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Name: Tilda Swinton
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Date of Birth:
November 05, 1960
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Place of Birth:
London, England, UK
Mini-bio:
Known throughout Britain for her idiosyncratic performances and long-time association with the late filmmaker Derek Jarman, Tilda Swinton is nothing if not one of the more unique actresses to come alo... read moreng during the second half of the 20th century. Born in London on November 5, 1961, Swinton attended Cambridge University, where she received a degree in social and political sciences. While at Cambridge, she became involved in acting, performing in a number of stage productions. Following graduation, Swinton began her professional theater career, working for Edinburgh's renowned Traverse Theatre and the Royal Shakespeare Company.In 1985, Swinton began her long collaboration with Derek Jarman, both as a friend and fellow artist. She made her screen debut in his Caravaggio (1986) and appeared in every one of the director's films until his death from AIDS in 1994. It was for her role as the spurned queen in Jarman's anachronistic, controversial Edward II (1992) that Swinton earned her first dose of recognition, becoming a familiar face to arthouse audiences on both sides of the Atlantic and earning a Best Actress prize at the Venice Film Festival for her work in the film. The acclaim and recognition Swinton garnered was amplified the same year with her title role in Sally Potter's adaptation of Orlando, Virginia Woolf's classic tale of an Elizabethan courtier who experiences drastic changes in both gender and lifestyle over the course of 400 years.Following appearances in Jarman's Blue (1993) and in his acclaimed biopic, Wittgenstein (1994), Swinton earned some of her strongest notices to date for her lead in Female Perversions (1996), in which she played a successful lawyer trying to cope with her own insecurities and self-destructive tendencies. She then portrayed another brilliant, troubled woman in Conceiving Ada (1997), a science fiction piece that cast her as the real-life daughter of Lord Byron, a woman who was widely held to be the inventor of the first computer.Never one to choose films for their simplicity or mainstream appeal, Swinton subsequently appeared in Love Is the Devil (1998), John Maybury's controversial account of the life and times of artist Francis Bacon. She then portrayed a battered wife in The War Zone (1999), Tim Roth's hellish portrait of extreme family dysfunction. Following on a slightly lighter note with Trainspotting director Danny Boyle's The Beach in 2000, Swinton would later take the lead in The Deep End (2001). Noted for her delicately textured performance as an isolated and protective mother who makes a desperate bid to protect her son after assuming he has committed murder, many critics noted Swinton's performance as a key element to the film's success. The next year, the talented actress took on multiple roles in a complex tale of cyborg fantasy and speculative science fiction, Teknolust, and appeared in a small role in Adaptation, written by Charlie Kaufman and directed by Spike Jonze. In 2003, Swinton delivered strong performances opposite Michael Caine in the thriller The Statement and Ewan McGregor in the erotic drama Young Adam. She went on to star in the ensemble comedy Thumbsucker and appeared with Keanu Reeves in the supernatural thriller Constantine. In 2005, she would play the White Witch in the much-anticipated live-action adaptation of C.S. Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia.For her work in 2007's legal thriller Michael Clayton, Swinton earned her first Oscar. That organization was one of many to recognize her portrayal of a cold, controlling corporate achiever as one of the best of the year. ~ Rebecca Flint Marx, Rovi
Tilda Swinton mini-bio: She worked with the Traverse Theatre in Edinburgh, and the Royal Shakespeare Company before embarking on a career in film in the mid-1980s. Her early film work included several film roles for director Derek Jarman, and also the title role in Orlando, Sally Potter's film version of the novel by Virginia Woolf. Swinton became notorious for a brief period in 1995 when she appeared as a live exhibit in the Serpentine Gallery, London. She was on display to the public for a week, asleep or apparently so, in a glass case, as a piece of performance art by Cornelia Parker. The following year, the performance, entitled The Maybe, was repeated at a gallery in Rome. She appeared in the music video for Orbital's The Box. Recent years have seen her move towards more mainstream projects, including the leading role in the well-reviewed American film The Deep End (2001). She appeared as a scheming angel Gabriel in Constantine with Keanu Reeves, as a supporting character in films such as Vanilla Sky with Tom Cruise, and The Beach, featuring Leonardo DiCaprio. Swinton has also appeared in British films: The Statement (2003) and Young Adam (2004), and sat on the jury of the 2004 Cannes Film Festival. In 2005, her performance as the sinister, seductive and mildly psychotic White Witch Jadis, in the film version of The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe garnered critical praise as did her portrayal of Audrey Cobb in the Mike Mills film adaptation of the novel Thumbsucker.She lives in Nairn in the north of Scotland with her husband John Byrne, an artist, and their two children, Xavier Byrne and Honor Byrne. 
