Natasha Richardson

Natasha Jane Richardson (11 May 1963 – 18 March 2009) was an English actress. Born into the Redgrave acting dynasty in London, she was the daughter of actress Vanessa Redgrave and director-producer Tony Richardson. Her grandparents were actors Sir Michael Redgrave and Rachel Kempson.

Richardson attended private schools in London, including the Lycée Français Charles de Gaulle and St. Paul's Girls' School, before studying acting at the Central School of Speech and Drama. She made an early uncredited film appearance in 1968 in The Charge of the Light Brigade, directed by her father. She began her professional stage career in regional theatre at Leeds Playhouse and London's Open Air Theatre before making her West End debut in a 1985 revival of The Seagull.

Her early film work included playing Mary Shelley in Gothic (1986), starring in A Month in the Country (1987), and playing the title role in Paul Schrader's 1988 docudrama Patty Hearst. For her performances in The Handmaid's Tale and The Comfort of Strangers (both 1990), she won the Evening Standard British Film Award for Best Actress. During this period, she also appeared in television productions such as Ghosts (1987), Suddenly, Last Summer (1993), and the television movie Zelda (1993).

Richardson made her Broadway debut in the 1993 revival of Anna Christie, earning a Theatre World Award and a Tony Award nomination for Best Actress in a Play. In 1998, she starred as Sally Bowles in the Broadway revival of Cabaret, winning the Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical, the Drama Desk Award, and the Outer Critics Circle Award. Her later stage credits included Closer (1999), A Streetcar Named Desire (2005), and a 2009 concert production of A Little Night Music.

In film, Richardson was named Best Actress at the 1994 Karlovy Vary International Film Festival for Widows' Peak. She subsequently appeared in Nell (1994), played Elizabeth James in the 1998 Disney remake of The Parent Trap, and starred in Maid in Manhattan (2002) and The White Countess (2005). Her performance in Asylum (2005) earned her a second Evening Standard British Film Award. Her final onscreen film role was in Wild Child (2008), followed by a recorded offscreen voice role in the documentary The Wildest Dream.

In her personal life, Richardson was married to filmmaker Robert Fox from 1990 to 1992. She married actor Liam Neeson in 1994, with whom she had two sons, Micheál and Daniel, and became a naturalised American citizen. She was an advocate in the fight against AIDS, joining the board of AmfAR in 2006 and receiving its Award of Courage in 2000. Richardson died on 18 March 2009 at age 45 following a skiing accident in Quebec that caused an epidural hematoma.