Louise Brealey

Louise Brealey
Louise Brealey in 2009
Born	1979 (age 32–33) Bozeat, Northamptonshire, England
Occupation	Actress and Journalist
Years active	2001 – present

Louise Brealey (born 1979), also credited as Loo Brealey, is an English actress and journalist. She is best known for playing Molly Hooper in Sherlock, Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss' adaption of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes".

Early life and education

Born in Bozeat, Northamptonshire, England, she read history at Cambridge before training at the Lee Strasberg Institute in New York City and with clown guru Philippe Gaulier.

Writing

Brealey has written on cinema, art and music since her teens. She has contributed reviews and features for various magazines including Premiere UK, Empire, SKY, The Face, Neon, Total Film and Radio Times.

She is the editor of Anarchy and Alchemy: The Films of Alejandro Jodorowsky (Creation Books, 2007).

Brealey was the deputy editor of Wonderland until April 2009, interviewing Liv Tyler for the cover of the Feb/March edition. Other recent features include the Pet Shop Boys and art collective Gelitin.

She works on a freelance basis as an Associate Producer for the BBC, writing documentary pitches.

Producing

Brealey is currently producing and co-writing "The Charles Dickens Show", a children's comedy drama for the BBC starring Jeff Rawle, Rupert Graves, Neil Dudgeon, Nathaniel Parker, Lynda Baron, Honeysuckle Weeks, Rupert Young, Adjoa Andoh, Sam Kelly, Geoffrey Streatfeild, Fiona Button and Mariah Gale.

Acting

Stage

Brealey made her professional stage debut in 2001 as 14-year-old Sophie in Max Stafford-Clark's production of Judy Upton's Sliding With Suzanne at the Royal Court. The Telegraph called her performance "a perfect poignant study of adolescence". Her portrayal of child prodigy Thomasina in the production of Tom Stoppard's Arcadia at the Bristol Old Vic in 2005 was described as "excellent" by The Mail on Sunday, with The Telegraph saying that "the evening belongs to Loo Brealey's Thomasina".

She appeared as Louise in Dennis Kelly's After The End for Paines Plough. The show opened in Russia before a hit Off-Broadway run in July 2006.

Brealey worked with Sir Peter Hall on the premiere of Simon Gray's Little Nell in 2007, in which she starred as Nell opposite Michael Pennington and Tim Pigott-Smith. The play was based on The Invisible Woman, Claire Tomalin's award-winning biography of Charles Dickens's mistress Ellen Ternan. Critics described her performance as "excellent" (The Mail), "impressive" (The Stage), "highly compelling" (Independent) and "astounding" (British Theatre Guide).

In 2008, Brealey won critical acclaim playing Sonya in Sir Peter Hall's production of Uncle Vanya, the first production at the Rose Theatre, with The Telegraph calling hers "a name to watch" and The Independent comparing her to Joan Fontaine in Rebecca. The Spectator said: "The besotted Sonya (Loo Brealey) is the only performer who uncovers the pathetic poetry beneath the indolent superficialities. Her big disadvantage is that she’s too attractive for ‘plain’ Sonya, but she disguises this by suggesting a lack of sexual allure with awkward giggles, squirrelly movements and a stupefied beaming naivety. All brilliantly done. It was only during her brief final speech... that the production reached out and imprisoned my heart." She appeared with Jeff Rawle and Sheila Reid in the sell-out Edinburgh Festival premiere of Simon Stephens's 7/7 play, Pornography. She next appeared with Linda Bassett as 15-year-old Hannah in Marius von Mayenburg's The Stone at the Royal Court before playing opposite Michael Feast at London's Theatre 503 in The Ones That Flutter.

Last summer she was the sex-mad, short-frocked daughter of Julian Barratt and Doon Mackichan at The Young Vic in Richard Jones's sell-out smash Government Inspector and 66 Books at the Bush Theatre.

Screen

Brealey made her television debut as Nurse Roxy Bird in two series of BBC drama Casualty. She then played Judy Smallweed in the 2005 BBC adaptation of Bleak House. Terry Wogan took Judy and her snaggle-toothed grandfather Smallweed (Phil Davis) to heart, regaling Radio 2 listeners with regular renditions of Davis' catchphrase "Shake me up, Judy!". Brealey followed Bleak House with a comic turn as Anorak, Alistair MacGowan's black-bobbed sidekick, in the Sunday night comedy-drama Mayo, cancelled by the BBC after just one series. The show fared better on its US release in 2007, with The Hollywood Reporter comparing it favourably to Moonlighting.

Brealey plays pathologist Molly Hooper in both series of Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss's drama serial phenomenon, Sherlock.

TV and film credits

Year	Title	Role	Director	Notes
2002	Casualty	Roxanne Bird	Various	TV (2002–2004)
2004	I Want You		Alex Norris	Short
2005	Bleak House	Judy Smallweed	Justin Chadwick	TV
2006	Mayo	Harriet 'Anorak' Tate	Metin Hüseyin	TV
2007	Green	Abi	Alex Hardcastle	TV film
2008	Hotel Babylon	Chloe	Sam Miller	Episode 23
2010	Sherlock	Molly Hooper	Paul McGuigan/Euros Lyn	TV
	Reuniting the Rubins	Miri Rubins	Yoav Factor
2011	Sherlock	Molly Hooper	Paul McGuigan/Toby Haynes	TV
	Law & Order UK	Joanne Vickery	Mark Everest	TV

Theatre credits

Year	Title	Role	Director	Theatre
2001	Sliding with Suzanne	Sophie	Max Stafford-Clark	Royal Court Theatre
2005	Arcadia	Thomasina	Rachel Kavanaugh	Bristol Old Vic
2006	After the End	Louisa	Roxana Silbert	US and Russian tour, Off-Broadway
2007	Little Nell	Nell	Peter Hall	Theatre Royal, Bath
2008	Uncle Vanya	Sonya	Peter Hall	Rose Theatre, Kingston
	Pornography	Actor 7	Sean Holmes	Traverse Theatre
2009	The Stone	Hannah	Ramin Gray	Royal Court Theatre
	The Ones That Flutter	Julie Ray	Abbey Wright	Theatre 503
2011	Government Inspector	Mayor's daughter	Richard Jones	Young Vic

External links

• Louise Brealey writing, editing website
• Louise Brealey at Spotlight
• Loo Brealey at the Internet Movie Database
• Louise Brealey at United Agents
• Louise Brealey at the BBC's Casualty site