Movies

Lindsay Vere Duncan CBE (born 7 November 1950) is a Scottish actress. On stage, she has won two Olivier Awards (for Les Liaisons Dangereuses and Private Lives) and a Tony Award (for Private Lives). She has starred in several plays by Harold Pinter. Her best-known television roles include Barbara Douglas in Alan Bleasdale's G.B.H. (1991), Servilia of the Junii in the HBO/BBC/RAI series Rome (2005–2007), Adelaide Brooke in the Doctor Who special "The Waters of Mars" (2009), and Lady Smallwood in the BBC series Sherlock. On film, she portrayed Anthea Lahr in Prick Up Your Ears (1987), voiced the android TC-14 in Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace (1999) and Alice's mother in Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland (2010), and played acerbic theatre critic Tabitha Dickinson in Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) (2014).

Early life
Duncan was born into a working-class family in Edinburgh, Scotland. Her father had served in the British army for 21 years before becoming a civil servant. Her parents moved to Leeds, then Birmingham, when she was still a child. She attended King Edward VI High School for Girls in Birmingham through a scholarship. Despite her origins, she speaks with a received pronunciation accent. As of 2011, her only role with a Scottish accent is AfterLife (2003).

Duncan's father died in a car accident when she was 15. Her mother was affected by Alzheimer's disease and died in 1994; she inspired Sharman Macdonald to write the play The Winter Guest (1995), directed by Alan Rickman, which he later adapted as a film.