Rosamund Pike

Rosamund Mary E Pike

27 January 1979


An English actress. She first came to attention for playing Bond girl Miranda Frost in "Die Another Day" in 2002. Her best known film roles include "Pride and Prejudice" (2005), "Johnny English Reborn" (2011), "Wrath of the Titans" (2012), "Jack Reacher", and "The World's End" (2013). In 2014, she starred in David Fincher's "Gone Girl", which earned her nominations for an Academy Award, a Golden Globe, a SAG Award, and a BAFTA Award.

Pike won a scholarship to Badminton School in Bristol, and while appearing as Juliet in a production of "Romeo and Juliet" at the National Youth Theatre, was noticed by an agent who helped her embark upon a professional career.

After being turned down by every stage school she applied to, she gained a place to read English Literature at Wadham College, Oxford from which she graduated. She took a year off to pursue her acting career, garnering stage experience in David Hare's "Skylight", Arthur Miller's "All My Sons", and several plays by Shakespeare; she achieved an Upper Second class degree in 2001.

While she was still at the university, Pike made appearances on British television shows, including "A Rather English Marriage" (1998), "Wives and Daughters" (1999), and "Love in a Cold Climate" (2001), a miniseries based on Nancy Mitford's novels "The Pursuit of Love" and "Love in a Cold Climate". 

After graduating she considered working at Waterstone's bookshop, due to a lack of acting opportunities, but was offered a role as a Bond girl and MI6 agent assigned to aid James Bond in "Die Another Day". She also appeared in the special show "Bond Girls Are Forever" and, shortly afterwards, the BAFTA tribute to the James Bond series. Pike then played Elizabeth Malet in "The Libertine" (2004), co-starring Johnny Depp, which won her the Best Supporting Actress award at the British Independent Film Awards. In the same year, she portrayed Rose in The Promised Land, a film about Israel, and starred as scientist Samantha Grimm in the cinematic adaptation of the computer game series "Doom". In 2005, she appeared as Jane, the elder sister of Elizabeth (played by Keira Knightley), in "Pride & Prejudice". Pike then starred in the film adaptation of Anne Michaels's novel "Fugitive Pieces". She also starred as a successful attorney in the film "Fracture", opposite Anthony Hopkins and Ryan Gosling.

As actress

• Die Another Day (2002)
• Promised Land (2004)
• The Libertine (2004)
• Pride & Prejudice (2005)
• Doom (2005)
• Fracture (2007)
• Fugitive Pieces (2007)
• An Education (2009)
• Surrogates (2009)
• Yesterday We Were in America (2009)
• Burning Palms (2010)
• Jackboots on Whitehall (2010)
• Barney's Version (2010)
• Made in Dagenham (2010)
• The Organ Grinder's Monkey (2011)
• Johnny English Reborn (2011)
• The Big Year (2011)
• The Devil You Know (2012)
• Wrath of the Titans (2012)
• Jack Reacher (2012)
• The World's End (2013)
• A Long Way Down (2014)
• Hector and the Search for Happiness (2014)
• What We Did on Our Holiday (2014)
• Gone Girl (2014)
• Return To Sender (2015)
• A United Kingdom (2016)
• HHhH (2017)
• High Wire Act (2017)
• Hostiles (2017)

Quotations

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I look my best when I'm totally free, on holiday, walking on the beach.

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Acting is about communicating what it is like to be human: the pain, the laughs, the misery, the joy. I suppose I am searching to have it all.

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Actresses generally aren't allowed to have haircuts, because short hair isn't considered as versatile.

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Especially in Britain, people want to limit you.

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You just never know who's going to have chemistry. You can put two of the sexiest people in the world together, and they could be completely flat.

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Anger is not an accepted thing for women. And, you know, I do get angry. I feel it's a very honest emotion.

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I do know that the key to anything good is feeling relaxed and free. That's the main thing that you can offer yourself as an actor.

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Success is freedom - scripts coming your way and getting to choose the stories you want to tell.

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What I find sexy is when someone's having fun and able to look right back at you.

* * *

I remember times of anxiety, ups and downs, and times of unexpected windfalls. But my parents loved what they did. And because their work was also their hobby, it taught me that work could be fulfilling.

* * *

I think I was lucky in that I wasn't one of those girls who are told they are pretty the whole time. I never got that. Nor did I ever obsess about my looks as a teenager.

* * *

Nothing can teach you what it's like to work on a film set, and the best education there can be for an actor is to walk up the street and observe human nature.

* * *

I never thought I'd make any money at all doing this business. Film was never even on the cards.

* * *

I work in the entertainment industry, and I like to be entertained.

* * *

I'd like people to get a sense of who I am, yet I want to keep my privacy, too.

* * *

I'd like to do Nicole Diver in F. Scott Fitzgerald's 'Tender Is the Night,' if that ever gets made.

* * *

If you told my 13-year-old self that one day I'd be talking about how Tom Cruise and I had good chemistry, she'd think you were completely mad.

* * *

It is interesting to break all the rules. I'm not married, I have a baby, and it feels infinitely more right.

* * *

Looking back, I just think I was a really average sort of girl.

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