Francesca Annis Movies and Career Information

Francesca Annis (born 14 May 1945) is a British actress, known for her film and television appearances, most recently in the BBC series Wives and Daughters, Cranford, and Deceit. Annis was born in London to a British father, Lester William Anthony Annis (1914–2001) and a Brazilian-French mother, Mariquita Purcell (1913–2009). She has two brothers, Quenton D. and Tony P. Annis. Her family moved to Brazil when Annis was a year old, spending 6 years there before returning to England when she was 7. There she was educated at a convent school. She trained as a ballet dancer and then studied drama at the Corona Stage Academy. Francesca Annis began acting professionally in her teens, and made her film debut in The Cat Gang (1959). In 1967 she played Estella in a television adaptation of Great Expectations. She also presented children's television programmes. Annis gained notoriety for her performance as Lady Macbeth in Roman Polanski's controversial 1971 film interpretation of Macbeth in which she performs the sleepwalking soliloquy in the nude. The critic Kenneth Tynan was present when the scene was shot: Francesca does it very sportingly and with no fuss ... though of course the set is