Fine-boned and soft-spoken, Thandie Newton displays a deceptive
fragility that is betrayed by the strong, resilient characters she often
portrays. The actress was born in Zambia in 1972 to a Zimbabwean mother
and British father who moved their family to London when Newton was four.
It was while a student at a private school in North London that the
actress met Australian director John Duigan, who was casting his
coming-of-age tale Flirting (1991). Newton won a leading role as the
smart, worldly girlfriend of the film's protagonist and starred alongside
a then relatively unknown Nicole Kidman.Her next film of any significance
was 1994's Interview With the Vampire, in which she had a minor role
which, ironically enough, called for her to be killed off by Kidman's
husband, Tom Cruise. The same year Newton acted as part of an ensemble
cast in Loaded, a fairly obscure film directed by Anna Campion, sister of
The Piano's Jane. She was then reunited with Flirting director Duigan in
1995 for The Journey of August King, a little-seen feature in which she
starred with Jason Patric. Greater recognition came in the form of the
same year's Jefferson in Paris, a critically maligned but impressively
cast film in which Newton played Sally Hemings, slave and lover of Nick
Nolte's Thomas Jefferson. Acting alongside individuals such as Nolte,
James Earl Jones, and Gwyneth Paltrow certainly did little to hurt
Newton's reputation, and the next year she had yet another starring role,
this time opposite Jon Bon Jovi in her third film with director Duigan,
The Leading Man. Despite her leading status, Newton still hovered on the
border of relative obscurity, something that finally began to change with
three 1998 films in which she had major roles. The first was Vondie Curtis
Hall's Gridlock'd, a film that won Newton raves for her turn as a
heroine-addicted jazz singer opposite Tim Roth and Tupac Shakur. Beloved,
Newton's second film that year, won her further recognition, both for her
mere presence in the highly-anticipated adaptation of Toni Morrison's
novel, and for her portrayal of the mysterious, ghostly girl who torments
Oprah Winfrey's Sethe. Finally, it was with her third film of 1998,
Besieged, that Newton graduated from relative obscurity to the rank of
Hollywood Up and Comer. The film, which was directed by Bernardo
Bertolucci and co-starred David Thewlis, received stellar reviews, many of
which singled out Newton's performance for particular praise. This, along
with a coveted spot on the April 1999 cover of Vanity Fair's annual
Hollywood Issue, further cemented the actress' well-deserved status as one
of the industry's latest Forces to Be Reckoned With. In 2000, Newton
further ascended the ranks of recognition when she starred opposite former
Interview With the Vampire co-star Tom Cruise in John Woo's Mission:
Impossible II; although the film received mixed reviews, Newton earned
almost unanimous approval from critics who praised her strong, dynamic
performance. |