Keira Knightley is an English actress who shot to worldwide prominence in the 2003 American fantasy film Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl. Knightley began her ascent up to Hollywood A-list status in Star Wars: Episode 1- The Phantom Menace in 1999 and went on to appear in films like Bend It Like Beckham, Pride And Prejudice and The Imitation Game. Her role in the later had her nominated for a Golden Globe, a Screen Actors Guild Award, a BAFTA and an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress.
Knightley also featured in the historical drama Colette, based on the French novelist of the same name. The biopic premiered at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.
In the wake of the sexual assault scandal rocking Hollywood, the British actress recently spoke out in praise of the MeToo movement, revealing that she had also been a victim of sexual harassment on four different occasions. She, however, revealed that those instances didn’t happen on a film set but in her personal life.
Keira Knightley Bio
Keira Christina Knightley was born on March 26, 1985, in a suburban area in southwest London. She was originally named “Kiera” but her mother mistakenly spelled it as “Keira” on the birth certificate and they decided to go with the error.
Her father Will Knightley is an actor and her mother Sharman Macdonald is an actress-turned-playwright. Keira Knightley sure had a large pool of acting genes to select from! Her dad is English, while her Scottish-born mother is of Scottish and Welsh descent.
Her only sibling is an elder brother Caleb Knightley. She was a bridesmaid at his wedding to Kerry Nixon in Glasgow.
Knightley grew up in a modest household in Richmond, London, where she attended Stanley Junior School and Teddington School. She got involved in acting at a very young age and by the age of just 3, she asked for her own agent. That request was not granted until after 3 years when Knightley turned 6 and by the age of seven, Keira Knightley landed her first role in Screen One: Royal Celebration (1993).
After Juliet, written by her mother and the United States, written by her drama teacher are some of Knightley’s numerous local productions which she performed in. Her first major role was in the 2001 Walt Disney romantic adventure Princess of Thieves.
The actress enrolled at Esher College to study for her A-Levels where she focused on art, history, and English literature. Knightley, however, left after a year when she got the role of Lara Antipova in Doctor Zhivago (2002).
Her breakthrough role came in 2002 when she starred in Gurinder Chadha’s sports comedy film Bend It Like Beckham. Beyond the expectations of Knightley who didn’t have high hopes for the project, Bend It Like Beckham was a smash hit both in the UK and the United States. Despite her initial pessimism about the project, Knightley won 2 awards for that performance: the London Film Critics’ Circle for Best Newcomer and the Online Film Critics Society Award for Best Breakthrough Performance.
Knightley and her co-star Parminder Nagra, who played the main characters of aspiring footballers, attracted international recognition for their performances in the film. To prepare for their roles, they had to undergo 3 months of football training under the English football coach Simon Clifford.
Despite previously stating that she would never return to the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, Knightley reiterated her role of Elizabeth Swann with an appearance in 2017’s Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales.
Keira Knightley admits that she prefers history-based movies to modern-day films because of the distasteful way women are portrayed. According to the Pirates of the Caribbean star, female characters “nearly always get raped” in contemporary movies.
Keira Knightley’s Husband
Keira Knightley is married to English rock musician James Righton. Righton was a keyboard player of the London-based band Klaxons which disbanded in 2015.
The couple dated for 2 years before tying the knot on May 4, 2013, in Provence, France. Theirs was a private wedding ceremony with just 11 guests in the town hall of Mazan, just 12 miles away from Marseilles.
In May 2015, the couple welcomed their 1st child, a daughter named Edie Righton in London. The highly sought British actress returned to work just 5 months after giving birth to her daughter.
Is She Related To Natalie Portman?
The two actresses sure have a striking resemblance, however, they are not related in any way known to us. For starters, Knightley is English while Portman is American.
Due to their close resemblance, Knightley was chosen to play Queen Amidala’s handmaiden and decoy in Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace (1999) while Natalie Portman played the Queen.
So close is the similarity between these two that their own mothers were not able to distinguish between them once in makeup and costume for the movie. Knightley’s role as the decoy queen was kept under wraps in order to not spoil the surprise, through the promotions, fans were made to believe that Portman played both roles.
Her impersonation of Portman goes beyond Star wars as the English-born Keira Knightley has admitted to taking pictures and signing autographs for fans who had mistaken her to be Natalie Portman. Explaining that she isn’t Natalie Portman must be too much work for Knightley and so, she just decides to play along with the fans.
Net Worth
The English-born beauty made the Forbes annual list in 2008 as the second-highest-paid actress in Hollywood. She had earned a whopping $32 million in 2007 and was the only non-American on the highest-paid actresses chart that year.
Her net worth is currently estimated at $50 million. Of course, much of this comes from her flourishing acting career and her lucrative endorsement deal with Chanel’s Coco Mademoiselle perfume.
