomas Anderson to star opposite Daniel Day-Lewis in Phantom Thread<\/p>\n \u201cThe big one. In 2016, my agent said, \u2018Paul Thomas Anderson\u2019s gonna call you tomorrow morning at 11am to talk about a film he\u2019s got in his head.\u2019 And I thought, \u2018Well, OK. Wow. I bet he\u2019ll forget.\u2019 On the dot, he calls and says, \u2018I’ve got this film. It\u2019s you and Daniel Day-Lewis. You\u2019d be brother and sister, and you run this fashion house, and it\u2019s the Fifties.\u2019 And in my heart, \u2018I\u2019m just going, \u2018Please, please, please tell me this is mine!\u2019 Because fashion has been a thing all my life. <\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ll never forget, he said, \u2018Give the script a read when you\u2019ve got a minute.\u2019 As if I wasn\u2019t gonna tear through it. He called me back and said, \u2018Look, Daniel and I are coming to London in a couple of months, so maybe we can meet up.\u2019 I didn\u2019t know if it was mine. Then I get an email from PTA over the weekend, and he went, \u2018Oh sorry, I forgot to say \u2013 it\u2019s yours.\u2019 Little detail! So then we started shooting \u2013 it was 14 of the most heavenly work weeks of my life. The whole job was something else. I\u2019m not superstitious, but six has been a recurring number in my life, and the script that PTA first sent me was dated 6\/6\/2016. I\u2019ve still got it. It\u2019s gonna be archived by the V&A.\u201d <\/p>\n On… attending the Oscars as a nominee for Phantom Thread<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019d never been before. At the end of the ceremony, you\u2019ve been there for five hours and you\u2019re hungry, and it\u2019s a lot of small talk, you know. Nice, but a lot of small talk. I said, \u2018What are we gonna do? What\u2019s the Vanity Fair party like?\u2019 And PTA said, \u2018It\u2019ll be just like this, but with more models.\u2019 So we did a great thing \u2013 me, him, Maya [Rudolph, PTA\u2019s wife] and Jonny [Greenwood, of Radiohead] went to a quiet cocktail room in a hotel, and we had omelettes and cocktails. It was the best end to the night. And at midnight LA time \u2013 which is 8am the following morning in the UK \u2013 I had to go on the Today programme, so I had to be sober. I thought, \u2018I absolutely can\u2019t be drunk as a skunk on live radio!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n On… BBC series Mum, which ran from 2016 to 2019<\/p>\n \u201cWhat a beautiful job that was \u2013 and it\u2019s the thing I get stopped for the most. If I\u2019m at the National Theatre or the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, it\u2019ll be a play, but on the street, on the train, it\u2019s Mum. It was so sublime. Obviously, I get to meet and work with so many different people, and you can\u2019t keep all of them in your contacts list, but very unusually, there were eight principal actors in Mum, and we are all close. I mean, Peter Mullan! I don\u2019t think he\u2019ll mind me saying this, but I think he was nervous doing Mum because he usually plays characters who\u2019re going to, you know, scoop your eyes out. But Peter is the most gentle, warm, loving human being. It was nice to see that natural side of him come out in this. Everyone asks if we\u2019re gonna do any more and I say no because [creator] Stefan Golaszewski intended it as three seasons. That\u2019s what I always saw in my head. It\u2019s beautifully timed \u2013 of course you wouldn\u2019t do it again!\u201d <\/p>\n On\u2026 playing Princess Margaret in The Crown <\/p>\n \u201cThis was an amazing job. Imelda [Staunton] and I were cast two years before, so I used to wake up every morning thinking \u2018I\u2019m gonna play Princess Margaret!\u2019, which was so exciting. And for two years, I could research really leisurely. And working with Imelda \u2013 we\u2019d been pixies together! Maleficent was our research, really. I knew it wasn\u2019t gonna be 20 episodes about Princess Margaret, but boy oh boy did Peter Morgan write me two amazing episodes. Astonishing. I felt for Margaret deeply. I felt the pain of somebody trapped in a circumstance and wanting to be something, but not quite having the freedom to be that person. I loved playing her \u2013 I had a cigarette holder, a silk dressing gown and a fabulous wig. It was win-win.\u201d<\/p>\n On\u2026 how she chooses roles <\/p>\n \u201cAll I want is to play a cleaning lady in Mrs Harris Goes to Paris [2022] and then Princess Margaret \u2013 two ends of the social spectrum. You couldn\u2019t get further away. That\u2019s what gets me up in the morning. I don\u2019t want people to think, \u2018Oh, that\u2019s alright for you to say, Lesley. You get those opportunities.\u2019 I\u2019m grateful and humble about that. But that\u2019s my modus operandi.\u201d<\/p>\n On\u2026 remaining in the UK<\/p>\n \u201cI never considered moving to America. I didn\u2019t think I would do it as a goal. Why would I do that when I was doing the best work that was on offer to anybody, anywhere? I do think we do the best theatre in the world \u2013 and I was doing it at the Royal Shakespeare Company, the National Theatre, the Royal Court, occasionally the West End, working with Mike Leigh, Max Stafford-Clark, Richard Eyre, Nick Hytner, Sam Mendes, Marianne Elliott. I mean, the list goes on and on and on. Why would I go to America?\u201d<\/p>\n On\u2026 going viral for saying people shouldn\u2019t take photos in theatres<\/p>\n \u201cLots of other actresses are doing it now. The thing is, I\u2019m not saying it wouldn\u2019t be all right at the end of any production, but it felt particularly wrong or inappropriate at the end of Oedipus [Robert Icke\u2019s 2024 West End production that she starred in]. You know how it ends! It\u2019s pretty devastating. And most of the audience were sitting there just going, \u2018I don\u2019t know what I\u2019ve just watched.\u2019 And then you get these other people who just think, \u2018I’ve gotta capture this on camera.\u2019 Cate Blanchett was going on about it recently because somebody was filming her in Electra\/Persona and at the end of the show, she quite rightly said, \u2018Look, you\u2019re spoiling it for people who haven\u2019t seen the show yet.\u2019 I feel I\u2019m fighting a losing battle, but I don\u2019t feel I can\u2019t say anything.\u201d <\/p>\n On\u2026 being a national treasure<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s not for me to say. All I want is for people to like my work, see what I\u2019m trying to do \u2013 not just in each individual performance \u2013 but acknowledge that I\u2019m trying to do characters that are different and keep it alive for myself, apart from anything. I think I\u2019m just Lesley Manville!\u201d <\/p>\n \u2018Winter of the Crow\u2019 is in cinemas now<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Want to bookmark your favourite articles and stories to read or reference later? 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\n Log in<\/a>\n <\/p>\n![\"Lesley](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Lesley-1.png\")
Lesley Manville in ‘Emmerdale’ (ITV)<\/p>\n![\"Lesley](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Screenshot-2026-10-13-at-09-02-14.png\")
Lesley Manville performing ‘Serious Money’ at Royal Court in 1987 (Shutterstock)<\/p>\n![\"Mike](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Lesley-2.png\")
Mike Leigh has worked with Lesley Manville more than any other actor (Getty)<\/p>\n![\"Imelda](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Lesley-7.png\")
Imelda Staunton and Lesley Manville playing pixies in 2014 film ‘Maleficent’ (Disney)<\/p>\n![\"Daniel](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Lesley-3.png\")
Daniel Day-Lewis and Lesley Manville in Paul Thomas Anderson\u2019s ‘Phantom Thread’ (Universal Pictures)<\/p>\n![\"Lesley](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Screenshot-2026-10-13-at-09-17-42.png\")
Lesley Manville and Peter Mullan in the BBC series ‘Mum’ (BBC)<\/p>\n![\"Lesley](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Lesley-4.png\")
Lesley Manville played Princess Margaret in the final two seasons of ‘The Crown’ (Netflix)<\/p>\n![\"Lesley](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Lesley-5.png\")
Lesley Manville in new film ‘Winter of the Crow’ (Signature Entertainment)<\/p>\n