| Miranda Otto | |
|---|---|
| |
| Born: | December 16, 1967 Brisbane, Queensland, Australia |
| Role: | Rebecca Ingram |
Miranda Otto (born December 16, 1967; age 56) is an Australian actress who plays Rebecca Ingram in 24: Legacy. Ingram, married to U.S. Senator John Donovan, is a former CTU National Director who struggles with doubts about leaving the agency. Otto's casting was announced on January 27, 2016.
Biography and career[]
Otto was born in Brisbane, Australia to actors Barry and Lindsay Otto, the sister of actress Gracie Otto. She was raised in Newcastle, Brisbane, and Hong Kong and became interested in acting through her father. Otto considered becoming a ballerina but was forced to abandon this goal due to moderate scoliosis. She graduated from the Sydney National Institute of Dramatic Art in 1990 and made her film debut in The Girl Who Came Late (1991) as Nell Tiscowitz, a role that earned her an Australian Film Institute nomination for Best Actress. Otto worked steadily in Australian film and TV productions through the 1990s, appearing in films including The Last Days of Chez Nous (1992), Love Serenade (1996), The Well (1997), and In the Winter Dark (1998), receiving three more AFI nominations. She also appeared in a small role in The Thin Red Line (1998, with Kirk Acevedo and Michael McGrady).
Otto's first significant Hollywood film was the thriller What Lies Beneath (2000, with Wendy Crewson), where she played Harrison Ford and Michelle Pfeiffer's doomed neighbor Mary. This was followed by roles in Human Nature (2001) and the BBC's The Way We Live Now (2001). In 1999, Otto was cast as Éowyn, a shield-maiden of Rohan, in Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings trilogy, immediately after Jackson viewed her audition video. To prepare for the role, Otto spent six weeks learning stunt choreography and horseback riding. She appeared in the second and third films, The Two Towers (2002) and The Return of the King (2003), acting opposite Sean Astin, Sala Baker, and John Noble. Otto's performance earned her an Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films nomination for Best Supporting Actress.
Her next project was the Australian TV miniseries Through My Eyes: The Lindy Chamberlain Story (2004), in which Otto played the title character, a mother who was convicted in a highly publicized trial of killing her baby daughter. The role earned her a 2005 Logie Award for Most Outstanding Actress in a Drama Series. Director Steven Spielberg, impressed by Otto's performance in The Lord of the Rings, cast her as Tom Cruise's estranged wife in The War of the Worlds (2005, with Robert Cicchini, Tracy Howe, and Jorge-Luis Pallo). The role was rewritten to accommodate Otto's pregnancy at the time. After War of the Worlds, she took a hiatus from acting to focus on raising her daughter.
In 2007, Otto starred in the miniseries The Starter Wife, opposite Judy Davis and Chris Diamantopoulos, and the short-lived NBC drama Cashmere Mafia, co-starring Lourdes Benedicto and Harris Yulin. Other recent film and TV projects include In Her Skin (2009), Reaching for the Moon (2013, with Tracy Middendorf), I, Frankenstein (2014, with Yvonne Strahovski), and Rake (2014, with Jeffrey Nordling, Bill Smitrovich, and Necar Zadegan).
In 2015, Otto was cast as CIA station chief Allison Carr in the fifth season of Showtime's Homeland, produced by Howard Gordon and Alex Gansa and written in part by David Fury and Chip Johannessen. Otto had a significant role in the season, filmed in Berlin, Germany, and shared several scenes with Mark Ivanir. Other actors in Homeland that year included Alex Lanipekun and Morocco Omari.
Otto married actor Peter O'Brien in 2003, after they met while performing in A Doll's House. They have one daughter, Darcey (born April 1, 2005).
24 credits[]
Selected filmography[]
- Annabelle: Creation (2017)
- The Daughter (2015)
- I, Frankenstein (2014)
- In Her Skin (2009)
- War of the Worlds (2005)
- The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
- The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002)
- What Lies Beneath (2000)
- The Thin Red Line (1998)
- The Well (1997)
- The Nostradamus Kid (1993)
- Initiation (1987)
Television appearances
- Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (2018-present)
- Homeland (2015)
- Rake (2014)
- Cashmere Mafia (2008)
- G.P. (1994)
- Hampton Court (1991)
- The Flying Doctors (1988)
