Celebrity Online NewsOnline Celebrity Gossip and News

Thandie Newton
Newton at the 2007 BAFTAs
Born	Thandiwe Adjewa Newton November 6, 1972 (1972-11-06) (age 35)
Years active	1991-present
Spouse(s)	Ol Parker (1997-present) 2 children
Awards won BAFTA Awards Best Supporting Actress 2005 Crash Screen Actors Guild Awards Best Cast - Motion Picture 2005 Crash

The introduction of this article is too short. To comply with Wikipedia's lead section guidelines, it should be expanded to summarize the article.

Thandiwe Adjewa "Thandie" Newton (born November 6, 1972) is a BAFTA and SAG Award-winning English actress.^[1]

Biography

Early life

Newton is the daughter of Nyasha, a Zimbabwean health-care worker, and Nick Newton, an English laboratory technician and artist.^[2][3] Her birthplace is reported to be Zambia in biographies ^[2][3], but she herself has said that she was born in London, during a two week trip by her parents.^[4][5] The name "Thandiwe" means "beloved" in Ndebele, Zulu, Xhosa or Swazi and the name "Thandie" is pronounced TAN-dee. Newton played a character named "Beloved" in the film adaptation of the Toni Morrison novel Beloved in 1998. According to Newton, her mother is a Zimbabwean Shona Princess.^[6] She was raised in London and at Penzance, Cornwall, and educated at Downing College, Cambridge.

Career

Newton made her film debut in Flirting (1991). This Australian movie was also a launch pad for a young Nicole Kidman, with whom she has remained friends. She gained international recognition opposite Nick Nolte in the Merchant-Ivory production of Jefferson in Paris as Sally Hemmings, which led to her being cast in Jonathan Demme's Beloved (1998), in which she played the title character and costarred with Danny Glover, Kimberly Elise, and Oprah Winfrey. She played the female lead Nyah Hall in the film Mission: Impossible II. When this film went over schedule, she had to pull out of the film Charlie's Angels, and her character ultimately went to Lucy Liu.

Between 2003 and 2005, Newton played Makemba "Kem" Likasu, the love interest, and later wife of Dr. John Carter on the American television series ER, and in 2004 also appeared in The Chronicles of Riddick and Crash. In the latter, she played a wealthy black woman who, along with her husband, finds herself the target of a racist policeman (played by Matt Dillon). The policeman molests her before ultimately saving her life. Newton was honoured with a BAFTA award for Best Supporting Actress in 2006. Crash also won the Academy Award for Best Picture in 2005.

In addition to her film and television credits she played the title role in a 2006 radio pantomime version of Cinderella.^[7]

In 2007, she starred alongside Eddie Murphy in the comedy Norbit as his love interest, and opposite Simon Pegg as his ex-girlfriend in the comedy Run Fat Boy Run.

Newton's next role will be her portrayal of U.S. National Security Advisor-turned Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, in W., Oliver Stone's upcoming film biography of President George W. Bush, set to begin production in 2008.

Newton was an introducer at Wembley Stadium on July 7, 2007 for the UK leg of Live Earth. She was due to introduce Al Gore to the concert, but he was delayed, leaving Newton to tell jokes to try and entertain the audience.

Personal life

Newton married English writer and director Ol Parker in 1997. The couple have two daughters: Ripley, born in 2000, and Nico, born in 2004. Her daughters were named after the character Ripley in the Alien films and the cult singer of The Velvet Underground fame.^[8]

In 2006, she contributed a foreword to We Wish: Hopes and Dreams of Cornwall's Children, a book of children's writing published in aid of the NSPCC. In it, she writes vividly about her childhood memories of growing up in Cornwall and the way in which the county's vibrant cultural heritage made it easy for her to "enrich every situation with layers of magic and meaning".^[9]

Newton swapped her BMW X5 for a Toyota Prius after protesters bombarded the car with eggs at the gates of her daughters’ school. She then wrote to her celebrity friends, asking them to join her in switching to more environmentally sound cars.^[8]

Filmography

Awards and nominations

• BAFTA
  • 2006, Best Supporting Actress: Crash (Winner)
• BET Award
  • 2006, Best Actress: (Nominated)
• Black Movie Awards
  • 2006, Best Supporting Actress: Crash (Nominated)
• Black Reel Awards
  • 2006, Best Supporting Actress: Crash (Nominated)
  • 2003, Best Actress: The Truth About Charlie (Nominated)
  • 2000, Best Actress: Besieged (Nominated)
• Image Awards
  • 2007, Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture: The Pursuit of Happyness (Nominated)
  • 2006, Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture: Crash (Nominated)
  • 2003, Outstanding Actress in a Motion Picture: The Truth About Charlie (Nominated)
  • 2001, Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture: Mission: Impossible II (Nominated)
  • 1999, Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture: Beloved (Nominated)
• Razzie Award
  • 2001, Worst Supporting Actress: Mission: Impossible II (Nominated)
• Screen Actors Guild
  • 2006, Outstanding Cast in a Motion Picture: Crash (Winner)

References

External links

• Thandie Newton at the Internet Movie Database
• Exclusive Interview: Thandie Newton "The Chronicles of Riddick"
• We Wish: Hopes and Dreams of Cornwall's Children
• Video of premiere, London Sept 3 2007
• Newton, Thandie. Interview with Nigel Slater. "A Taste of My Life" Episode 3, Series 4. BBC Two, UK. 18:30 4th June 2008.