Sally Cecilia Hawkins (born 27 April 1976) is an English actress who began her career on stage and then moved into film. She has received several awards including a Golden Globe Award and the Berlin International Film Festival's Silver Bear for Best Actress, with nominations for a Critics' Choice Movie Award, a Screen Actors Guild Award, two Academy Awards, and two British Academy Film Awards.
After graduating from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, she started her career as a stage actress in productions such as Romeo and Juliet (playing Juliet), Much Ado About Nothing, and A Midsummer Night's Dream. Her first major role was in Mike Leigh's All or Nothing in 2002. She continued working with Leigh, appearing in a supporting role in Vera Drake (2004) and taking the lead in Happy-Go-Lucky (2008), for which she won several awards, including the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy and the Silver Bear for Best Actress.
Hawkins appeared in two Woody Allen films, Cassandra's Dream (2007) and Blue Jasmine (2013); for the latter, she received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. She went on to play the lead role in Made in Dagenham (2010), Paddington (2014), Maudie (2016), and Paddington 2 (2017), and appeared in Godzilla (2014) and Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019). For starring as Elisa Esposito, a mute cleaning woman in the romantic contemporary fantasy film The Shape of Water (2017), she earned critical acclaim and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress.
She has also appeared in stage productions with the Royal Court Theatre in London, and in 2010 made her Broadway debut in Mrs. Warren's Profession. In 2012 she starred in Constellations at the Royal Court Theatre, which later moved to the Duke of York's Theatre in the West End. On television, she appeared in the BBC adaptations of Tipping the Velvet (2002) as Zena Blake, and Fingersmith (2005) as Sue Trinder. She also appeared as Anne Elliot in Persuasion (2007), ITV's adaptation of Jane Austen's novel.
Early life
Hawkins was born in Dulwich, London on 27 April 1976, the daughter of Jacqui Hawkins and Colin Hawkins, authors and illustrators of children's books. Her parents both have Irish ancestry. She has a brother, Finbar, a television and film producer with Aardman Animations, who also writes children's books.
Hawkins grew up in Blackheath in a National Trust-protected gingerbread house designed by Patrick Gwynne. She developed an interest in acting at the age of three when she went to a circus show. She intended to go into comedy but ended up doing theatre plays. She attended James Allen's Girls' School in Dulwich, and graduated from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in 1998.
