Loo Brealey
Encyclopedia
Louise Brealey also credited as Loo Brealey, is an English
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 actress and journalist
Journalist
A journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...

.

Early life and education

Born in Bozeat
Bozeat
Bozeat is a village and civil parish in the Wellingborough borough of Northamptonshire, England, about south of Wellingborough on the A509 road, near Wollaston...

, Northamptonshire
Northamptonshire
Northamptonshire is a landlocked county in the English East Midlands, with a population of 629,676 as at the 2001 census. It has boundaries with the ceremonial counties of Warwickshire to the west, Leicestershire and Rutland to the north, Cambridgeshire to the east, Bedfordshire to the south-east,...

, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

. She studied at Dame Alice Harpur School
Dame Alice Harpur School
Dame Alice Harpur School is an independent girls school in Bedford, United Kingdom, for girls aged 11-18. In September 2010 the junior department of the school merged with the junior department of Bedford High School...

, Bedford
Bedford
Bedford is the county town of Bedfordshire, in the East of England. It is a large town and the administrative centre for the wider Borough of Bedford. According to the former Bedfordshire County Council's estimates, the town had a population of 79,190 in mid 2005, with 19,720 in the adjacent town...

 and went on to read history at Cambridge University before training at the Lee Strasberg Institute
Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute
__notoc__The Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute is an acting school located at 115 East 15th Street between Union Square East and Irving Place in the Union Square neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City, as well as at 7936 Santa Monica Boulevard in West Hollywood, California...

 in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

 and with clown guru Philippe Gaulier
Philippe Gaulier
Philippe Gaulier is founder of École Philippe Gaulier, a theatre school located in Sceaux, near Paris. He trained with Jacques Lecoq from 1965 - 67. Then became a teacher at École Jacques Lecoq from 1976 - 80. Gaulier is also a playwright and has worked as a clown and theatre director...

.

Writing

Brealey has written on cinema, art and music since her teens. She has contributed reviews and features for various magazines including Premiere UK
Premiere (magazine)
Premiere was an American and New York City-based film magazine published by Hachette Filipacchi Media U.S., published between the years 1987 and 2007. The original version of the magazine, Première , was started in France in 1976 and is still being published there.-History:The magazine originally...

, Empire
Empire (magazine)
Empire is a British film magazine published monthly by Bauer Consumer Media. From the first issue in July 1989, the magazine was edited by Barry McIlheney and published by Emap. Bauer purchased Emap Consumer Media in early 2008...

, SKY
Sky Magazine
Sky Magazine is the magazine distributed to subscribers of the BSkyB satellite service Sky Digital.- Availability :The magazine is available to subscribers of the Variety Pack or all packs of entertainment.- Content :...

, The Face
The Face (magazine)
The Face was a British music, fashion and culture monthly magazine started in May 1980 by Nick Logan.-1980s:Logan had previously created the teen pop magazine Smash Hits, and had been an editor at the New Musical Express in the 1970s before launching The Face in 1980.The magazine was influential in...

, Neon
Neon (magazine)
Neon was a British film magazine published monthly by Emap Consumer Media from December 1996 to February 1999. It attempted to be a refreshing alternative to other UK film magazines such as Empire....

and Total Film
Total Film
Total Film is a British film magazine published 13 times a year by Future Publishing. The magazine was launched in 1997 and offers film, DVD and Blu-ray news, reviews and features...

.

She is the editor of Anarchy and Alchemy: The Films of Alejandro Jodorowsky
Alejandro Jodorowsky
Alejandro Jodorowsky Prullansky, known as Alejandro Jodorowsky, is a Chilean filmmaker, playwright, actor, author, comic book writer and spiritual guru...

(Creation Books
Creation Books
Creation Books is a British publishing house specializing in experimental literature, surrealism, erotic and decadent literature. Creation also publish non-fiction, with books on magic, subcultures, and taboo topics such as suicide and serial killers. They are best known for publishing a number of...

, 2007).

Brealey was the deputy editor of Wonderland until April 2009, interviewing Liv Tyler
Liv Tyler
Liv Rundgren Tyler is an American actress and model. She is the daughter of Aerosmith's lead singer, Steven Tyler, and Bebe Buell, model and singer. Tyler began a career in modeling at the age of 14, but after less than a year she decided to focus on acting. She made her film debut in the 1994...

 for the cover of the Feb/March edition. Other recent features include the Pet Shop Boys
Pet Shop Boys
Pet Shop Boys are an English electronic dance music duo, consisting of Neil Tennant, who provides main vocals, keyboards and occasional guitar, and Chris Lowe on keyboards....

 and art collective Gelitin
Gelitin
gelitin is a group of four artists from Vienna, Austria. The group was formerly known as gelatin and changed their name in 2005. They are known for creating sensational art events in the tradition of Relational Aesthetics, often with a lively sense of humor.Among their projects are a gigantic plush...

.

Stage

Brealey made her professional stage debut in 2001 as 14-year-old cybergeek Sophie in Max Stafford-Clark
Max Stafford-Clark
Maxwell Robert Guthrie Stewart Stafford-Clark is an English Theatre Director.-Life and career:He went to school at Felsted and Riverdale Country School in New York City. He has worked as a theatre director since he left Trinity College, Dublin.His directing career began as associate director of...

's production of Judy Upton
Judy Upton
-Life:She collaborated with Lisa Goldman at The Red Room Theatre Company.She has written radio plays for the BBC.Ashes and Sand has been adapted into film.-Works:*Everlasting Rose, Old Red Lion Theatre, London, 1992...

's Sliding With Suzanne at the Royal Court
Royal Court Theatre
The Royal Court Theatre is a non-commercial theatre on Sloane Square, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. It is noted for its contributions to modern theatre...

. The Telegraph called her performance "a perfect poignant study of adolescence". Her portrayal of child maths prodigy Thomasina in the production of Tom Stoppard's
Tom Stoppard
Sir Tom Stoppard OM, CBE, FRSL is a British playwright, knighted in 1997. He has written prolifically for TV, radio, film and stage, finding prominence with plays such as Arcadia, The Coast of Utopia, Every Good Boy Deserves Favour, Professional Foul, The Real Thing, and Rosencrantz and...

 Arcadia
Arcadia (play)
Arcadia is a 1993 play by Tom Stoppard concerning the relationship between past and present and between order and disorder and the certainty of knowledge...

at the Bristol Old Vic
Bristol Old Vic
The Bristol Old Vic is a theatre company based at the Theatre Royal, King Street, in Bristol, England. The theatre complex includes the 1766 Theatre Royal, which claims to be the oldest continually-operating theatre in England, along with a 1970s studio theatre , offices and backstage facilities...

 in 2005 was described as "excellent" by The Mail on Sunday, with The Telegraph declaring that "the evening belongs to Loo Brealey's Thomasina".

She then took the role of Louise in Dennis Kelly
Dennis Kelly
Dennis Kelly is a London-based writer for both the theatre and television. Oberon plays have published a volume of Dennis Kelly Plays; Debris, After the End, Osama the Hero and Love and Money...

's apocalyptic two-hander After The End for Paines Plough
Paines Plough
Paines Plough is a London-based British touring theatre company founded in 1974 by writer David Pownall and director John Adams. They named the company after their favourite pub, the Plough, where they would drink pints of Paines....

. The show toured Russia before a hit Off-Broadway
Off-Broadway
Off-Broadway theater is a term for a professional venue in New York City with a seating capacity between 100 and 499, and for a specific production of a play, musical or revue that appears in such a venue, and which adheres to related trade union and other contracts...

 run in July 2006.

Brealey next worked with Sir Peter Hall on the premiere of Simon Gray
Simon Gray
Simon James Holliday Gray, CBE , was an English playwright and memoirist who also had a career as a university lecturer in English literature at Queen Mary, University of London, for 20 years...

's Little Nell in 2007, in which she starred as Nell opposite Michael Pennington
Michael Pennington
Michael Vivian Fyfe Pennington is a British director and actor who, together with director Michael Bogdanov, founded the English Shakespeare Company...

 and Tim Pigott-Smith
Tim Pigott-Smith
Tim Pigott-Smith is an English film and television actor.-Early life:Pigott-Smith was born in Rugby, Warwickshire, the son of Margaret Muriel and Harry Thomas Pigott-Smith, who was a journalist. He was educated at Wyggeston Boys' School, Leicester, King Edward VI School Stratford-upon-Avon, and...

. The play was based on The Invisible Woman, Claire Tomalin
Claire Tomalin
Claire Tomalin is an English biographer and journalist. She was educated at Newnham College, Cambridge.She was literary editor of the New Statesman and of the Sunday Times, and has written several noted biographies...

's award-winning biography of Charles Dickens
Charles Dickens
Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...

' mistress Ellen Ternan
Ellen Ternan
Ellen Lawless Ternan , also known as Nelly Ternan or Nelly Robinson, was an English actress who is mainly known as the woman for whom Charles Dickens separated from his wife Catherine.-Life:...

. Critics dubbed her performance "excellent" (The Mail), "impressive" (The Stage), "highly compelling" (Independent) and "astounding" (British Theatre Guide).

In 2008, Brealey won more critical acclaim playing Sonya in Sir Peter Hall's production of Uncle Vanya, the first production at London's Rose Theatre, with The Telegraph calling hers "a name to watch" and The Independent comparing her to Joan Fontaine in Rebecca. The Specator said: "The besotted Sonya (Loo Brealey) is the only performer who 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. It was only during her brief final speech... that the production reached out and imprisoned my heart."

Also in 2008, she appeared with Jeff Rawle
Jeff Rawle
Jeff Rawle is a British actor, perhaps best known for playing the long-suffering George in the news-gathering sitcom Drop the Dead Donkey...

 and Sheila Reid
Sheila Reid
Sheila Reid is a Scottish actress, best known for her performance as Madge Barron in Benidorm.-Career:Reid has had a long and distinguished career in theatre, film and television, and worked with Laurence Olivier at the Royal National Theatre. In 1980, she played the long-suffering wife of Trevor...

 in the sell-out Edinburgh Festival
Edinburgh Festival
The Edinburgh Festival is a collective term for many arts and cultural festivals that take place in Edinburgh, Scotland each summer, mostly in August...

 premiere of Simon Stephen's 7/7 play, Pornography. She next appeared with Linda Bassett as 15-year-old Hannah in Marius von Mayenburg
Marius von Mayenburg
Marius von Mayenburg is a German playwright, translator, and also instructor.In 1994, Mayenburg began his studies at Hochschule der Künste in Berlin. His first play, Haarmann, was first performed at Baracke in 1996.Fireface , written in 1997, was his breakthrough as a dramatist...

's The Stone at the Royal Court
Royal Court Theatre
The Royal Court Theatre is a non-commercial theatre on Sloane Square, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. It is noted for its contributions to modern theatre...

 before playing Michael Feast's daughter at London's Theatre 503
Theatre 503
Theatre503 is located at 503 Battersea Park Road in Battersea in the London Borough of Wandsworth, above the Latchmere pub. It is a performing arts venue which specialises in new work.-History:...

 in The Ones That Flutter.

She appeared this Summer as the sex-mad, short-frocked daughter of The Mighty Boosh's Julian Barratt and Smack The Pony's Doon Mackichan at The Young Vic in Richard Jones' smash-hit Government Inspector. (The Guardian ****, The Evening Standard ****)

Screen

Brealey plays Molly Hooper in both series of Steven Moffat
Steven Moffat
Steven Moffat is a Scottish television writer and producer.Moffat's first television work was the teen drama series Press Gang. His first sitcom, Joking Apart, was inspired by the breakdown of his first marriage; conversely, his later sitcom Coupling was based upon the development of his...

 and Mark Gatiss
Mark Gatiss
Mark Gatiss is an English actor, screenwriter and novelist. He is best known as a member of the comedy team The League of Gentlemen, and has both written for and acted in the TV series Doctor Who and Sherlock....

's drama serial, Sherlock.

She made her debut on television as Student Nurse Roxy Bird in two series of BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

 drama Casualty
Casualty (TV series)
Casualty, stylised as Casual+y, is a British weekly television show broadcast on BBC One, and the longest-running emergency medical drama television series in the world. Created by Jeremy Brock and Paul Unwin, it was first broadcast on 6 September 1986, and transmitted in the UK on BBC One. The...

. She then played Judy Smallweed in the 2005 BBC Television adaptation of Bleak House. Terry Wogan
Terry Wogan
Sir Michael Terence Wogan, KBE, DL , or also known as Terry Wogan, is a veteran Irish radio and television broadcaster who holds dual Irish and British citizenship. Wogan has worked for the BBC in the United Kingdom for most of his career...

 took Judy and her snaggle-toothed grandfather Smallweed (Phil Davis) to heart, regaling Radio 2
BBC Radio 2
BBC Radio 2 is one of the BBC's national radio stations and the most popular station in the United Kingdom. Much of its daytime playlist-based programming is best described as Adult Contemporary or AOR, although the station is also noted for its specialist broadcasting of other musical genres...

 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 cult Sunday night comedy-drama Mayo
Mayo (TV series)
Mayo was a comedy detective drama television series made by the BBC and starring Alistair McGowan, Jessica Oyelowo, Huw Rhys and Loo Brealey. The series is based on a popular series of Gil Mayo mysteries books by Marjorie Eccles. It was filmed on location in and around Leamington Spa. The series...

, cancelled by the BBC after just one series despite support from Time Out London, who described it as "David Lynch
David Lynch
David Keith Lynch is an American filmmaker, television director, visual artist, musician and occasional actor. Known for his surrealist films, he has developed his own unique cinematic style, which has been dubbed "Lynchian", and which is characterized by its dream imagery and meticulous sound...

 does Agatha Christie
Agatha Christie
Dame Agatha Christie DBE was a British crime writer of novels, short stories, and plays. She also wrote romances under the name Mary Westmacott, but she is best remembered for her 66 detective novels and 14 short story collections , and her successful West End plays.According to...

". The show fared better on its US release in 2007, with The Hollywood Reporter comparing it favourably to Moonlighting
Moonlighting (TV series)
Moonlighting is an American television series that aired on ABC from March 3, 1985, to May 14, 1989. The network aired a total of 66 episodes...

.

She appeared as Miri Rubins in Reuniting The Rubins, starring Timothy Spall and Rhona Mitra.

TV and film credits

Year Title Role Director Notes
2002 Casualty
Casualty (TV series)
Casualty, stylised as Casual+y, is a British weekly television show broadcast on BBC One, and the longest-running emergency medical drama television series in the world. Created by Jeremy Brock and Paul Unwin, it was first broadcast on 6 September 1986, and transmitted in the UK on BBC One. The...

Roxanne Bird Various TV (2002–2004)
2004 I Want You Alex Norris Short
2005 Bleak House Judy Smallweed Justin Chadwick TV
2006 Mayo
Mayo (TV series)
Mayo was a comedy detective drama television series made by the BBC and starring Alistair McGowan, Jessica Oyelowo, Huw Rhys and Loo Brealey. The series is based on a popular series of Gil Mayo mysteries books by Marjorie Eccles. It was filmed on location in and around Leamington Spa. The series...

Harriet 'Anorak' Tate Metin Hüseyin
Metin Hüseyin
Metin Hüseyin is a British television and film director.-Biography:His debut film, Tight Trousers, was nominated for a BAFTA Film Award for Best Short Film in 1989, and in 1998 he received an RTS award and a British Academy Television Award nomination for Common as Muck and The History of a...

TV
2007 Green
Green
Green is a color, the perception of which is evoked by light having a spectrum dominated by energy with a wavelength of roughly 520–570 nanometres. In the subtractive color system, it is not a primary color, but is created out of a mixture of yellow and blue, or yellow and cyan; it is considered...

Abi Alex Hardcastle TV film
2008 Hotel Babylon
Hotel Babylon
Hotel Babylon was a BBC television drama series based on the book of the same name by Imogen Edwards-Jones, that aired from 19 January 2006 to 14 August 2009, produced by independent production company Carnival Films for BBC One...

Chloe Sam Miller
Sam Miller
Sam Miller is an English television director. He is best known for his work on the BBC television dramas Cardiac Arrest and This Life. -Filmography:-Actor - Filmography:...

Episode 23
2010 Sherlock Molly Hooper Paul McGuigan
Paul McGuigan (filmmaker)
Paul McGuigan is a film director, best known for directing films such as Lucky Number Slevin and Push. He has also directed episodes of Sherlock and Monroe.-Filmography:-Awards:...

/Euros Lyn
Euros Lyn
Euros Lyn is a television director. He was born in 1971 and educated at Ysgol Gyfun Ystalyfera and the University of Manchester.To date, he has directed nine episodes of Doctor Who. He won the BAFTA Cymru award for Best Director for "Silence in the Library" and the 2007 Hugo Award for Best Dramatic...

TV
Reuniting the Rubins Miri Rubins Paul McGuigan
Paul McGuigan (filmmaker)
Paul McGuigan is a film director, best known for directing films such as Lucky Number Slevin and Push. He has also directed episodes of Sherlock and Monroe.-Filmography:-Awards:...

/Euros Lyn
Euros Lyn
Euros Lyn is a television director. He was born in 1971 and educated at Ysgol Gyfun Ystalyfera and the University of Manchester.To date, he has directed nine episodes of Doctor Who. He won the BAFTA Cymru award for Best Director for "Silence in the Library" and the 2007 Hugo Award for Best Dramatic...

2011 The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel John Madden
John Madden (director)
John Philip Madden is an English director of theatre, film, television, and radio.- Biography :Madden was educated at Clifton College. He was in the same house as friend and fellow director Roger Michell. He began his career in British independent films, and graduated from the University of...

Filming
Law & Order UK Joanne Vickery Mark Everest TV Series

Theatre credits

Year Title Role Director Theatre
2001 Sliding with Suzanne Sophie Max Stafford-Clark
Max Stafford-Clark
Maxwell Robert Guthrie Stewart Stafford-Clark is an English Theatre Director.-Life and career:He went to school at Felsted and Riverdale Country School in New York City. He has worked as a theatre director since he left Trinity College, Dublin.His directing career began as associate director of...

Royal Court Theatre
Royal Court Theatre
The Royal Court Theatre is a non-commercial theatre on Sloane Square, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. It is noted for its contributions to modern theatre...

2005 Arcadia
Arcadia (play)
Arcadia is a 1993 play by Tom Stoppard concerning the relationship between past and present and between order and disorder and the certainty of knowledge...

Thomasina Rachel Kavanaugh Bristol Old Vic
Bristol Old Vic
The Bristol Old Vic is a theatre company based at the Theatre Royal, King Street, in Bristol, England. The theatre complex includes the 1766 Theatre Royal, which claims to be the oldest continually-operating theatre in England, along with a 1970s studio theatre , offices and backstage facilities...

2006 After the End Louisa Roxana Silbert US and Russian tour, Off-Broadway
Off-Broadway
Off-Broadway theater is a term for a professional venue in New York City with a seating capacity between 100 and 499, and for a specific production of a play, musical or revue that appears in such a venue, and which adheres to related trade union and other contracts...

2007 Little Nell Nell Peter Hall Theatre Royal, Bath
Theatre Royal, Bath
The Theatre Royal in Bath, England, is over 200 years old. It is one of the more important theatres in the United Kingdom outside London, with capacity for an audience of around 900....

2008 Uncle Vanya
Uncle Vanya
Uncle Vanya is a play by the Russian playwright Anton Chekhov. It was first published in 1897 and received its Moscow première in 1899 in a production by the Moscow Art Theatre, under the direction of Konstantin Stanislavski....

Sonya Peter Hall Rose Theatre, Kingston
Rose Theatre, Kingston
The Rose Theatre, Kingston is a theatre on Kingston High Street in the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames. The theatre seats 899 around a wide, lozenge shaped stage....

Pornography Actor 7 Sean Holmes
Sean Holmes
Sean Holmes is a British theatre director and, from spring 2009, artistic director of London’s Lyric Hammersmith.-Early career:Sean Holmes took a masters degree at King's College, London and the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in text and performance...

Traverse Theatre
Traverse Theatre
The Traverse Theatre is a theatre in Edinburgh, Scotland. It was founded in 1963.The Traverse Theatre commissions and develops new plays or adaptations from contemporary playwrights. It also presents a large number of productions from visiting companies from across the UK. These include new plays,...

2009 The Stone Hannah Ramin Gray
Ramin Gray
Ramin Gray is an English theatre director and one time associated director of the Royal Court Theatre, London. From an Iranian background Gray now does extensive work abroad but is still based in London...

Royal Court Theatre
Royal Court Theatre
The Royal Court Theatre is a non-commercial theatre on Sloane Square, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. It is noted for its contributions to modern theatre...

The Ones That Flutter Julie Ray Abbey Wright Theatre 503
Theatre 503
Theatre503 is located at 503 Battersea Park Road in Battersea in the London Borough of Wandsworth, above the Latchmere pub. It is a performing arts venue which specialises in new work.-History:...

2011 Government Inspector Mayor's daughter Richard Jones
Richard Jones
-Artists and entertainers:* F. Richard Jones , American filmmaker* Dick Clair , born Richard Jones, American producer, actor and TV writer* Richard Jones , British bass guitarist...

Young Vic

External links

  • Louise Brealey writing, editing website
  • Louise Brealey at Spotlight
  • Louise Brealey at United Agents
  • Louise Brealey at the BBC
    BBC
    The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

    's Casualty site
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