Rosamund Pike

Rosamund Pike

Actor
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Life Story

Born on January 27, 1979 in London, England, actress Rosamund Mary Elizabeth Pike is the only child of a classical violinist mother, Caroline (Friend), and an opera singer father, Julian Pike. Due to her parents' work, she spent her early childhood traveling around Europe. Pike attended Badminton School in Bristol, England and began acting at the National Youth Theatre. While appearing in a National Youth Theatre production of "Romeo and Juliet", she was first spotted and signed by an agent, although she continued her education at Wadham College, Oxford, where she read English Literature, eventually graduating with an upper second class honors degree.

Pike appeared in a number of UK television series, including Wives and Daughters (1999), before scoring an auspicious feature film debut as the glacial beauty "Miranda Frost" in the James Bond film, Die Another Day (2002); when the film was released, she was only 23. Though her debut was a big-budget action film, the film work that followed was primarily in smaller, independent films, including Promised Land (2004), The Libertine (2004), (for which she won the Best Supporting Actress award at The British Independent Film Awards), and Pride & Prejudice (2005), as one of the Bennet daughters. A brief foray into Hollywood film followed with the action flick, Doom (2005), and the thriller, Fracture (2007), but she returned to smaller films with exceptional performances in three films: An Education (2009), Made in Dagenham (2010), and the lead opposite Paul Giamatti in Barney's Version (2010).

As she continued her stage work in England, Pike appeared in the spy spoof, Johnny English Reborn (2011), and inhabited the role of "Andromeda" in the sci-fi epic, Wrath of the Titans (2012). She returned to action films with the female lead opposite Tom Cruise in Jack Reacher (2012).

 
Family

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Trivia

Plays the piano and cello.
Can also speak French and German.
Went to school in Bristol, England, UK.
Graduated with a 2:1 (upper second class degree = 2nd Honors = Magna Cum Laude) in English Literature from Oxford University's Wadham College.
Went to the same school as famous Irish writer Iris Murdoch.
An only child, her parents are Julian and Caroline Pike. Julian is a professional opera singer, whilst Caroline is a concert violinist.
She was friends with Chelsea Clinton while at Wadham College, Oxford. Not only are they both the same height (5' 9"), they are both fluent in German, and they are both only children.
Won the Award for Best Debut at the 2003 Empire Awards for her performance as Miranda Frost in Die Another Day (2002).
The age difference between her and Halle Berry in Die Another Day (2002) - 12 years and 5 months - is the greatest age difference between two Bond girls in one film since Alison Doody and Grace Jones - a difference of 18 years - in A View to a Kill (1985).
Was engaged to Joe Wright, having met when he directed her on the set of Pride & Prejudice (2005), after he proposed to her on Lake Como in Italy (September 2007-June 2008).
Beat out Saffron Burrows, Alicia Silverstone, and Sophie Ellis-Bextor for her role in Die Another Day (2002).
Gave birth to her first child at age 33, a son named Solo Uniacke on 6 May 2012. The child's father is her long-term boyfriend, Robie Uniacke.
Was 5 months pregnant with her son Solo when she completed filming on Jack Reacher (2012).
She got the part in Gone Girl (2014) beating out Natalie Portman, Charlize Theron, Emily Blunt, Abbie Cornish, Olivia Wilde, Julianne Hough, and the film's producer Reese Witherspoon all of whom either auditioned or were considered for the part.
Turned down the role of Rita Skeeter on Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2005) in order to star in Pride & Prejudice (2005). The role went to Miranda Richardson.
She played two different characters in the James Bond franchise: Miranda Frost in Die Another Day (2002) and Pussy Galore in BBC4's 2010 radio adaptation of "Goldfinger". Die Another Day co-star Toby Stephens played James Bond in the BBC radio series.
David Fincher had her undergo a rigorous boxing training with welterweight champion Holly Lawson for her role in Gone Girl (2014).
Has been in a long-term relationship with Robie Uniacke since December 2009. They have two sons together.
Returned to work 4 months after giving birth to her son Solo to begin filming The World's End (2013).
Gave birth to her 2nd child at age 35, a son Atom Uniacke at home on December 2, 2014. Child's father is her long-term boyfriend, Robie Uniacke.
She and Halle Berry are the only two actresses to play Bond Girls (who bedded Bond) in the official 007 franchise to receive Oscar nominations: Berry won for her performance in Monster's Ball (2001), while Pike was nominated for her work in Gone Girl (2014). Kim Basinger, who starred in Never Say Never Again (1983), also went on to win the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for L.A. Confidential (1997), but her movie is considered non-canon in the 007 franchise. Both Pike and Berry were in the same Bond movie, Die Another Day (2002), and both were nominated in the Best Actress category. Oscar nominee Minnie Driver and Oscar Winner Judi Dench both appeared in the Bond film GoldenEye (1995), but neither played Bond Girls who bedded Bond.

 

Personal Quotes 

Filming Pride & Prejudice (2005) was a joy and made for one of my happiest summers ever. "It could well be that the story brings out the best in people - and it sounds so cheesy, but we really did behave like a family. The girls playing the younger sisters had never been on a film set before and wanted to socialize all the time, so we picnicked, hung out in a beautiful country house and went swimming naked in a lake. It was idyllic.
I don't think RADA wanted me, actually. When I was at Oxford I had a boyfriend at Central [School of Speech and Drama] and it looked like the most fantastic life, but I think not going makes you more free. Nothing can teach you what it's like to work on a film set, and the best education there can be for an actor is to walk up the street and observe human nature.
When you're dressed up like Miranda Frost [from Die Another Day (2002)], people assume you have a similar character, but I was 21 and quaking inside.
I think you can make a choice with that kind of thing. You can certainly keep a low public profile if you want to. Ideally, I'd like to be living in upstate New York, in a house that I could renovate and fill with books and clothes, while being offered the kind of parts that are currently going to Kate Winslet and Nicole Kidman.
I think it's OK to play to your strengths, and if I have a quality of Englishness that people like, I won't hide that. I'm probably not going to play a junkie and that's OK because there are other people who will do it better. A view that's been held for a long time is that the best way to prove oneself as an actor is to play the grittiest roles out there. I don't agree with that.
I'd love to say I was the kind of person who has an outline. But the only outline I have is that I want to carry on doing this all my life.
[on the direction from Joe Wright in Pride & Prejudice (2005)] You can get quite self-conscious at times, there's this business of your close-up coming up but, in that big ball scene, he put three cameras on it. And in lots of the dinner scenes too, so you wouldn't actually know when your moment was coming. That's why it's got that lovely unaware quality to it, you really did feel it's being observed. I think it's because people didn't know they were being watched really, that's what you get, this window on life.
Daniel Day-Lewis in In the Name of the Father (1993) was the first performance that made me think about how incredible acting is. It made me realise the power of film and that this medium could have a physical reaction on me and I hadn't really experienced that before. I come from a theatrical family and grew up around stage, so film-going was not really part of my life. But I remember going to see this film and being riveted by the story and the performances. I found it sexy and believable; it took me into another world. I was in floods of tears at the end of it.
[on writer-director Christopher McQuarrie's film, Jack Reacher (2012)] He is such a great writer, he manages to give you all the satisfaction of a love affair without [the characters] ever actually touched. In a way, I started to think that maybe sex scenes are what people put on when there isn't any chemistry.

 
 
Filmography

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