Lesley Manville can make an affectionate look feel troubling without overstating it. We value that precision, and her ability to make a supporting part worth watching even when the film around her disappoints.
Fi1m perspective
In Back to Black (2024), Lesley Manville sits at a kitchen table with Marisa Abela and a pot of tea, with little being said. As Cynthia, Amy Winehouse’s grandmother, she watches with pride and a chill that makes the affection less reassuring. We were moved by those quiet exchanges because Manville shows how closely Cynthia is watching her granddaughter without needing a speech to explain herself. Nick Cave and Warren Ellis leave a single line of strings beneath the scene; the restraint suits a performance that has already given us enough to notice.
Mike Leigh’s improvisational methods are important to her work, allowing characters to be developed in detail. Their collaborations stretch from Grown-Ups (1980) through Secrets & Lies (1996), in which she plays the social worker, to the central role of Mary in Another Year (2010). In Secrets & Lies, Brenda Blethyn and Marianne Jean-Baptiste carry the difficult conversations that make the film worth an uninterrupted evening. Paul Thomas Anderson’s Phantom Thread (2017) brought Manville wider international attention as Cyril Woodcock, opposite Daniel Day-Lewis. The detailed, collaborative preparation continued with Anderson; the attention came after decades of work.
Her recent supporting parts also show how little an actor can do about a film’s larger mistakes. Sam Taylor-Johnson’s Back to Black makes a safe romance out of a life that needs harder scrutiny. Manville gives Cynthia the assurance of someone who remembers being glamorous, and something less comfortable beneath her pride in Amy. There is not enough here to recommend the whole film, but Manville and Abela give it scenes worth staying for.
Her Doctor Cotter in Guadagnino’s Queer (2024) is agreeably odd, but she has only about twenty minutes to work with. The film lets her down in a different way: Guadagnino reaches for effects, and Marco Costa’s editing loses the briskness it has in the city. Her contribution cannot cure that slackness, and it would be unfair to expect it to. For a stronger film, start with Secrets & Lies, accepting that Manville is not the main attraction.
Biography
Lesley Manville is an English actress. Born on 12 March 1956 in Brighton, she has worked extensively in film, television and theatre, including eight films directed by Mike Leigh.
She is known for roles in Secrets & Lies (1996), Topsy-Turvy (1999), All or Nothing (2002), Another Year (2010) and Mr Turner (2014). Her performance as Cyril Woodcock in Phantom Thread (2017) earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress. Other film credits include Maleficent (2014), Let Him Go (2020), Mrs Harris Goes to Paris (2022), Back to Black (2024) as Cynthia and Queer (2024) as Doctor Cotter.
On television she has played Princess Margaret in The Crown (2022–2023). Her stage work includes Olivier Award-winning performances in Ghosts and Oedipus, and a Tony Award for the latter on Broadway. She was appointed OBE in 2015 and CBE in 2021 for services to drama.
