Tamsin Greig

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Tamsin Greig

Tamsin Greig
Birth name Tamsin Greig
Born 23 February 1967
Flag of England Camden, London, England
Other name(s) Tamsin Leaf
Spouse(s) Richard Leaf
Notable roles Dr. Caroline Todd in Green Wing
Fran Katzenjammer in Black Books
Alice Chenery in Love Soup
Debbie Aldridge in The Archers
BAFTA Awards
Nominated Best Comedy Performance
2005 Green Wing
Laurence Olivier Awards
Best Actress (leading role)
2007 Much Ado About Nothing

Tamsin Greig (IPA pronunciation [ˈtæmzın grεg]), born 23 February 1967) is an English actress best known for her comedy performances.

As of 2006 she is probably best known for two Channel 4 television comedy parts: Fran Katzenjammer in Black Books and Dr. Caroline Todd in Green Wing. Other notable roles include Alice Chenery in BBC One's comedy drama Love Soup and Debbie Aldridge in BBC Radio 4's soap opera The Archers.

In a Radio Times poll in 2005, Greig was voted the 19th most powerful person working in UK comedy.[1]

In 2006 she listed Smack the Pony and Cannon and Ball as her biggest comedy influences.

Contents

Greig has had a long-running part as Debbie Aldridge in the BBC Radio 4 soap opera The Archers. Due to her other work, she is not in the show all the time, and her character Debbie spends most of her time living in Hungary. Grieg also performed in fringe theatre, and is a founder member and dancer with the Flip Side Dance Company. Greig also appeared in some advertising films, including one for Diet Coke. She appeared in an insurance advert three weeks before giving birth to her first son.

She reportedly got her first laughs during a production of The Crucible.[2] It is also known that Greig has problems with corpsing.[3]

She guest-starred in five episodes of the second series in the radio version of Absolute Power, playing Gayle Shand, a rival to Prentiss McCabe and Charles Prentiss's former lover.

She made a guest appearance on Woman's Hour on 28 September 2005, presented a Brit Award in 2006, and also appeared on Friday Night with Jonathan Ross on 31 March 2006.

Her agents are Sally Hope Associates.

Her first major role was Fran Katzenjammer in the sitcom Black Books in 2000, a neurotic who owned, "Nifty Gifty," a sort of new-age gift shop, in the first series, but became unemployed, and eventually became worse at everything she tried as the series went on. Several later roles depict similar characters.

In 2004 she had a small part in the movie Shaun of the Dead with Dylan Moran, who also appeared in Black Books. In 2005 she appeared as a nurse in an episode of the BBC science fiction television series Doctor Who entitled The Long Game, which also featured Simon Pegg, the writer and star of Shaun of the Dead.

She played constantly embarrassed surgical registrar Dr. Caroline Todd, the lead character in the Channel 4 comedy drama series Green Wing. Her performance won her "Best Comedy Performance" in the 2005 Royal Television Society Awards.[4] She also appeared as Caroline in an appearance at The Secret Policeman's Ball.

She starred in the BBC comedy drama series Love Soup (2005), as Alice Chenery, a lovelorn woman working on a department store perfume counter, in a role specifically written for her by David Renwick, who she met in 2003 when she appeared in an episode of Jonathan Creek.

During 2006 and early 2007 she played Beatrice in the much acclaimed Much Ado About Nothing (for which she won a Laurence Olivier Award.[5]), and Constance in King John, as part of the Royal Shakespeare Company's The Complete Works season. She won a Critics' Circle Award for the role, becoming the first woman to win the award.[6]

Greig is currently narrating the BBC One documentary series Play It Again.

Greig as Fran Katzenjammer in Black Books.
Greig as Fran Katzenjammer in Black Books.
Greig as Dr. Caroline Todd in Green Wing.
Greig as Dr. Caroline Todd in Green Wing.

Greig grew up in Camden and is of Scottish and Jewish ethnicity. She moved to Kilburn when she was three with her two sisters. She went to Malorees Junior School, then graduated with a first class honours degree in Drama and Theatre Arts from the University of Birmingham. After that she spent some time working at the Family Planning Association in an administrative role, and also spent some time at a secretarial college.

She never planned to move back to London, but she did in 1996, because her father was dying and she wanted to comfort him. She now lives in a flat in Kensal Green. She converted to Christianity at this time, having being raised an atheist.[7]

She is married to actor Richard Leaf, who she met on the set of the 1996 adaptation of Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere, and has three children. It is unknown what the children's names are, but their middle names all begin with "Z", and are sometimes comicly referred to as "Leaflets".[7] She has previously admitted that she is somewhat embarrassed by the marriage because, "It suddenly hit me one day: after we're married I'll be called Mrs T Leaf!"[8]

Before she became a mother, she was keen on parachuting and trampolining.[9][10]

She has stated that she is often mistaken for Sharleen Spiteri, the lead singer of the band Texas, for the impressionist Ronni Ancona, for comedian Sue Perkins and is even sometimes mistaken for a man.[7] In 2005, Greig was pictured with look-alike Lee McDonald at the Edinburgh festival. She commented that her look-alike was "gorgeous" and that the resemblance between the two was uncanny.

Not much is known about her political views, however, when one review by Charlie Spencer in The Telegraph compared her performance as Beatrice in Much Ado About Nothing "not exactly beautiful, a little like Edwina Currie." She refused to read on.[11][12]

Greig as Beatrice in the RSC's Complete Works adaptation of Much Ado About Nothing.
Greig as Beatrice in the RSC's Complete Works adaptation of Much Ado About Nothing.
Grieg with husband Richard Leaf
Grieg with husband Richard Leaf

  1. ^ thecustard.tv List of polls, including Radio Times most powerful people in TV comedy.
  2. ^ Seriously funny, an interview with The Telegraph with Tamsin Greig, 30 July 2006.
  3. ^ Channel 4 Green Wing microsite, Tamsin Greig interview, Page 2.
  4. ^ RTS Winners and Nominations list 2005
  5. ^ BBC News (2007-02-18) "Sondheim show wins theatre awards". Retrieved 2007-02-18
  6. ^ Independent Online Stoppard's 'Rock 'n' Roll' strikes right chord with the critics.
  7. ^ a b c Nemone, BBC 6 Music, 20 December 2006, radio interview.
  8. ^ Internet Movie Database Biography of Tamsin Greig
  9. ^ Drama Faces - Tamsin Greig Accessed 23 February 2007.
  10. ^ Independent Online Edition - Tamsin Greig: Green Goddess Accessed 23 February 2007.
  11. ^ The Stage A bumper West End year, the Critics’ Circle and a critical think-tank….
  12. ^ The Telegraph Bursting with life, wit and feeling.

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