Early life and education
Emilia Rose Elizabeth Fox [1] was born on 31 July 1974 in Hammersmith, London. [2] Her mother is actress Joanna David and her father is actor Edward Fox; her uncle James Fox and her cousins Jack, Laurence, and Lydia are also actors. [3] She has a brother, Freddie (also an actor), and a half-sister, Lucy. [1] Her great-great-grandfather was Samson Fox, a self-made millionaire, and her great-grandmother was the actress Hilda Hanbury, sister of Lily Hanbury. Her grandfather was Robin Fox, a theatrical agent. [4]
Fox was educated at the independent Bryanston School near Blandford Forum, Dorset, where she played the cello, and at St Catherine's College, Oxford, where she studied English. [5] [6]
Career
Fox first appeared as Georgiana, the sister of Colin Firth's Mr. Darcy, in the 1995 television adaptation of Pride and Prejudice , followed by her role as the second Mrs. de Winter in the 1997 television adaptation of Rebecca , opposite Charles Dance. In 1998 she starred with Ben Miles in the adaptation of Catherine Cookson's The Round Tower as the young Vanessa Radcliffe, a girl from an affluent family who is forced to leave her home after becoming pregnant. Fox played Jeannie Hurst in the 2000 remake of Randall and Hopkirk .
In 2002, she starred in The Pianist as Dorota, a beautiful, blond, non-Jewish cellist who adores the playing of the Polish-Jewish pianist and composer Władysław Szpilman (played by Adrien Brody). The film was directed by Roman Polanski. In 2003, she played Jane Seymour in a two-part television biographical film about King Henry VIII. She also played the title role in Katherine Howard, directed by Robin Lefevre at the Chichester Festival Theatre in 1998.
In 2004, she joined the cast of the crime drama, Silent Witness . As of 2025, she is still in the show and has now played the role of Nikki Alexander for twenty-one years. 2004 also saw her play Lady Margaret in Part 2 of Gunpowder, Treason and Plot, the mini-series about James I (James VI in Scotland) and the Gunpowder Plot. In 2005, Fox appeared in the BBC miniseries The Virgin Queen, a four-part miniseries based upon the life of Queen Elizabeth I, Fox played Amy Dudley, the first wife of Robert Dudley, played by Tom Hardy, despite appearing in only one episode, her character remains a key character in the series. In 2008, she played Sister Jean in Baillie Walsh's Flashbacks of a Fool , which also featured Daniel Craig. She also starred in Things To Do Before You're 30 with Billie Piper, who would later marry her first cousin Laurence Fox; they divorced in 2016.
She was cast as Lynne Frederick in the 2004 film The Life and Death of Peter Sellers , which starred Geoffrey Rush in the lead role. A whole section of the film focusing on the Frederick/Sellers relationship was removed in the final edit, although she can be seen briefly in a background shot towards the end of the film. The deleted scenes with Fox can be found among the special features on the DVD release of the film.
In 2007, Fox was reunited with her Rebecca co-star Charles Dance when they starred together in the ITV1 mini-series Fallen Angel, Fox played a serial killer, Rosie Byfield, with Dance appearing as her father. The rewind format in which the show was shot traced the development of the killer streak of Fox's character. Fox and Dance had previously both appeared in ITV1's Henry VIII, but Dance's role as the Duke of Buckingham was limited, as his character was arrested for treason less than fifteen minutes into the first half, while Fox's scenes as the doomed third Queen Jane Seymour dominated the first half of the second episode. In the 2008 English language DVD re-release of the cult 2006 Norwegian animated film Free Jimmy , Fox voiced the character of "Bettina". The dialogue was written by Simon Pegg; other actors included Pegg himself and Woody Harrelson. Emilia Fox narrates the popular children's book We're Going on a Bear Hunt (by Michael Rosen and Helen Oxenbury) with Kevin Whately in a special edition book and DVD set. She appeared as Morgause in the second series of BBC's Merlin in 2009. She returned for the third and fourth series. The same year, she portrayed Queen Elizabeth II in the Channel 4 documentary The Queen .
She narrated the Doctor Who character Lady Winters in the Doctor Who Adventure Game, The Gunpowder Plot, (2011). [7] She had previously played Berenice in the Eighth Doctor audio drama Nevermore . [8]
In 2015, she appeared as Julia Swetlove in the BBC's dramatisation of J. K. Rowling's book The Casual Vacancy . The following year, she appeared in series 2 of The Tunnel as Vanessa Hamilton. In 2016–18 she starred as Sam Vincent in Delicious , a Sky television drama. Silent Witness , in which Fox stars, resumed on BBC1 in January 2018.
In 2019, Fox co-presented the BBC documentary Jack the Ripper – The Case Reopened, alongside criminologist David Wilson. [9] In 2021, [10] Fox and Wilson teamed up to present a full series of documentaries looking at cold cases, titled In the Footsteps of Killers. The second series aired in January 2023. [11]
Personal life
In 2000, Fox was engaged to comedian Vic Reeves; she subsequently dated Toby Mott. [12] [13]
In July 2005, she married British actor Jared Harris, the son of Irish actor Richard Harris. The couple announced their separation in 2008, and Harris filed for divorce in January 2009. [14] The divorce followed the breakdown of their long-distance relationship and her 2007 miscarriage. [15]
Following her separation from Harris, Fox began a relationship with actor Jeremy Gilley, and in May 2010 it was reported that Fox was pregnant with their child. [16] In November 2010, Fox gave birth to a daughter. [17] Fox and Gilley split up in 2011. [18]
She dated chef Marco Pierre White from 2012 to 2016 and Luc Chaudhary from 2019 to 2020. [18] She is currently in a relationship with TV producer Jonathan Stadlen. [19]
Fox is a patron of the drug, alcohol, and gambling addiction charity DrugFam. [20]
