Born in Wolverhampton in 1958, Frances Barber is a British actress whose sharp voice and steel-eyed presence have made her a distinctive figure of British stage and screen for four decades. She rose to notice with an unflinching performance in Stephen Frears' Sammy and Rosie Get Laid (1987), for which she received a BAFTA nomination, and appeared for Peter Greenaway in Prospero's Books (1991). Her television work includes prominent turns in the BBC's Silk Stockings-adjacent series such as Silk (2011) as barrister Caroline Warwick and roles in Doctor Who as the villainous Madame Kovarian. On the London stage she has been a mainstay of the Royal Shakespeare Company and the National Theatre, admired especially for her Shakespearean and Pinter work. Read more