Pearl Mackie

Pearl Mackie is a British actress who gained widespread recognition for portraying Bill Potts, a companion to The Doctor, in the long-running BBC television series Doctor Who. Before her major television roles, she built her acting career through extensive drama training and performances across various London theatrical venues and screen projects.

Mackie was born on 29 May 1987 in South London and grew up in Brixton. She is of paternal West Indian and maternal English heritage, and her grandfather was Philip Mackie, the screenwriter of The Naked Civil Servant. She received her secondary education at Burntwood School in Tooting before earning a degree in Drama from the University of Bristol. During her university studies, she engaged in workshops, participated in extra-curricular stage productions, and developed proficiency in English, French, and Spanish. She subsequently completed her training at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, graduating in 2010.

Following her graduation, Mackie received a nomination for the BBC Carleton Hobbs Award in 2010 for her duologue performances in the school play Noughts & Crosses. She made an early feature appearance in the 2013 musical comedy Svengali as a front of house worker. Her television breakthrough arrived in 2014 when she was cast as Anne-Marie Frasier in the BBC One soap opera Doctors. That same year, she performed as Mia in Crystal Springs at the Park Theatre and played two characters, Cece and Caits, in the political satire Obama-ology at the Finborough Theatre.

Mackie's stage career continued in 2015 when she joined the National Theatre's West End production of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. She also appeared in the satirical short film Date Aid for Bond and worked as an acting tutor with Troupers, an organization providing theatre instruction to young people. In April 2016, she was announced as Bill Potts in Doctor Who, and it was revealed in March 2017 that her character would be the show's first openly gay main companion.

After completing work on Doctor Who, Mackie joined the cast of Harold Pinter's play The Birthday Party as Lulu. The production opened at London's Harold Pinter Theatre in January 2018 alongside cast members Stephen Mangan, Toby Jones, and Zoë Wanamaker.

In 2020, Mackie made a guest appearance as Lucy 1 in Friday Night Dinner and later secured a recurring role as Alysse in the American television series The Diplomat. She was also cast in the 2025 Death in Paradise Christmas special alongside Kate Ashfield, Josie Lawrence, and Billy Harris. In her personal life, Mackie publicly came out as bisexual in June 2020, announced her engagement to Kam Chhokar in January 2022, and married her partner in May 2024.