Early life and career

Whalley was born in Salford, Lancashire, and later moved to Levenshulme and then to Stockport, Greater Manchester. There, she attended Bredbury Comprehensive School, before leaving to study at Harrytown Convent Girls' School in Romiley^[5] and the Braeside School of Speech and Drama in Marple. As a child actress, from 1974 to 1979, Whalley made a number of television appearances including bit parts in popular soap operas Coronation Street and Emmerdale.^[4]

She made her feature film debut as a young Beatles fan in Richard Marquand's biographical film, Birth of the Beatles (1979) and flirted with the fringes of the Manchester New Wave scene by briefly being a member of a Stockport-based band called the Slowguns, but left before the release of the first of their two singles later that year. Her television work continued with early appearances in episodes of popular series including Juliet Bravo and The Gentle Touch.^[4]

From 1982 to 1986 she studied and performed with the Royal Court Theatre starting at the 1982 Young Writers' Festival by originating the role of Rita in Max Stafford-Clark's first production of Andrea Dunbar's Rita, Sue and Bob Too. That same year she made a non-speaking appearance as a groupie in Alan Parker's musical drama Pink Floyd – The Wall (1982), featured in Stan Barstow's well-received TV series A Kind of Loving (Granada, 1982) and starred as Gilly Brown alongside Trevor Eve in Danny Boyle's production of The Genius at the Royal Court Theatre.^[6][4]

At this time, she was also the lead singer of the pop group Cindy & The Saffrons; they recorded the Shangri-Las' song "Past, Present and Future" in 1982 at Abbey Road Studios, and the track made the UK singles charts, peaking at #56. The next year they recorded "Terry", written and originally recorded by Twinkle, but this single failed to chart. The group split up soon afterward.^[7]

Continuing her theatrical work, she played the title role in the first production of Daniel Mornin's Kate at the Bush Theatre in 1983. That year she also appeared in episodes of popular TV series Bergerac and Reilly, Ace of Spies. Her work for the English Stage Company at the Royal Court Theatre continued with performances as Pam in Danny Boyle's production of Saved and June in Max Stafford-Clark's The Pope's Wedding from 1984 to 1985.^[6][4]

Rise to prominence

Whalley found early success on British television with a lead role in Troy Kennedy Martin's highly-regarded and influential drama serial Edge of Darkness (BBC, 1985), for which she received a nomination for the BAFTA TV Award for Best Actress. At this time she appeared in Alan Bleasdale's comedy film No Surrender (1985) and two films for Mike Newell: The Good Father (FilmFour, 1985) and the critically acclaimed Dance with a Stranger (Goldcrest, 1985). She also concluded her work at the Royal Court Theatre this year by performing the role of Bianca in William Gaskill's production of Women Beware Women and then moved to the Royal National Theatre appearing as Dewey Dell in Peter Gill's productions of As I Lay Dying at the Cottesloe Theatre.

Further television success came with the key role of Nurse Mills in Dennis Potter's drama serial The Singing Detective (BBC, 1986).^[3] She concluded her work with the Royal National Theatre that year by performing as Euphie and 1st Cutie in Peter Gill and John Burgess's The Women. The following year she performed as Masha in Bill Kenwright and Elijah Moshinsky's production of Three Sisters at the Albery Theatre and the Greenwich Theatre.^[6][4]

Whalley met the American actor Val Kilmer in 1987 while filming her first US lead role in George Lucas and Ron Howard's Academy Award nominated fantasy adventure Willow (1988).^[3] After her wedding to Kilmer in 1988, she moved to Los Angeles to continue her film career and began using 'Joanne Whalley-Kilmer' as her professional SAG-AFTRA name.

Her most notable British film role to date was as Christine Keeler in Michael Caton-Jones' historical drama Scandal (1989), a fictionalised account of the Profumo affair, which screened in competition at the 1989 Cannes Film Festival, featuring John Hurt as Stephen Ward and Sir Ian McKellen as John Profumo.^[3] That same year she also co-starred with Kilmer in John Dahl's neo-noir Kill Me Again (1989) and received a Theatre World Award for her performance of Geraldine Barklay in John Tillinger's off-Broadway production of What the Butler Saw for the Manhattan Theatre Club.^[8]

Further theatrical work came with her performance in the title role of Lulu in Ian McDiarmid's production of The Lulu Plays at the Almeida Theatre in 1990 to 1991. Later that year she gave birth to her first child, Mercedes, in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

She recreated Margaret Mitchell's iconic heroine Scarlett O'Hara, originally played by Vivien Leigh in Gone with the Wind (1939), in the Emmy Award-winning TV miniseries Scarlett (CBS, 1994). That same year she also played the lead role in Heywood Gould's legal thriller Trial By Jury (1994).^[3] She gave birth to her second child, Jack, the following year.

After her divorce from Kilmer in 1996, she changed her surname back to Whalley, starting with her lead role in Jon Amiel's spy comedy The Man Who Knew Too Little (1997) starring Bill Murray. She played the title role of former US First Lady Jackie Kennedy in David Burton Morris's Emmy Award-winning miniseries Jackie Bouvier Kennedy Onassis (CBS, 2000).^[3]

Later career

She later collaborated with the pop-punk band Blink-182, reading a letter at the beginning of the song "Stockholm Syndrome". In 2005, she appeared as Queen Mary I in The Virgin Queen, a BBC serial about the life of Queen Elizabeth I which also starred Anne-Marie Duff and Tara FitzGerald. That same year she filmed Played which also starred her ex-husband Val Kilmer. However, the two did not share any scenes together. In 2006, she appeared in Life Line, a two-part drama on BBC1, starring opposite Ray Stevenson.

In February 2008, she appeared on stage in Billy Roche's Poor Beast in the Rain presented by the Salem K. Theatre Company at the Matrix Theatre in Los Angeles.^[9][10] In that same year, Whalley was also a regular in the ITV mini series Flood with Robert Carlyle amongst others.

Whalley played one of the female leads, Vannozza dei Cattanei, mistress of Cardinal Rodrigo Borgia, future Pope Alexander VI, in the Showtime historical drama The Borgias (2011),^[11] for which she was nominated for a Best Actress Golden Nymph Award at the Monte-Carlo Television Festival.

She guest-starred as Princess Sophie in season 4 of Gossip Girl. With the cast of 44 Inch Chest, she shared the Best Ensemble Award at the San Diego Film Critics Society Awards 2010. The film reunited her with John Hurt, with whom she had done two previous films. In 2014 she played Aunt Patience in Jamaica Inn for BBC One. In 2015, she played Claudia, the wife of Pontius Pilate, in A.D. The Bible Continues, and Catherine of Aragon in the BBC miniseries Wolf Hall.

She has made a number of appearances in streaming shows including roles as Sister Maggie in the third season of Daredevil (2018), reprising her role of Sorsha from Willow (Lucas Film, 1988) in Willow (Disney+, 2022),^[12] and a starring appearance in an episode of the second season of Carnival Row (Prime, 2023) as the "Puck" Leonora.

In 2020, Whalley starred in Eleanor Coppola's anthology film Love Is Love Is Love. It was scheduled to have its world premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival in April 2020, but the festival was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The film subsequently premiered at the Deauville American Film Festival in France in September of that year.^[13][14]

Film

Television