With her dark eyes and natural look of mischief, it is clear to see why Lily James was chosen for the role.
Millions saw the 23-year-old actress made her dramatic debut in the season finale of ITV’s Downton Abbey last night as seductress Lady Rose.The middle class girl, from a theatrical family in Surrey, will have won countless new admirers and they won’t have to wait long to see her again.Tipped as the next big thing in British acting, Lily will be seen next year in the Hollywood action adventure: Wrath of the Titans opposite Ralph Fiennes and Liam Neeson.Since graduating from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in 2010, she has notched up an impressive list of acting credits.
Last year she was seen in another racy role in the ITV drama: Secret Diary of a call Girl opposite the actress Billie Piper, 29.Earlier this year it was reported that she was in a relationship with the aspiring actor Jack Fox a scion of the Fox Family.Mr Fox, 27 who appeared in the channel 4 comedy series: Fresh meat is the younger brother of Laurence Fox, 33, who is married to her former co-star Billie Piper.Born in Surrey, her grandmother Helen Horton was an actress who had roles in Alien and Superman 3, and her father was also an actor, although he died from cancer in 2000.
As a child she attended the £21,000 a year Arts Educational School in Tring, which counts actresses Jane Seymour, Julien Andrews and Thandie Newton amongst its alumni.After joining the prestigious National Youth Music Theatre as a teenager, she won a place to study drama at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in 2007.Barely out of drama school, she won the role of Ethel, William Brown’s coquettish older sister in the BBC adaptation of Richmal Crompton’s Just William stories in 2010.
Then followed a starring turn in the British film- Fast Girls.She took her role as an athlete to such extremes that she was able to do 800 sit ups and ran up hills until she was sick.Having been ‘optioned’ for series four of Downton Abbey, Miss James will next be seen in the Christmas special.In her role as Lady Rose, the great niece of Maggie Smith’s character, the Dowager Countess of Grantham, she is the ultimate femme fatale who throws the world of Downton into disarray.In last night’s episode, fans of the ITV show saw her character, Lady Rose’s turn as the ultimate scarlet women.
Despite her wide-eyed innocence, Lady Rose has a penchant for married men and manages to captivate the co-owner of Downton Abbey, Matthew Crawley, played by actor Dan Stevens, 30.But it is her affair with the new male character, Terence Margadale, (Edward Baker-Duly) that sees the world of Downton become embroiled in scandal.After eloping to London, the pair are caught in the notorious Blue Dragon night club where they are discovered by Lady Edith (Laura Carmichael) locked in a passionate embrace.
And in a dramatic finale, Lady Rose is banished by her family to Scotland once the fling is exposed.Speaking in an interview earlier this year about the role, the actress hinted that she is often cast as posh young girls.Describing her turn as Lady Rose, she said: ‘I come in at the end and I am playing a posh person, surprise, surprise’. – Dailymail
