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21 Facts About Joanne Whalley

1.

Joanne Whalley was born on 25 August 1961 and is an English film and television actress.

2.

Joanne Whalley was credited as Joanne Whalley-Kilmer from 1988 to 1996 during her marriage to Val Kilmer.

3.

Joanne Whalley has appeared in both British and American feature films, including Willow, where she met Kilmer, and Scandal.

4.

Joanne Whalley was born in Salford, Lancashire, and later moved to Levenshulme and then to Stockport, Greater Manchester.

5.

Joanne Whalley made her feature film debut as a young Beatles fan in Richard Marquand's biographical film, Birth of the Beatles and flirted with the fringes of the Manchester new wave scene by briefly being a member of a Stockport-based band called the Slowguns, but left before the release of the first of their two singles later that year.

6.

Joanne Whalley found early success on British television with a lead role in Troy Kennedy Martin's highly regarded and influential drama serial Edge of Darkness, for which she received a nomination for the BAFTA TV Award for Best Actress.

7.

Joanne Whalley concluded her work at the Royal Court Theatre this year by performing the role of Bianca in William Gaskill's production of Women Beware Women and then moved to the Royal National Theatre appearing as Dewey Dell in Peter Gill's productions of As I Lay Dying at the Cottesloe Theatre.

8.

Joanne Whalley concluded her work with the Royal National Theatre that year by performing as Euphie and 1st Cutie in Peter Gill and John Burgess's The Women.

9.

Joanne Whalley met the American actor Val Kilmer in 1987 while filming her first US lead role in George Lucas and Ron Howard's Academy Award nominated fantasy adventure Willow.

10.

Joanne Whalley recreated Margaret Mitchell's iconic heroine Scarlett O'Hara, originally played by Vivien Leigh in Gone with the Wind, in the Emmy Award-winning TV miniseries Scarlett.

11.

Joanne Whalley gave birth to her second child, Jack, the following year.

12.

Joanne Whalley played the title role of former US First Lady Jackie Kennedy in David Burton Morris's Emmy Award-winning miniseries Jackie Bouvier Kennedy Onassis.

13.

Joanne Whalley later collaborated with the pop-punk band Blink-182, reading a letter at the beginning of the song "Stockholm Syndrome".

14.

In that same year, Joanne Whalley was a regular in the ITV miniseries Flood with Robert Carlyle amongst others.

15.

Joanne Whalley played one of the female leads, Vannozza dei Cattanei, mistress of Cardinal Rodrigo Borgia, future Pope Alexander VI, in the Showtime historical drama The Borgias, for which she was nominated for a Best Actress Golden Nymph Award at the Monte-Carlo Television Festival.

16.

Joanne Whalley guest-starred as Princess Sophie in season 4 of Gossip Girl.

17.

Joanne Whalley has made a number of appearances in streaming shows including roles as Sister Maggie in the third season of Daredevil, reprising her role of Sorsha from the Willow film in the Willow series, and a starring appearance in an episode of the second season of Carnival Row as the "Puck" Leonora.

18.

In 2020, Joanne Whalley starred in Eleanor Coppola's anthology film Love Is Love Is Love.

19.

Joanne Whalley met American actor Val Kilmer while filming the movie Willow.

20.

Joanne Whalley took a break from acting to bring up two children with Kilmer: a daughter Mercedes born on 29 October 1991 and a son, Jack, born on 6 June 1995.

21.

Joanne Whalley filed for divorce on 21 July 1995, citing irreconcilable differences.