Amanda Root

Life and career

Root was born in Chelmsford, Essex. She began her career at the Leeds Playhouse in 1983 when she played Essie in Bernard Shaw's The Devil's Disciple.

"She was a remarkably complete actress even in her early twenties, when physically she looked little more than a child. With her dark soulful eyes she could command a stage, and the Royal Shakespeare Company saw her talent very early on."

She worked regularly with the RSC in Stratford-upon-Avon and London from 1983 to 1991, including playing the role of Juliet to Daniel Day-Lewis's Romeo; a very young Lady Macbeth; Cressida to Ralph Fiennes's Troilus, and Rosaline to his Berowne.

In 1995, she starred as Anne Elliot in Persuasion, co-starring Ciaran Hinds and John Woodvine. The film (made for TV, then released theatrically) was based on the novel by Jane Austen and was her first leading role in a film.

She won rave reviews (and was nominated for a Tony Award) in October 2008 for her portrayal of the control freak Sarah in The Old Vic's revival of Alan Ayckbourn's interlinked trilogy The Norman Conquests, directed in the round by Matthew Warchus.

Audio

She was the voice of Sophie in the animated film of Roald Dahl's The BFG (1989).

She portrayed Joan de Pucelle in the Arkangel Shakespeare's 2000 production of Henry VI, Part 1.

In 2006, Amanda Root undertook the marathon task of recording an unabridged audiobook of Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre. Published by Naxos it has a running time of 20 hours 30 minutes, spread across 17 audio CDs: ISBN 978-962-634-357-9.

She had previously recorded an abridged 3-hour reading of Jane Austen's Persuasion, published by Hodder & Stoughton Audiobooks in July 2004: ISBN 1-84456-035-X.

In November 2007 for BBC Radio 4 she played in the Woman's Hour Drama serial adaptation of F. Tennyson Jesse's novel A Pin to See the Peep Show, and on 2 December 2007 was heard in Arnold Wesker's 75-minute radio play The Rocking Horse, commissioned by the BBC World Service to celebrate its 75th anniversary.

As part of the BBC Radio 4 Hopes and Desires season, she played Lindsey, an incurable romantic who yearns to meet a modern-day Heathcliff, in Nick Warburton's 30 minute comedy Catching Heathcliff, broadcast at 11pm on 15 January 2008.

She was the voice of Fanny in the 2-cassette 1997 BBC radio dramatization of Jane Austen's Mansfield Park.

Theatre

Her stage credits include: