How Essex-born star of Marriage Nicola Walker became a household name

2022-08-15

How Nicola Walker took over our screens! Essex-born daughter of a scrap metal dealer starring in Marriage has become a household name with leading roles in EVERY gritty drama

WARNING: Contains spoilers
Nicola Walker’s latest drama Marriage premiered on BBC One on Sunday night
The actress, 52, has huge credits under her belt since rising to fame on Spooks
Walker, known for playing complex characters, keeps her own private life quiet

Starring alongside Sean Bean in BBC One drama Marriage, Nicola Walker has cemented her place as a UK household name.

Playing Emma next to Bean’s Ian, the actress has been hailed by critics for portraying the mundane realism of married life.

With huge credits under her belt including ITV crime drama Unforgotten and The Split, also on BBC One, Walker has become a viewers’ favourite over the years.

Nicola Walker stars as Gillian in Last Tango in Halifax alongside Sarah Lancashire (bottom left), Anne Reid (top left) and Derek Jacobi (top right)

Walker, 52, is currently starring in BBC One drama Marriage alongside Sean Bean, which premiered on Sunday evening

Walker plays Hannah Stern in BBC One drama The Split, alongside Stephen Mangan

Viewers of ITV’s Unforgotten were devastated when Walker’s character, DCI Cassie Stuart, was killed off at the end of the fourth series

However, the humble actress often plays down her success and lives a quiet life off-camera.

Although Walker is no stranger to portraying the complexities of married life in her on-screen roles, she keeps relatively quiet about her own marriage to fellow actor Barnaby Kay.

It is not known where the couple met, but they have a son named Harry, who was born in 2006.

In an interview with the Radio Times, Walker said she and Kay decided to marry because they had both lost a parent at a young age. For Walker, it was her mother.

She’s a West End award-winner, too!

In 2012, Nicola’s career kicked up a gear. She won an Olivier Award for The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night-time at the National Theatre.

She also received rave reviews for her performance in the 2014 Young Vic/Wyndham’s Theatre production of Arthur Miller’s A View From The Bridge, which transferred to Broadway.

Nicola has also appeared at the Royal Court and Hampstead Theatre.

Theatre star: Nicola Walker with Mark Strong and Phoebe Fox in A View From The Bridge at Young Vic/Wyndham’s Theatre

She admitted it was ‘not the most romantic reason to get married’ but it was ‘the only thing that would get me to sign a piece of paper’.

The actress added: ‘I’m not a great advocate of marriage in real life.’

Her foray into acting was unorthodox, having joined youth theatre while at school so she could meet boys.

But the intelligent and hardworking pupil earnt herself a place at New Hall college at Cambridge University – where her talent began to shine and she brushed shoulders with other now-famous faces.

Her ‘college mother’ was Sue Perkins, the comedienne and former co-presenter of The Great British Bake Off.

Nicola was introduced to Footlights, the Cambridge theatrical club, by Sue, and they also performed with another university peer, Oscar winner Rachel Weisz.

Walker made her onscreen debut in Richard Curtis’s Four Weddings and a Funeral as the folk singer who is performing at a ceremony while Simon Callow’s Gareth fakes his own dramatic death in the pews.

Since then, she has thrilled TV audiences with roles in top BBC and ITV dramas, with her first big gig in spy drama Spooks.

Walker played eccentric analyst Ruth Evershed in the show, who had to fake her own death after being suspected of murdering a prison worker.

Throughout Walker’s time on the show, Walker’s character had a will-they-won’t-they romance with Harry Pearce (played by Peter Firth).

After starring in several seasons of the show, Walker’s character was killed off in the Spooks finale after being stabbed – just as she and Harry planned their retirement together.

Nicola never makes public appearances with husband Barnaby Kay but recently said the pair decided to marry for their son Harry’s sake, having both lost parents young themselves

Walker made her big-screen debut as Ruth Evershed in British spy drama Spooks

After the roaring success of the suave spy drama, which ran for a total of 10 seasons on BBC One, Walker became a familiar face on our screens.

In 2012 she was cast in Last Tango in Halifax, playing the role of sheep farmer Gillian, who is the polar opposite to her sister, Caroline (played by Sarah Lancashire).

The Daily Telegraph hailed Walker’s role in Sally Wainwright’s comedy/drama as a ‘game-changer’ in her career.

The Essex-born actress later admitted she didn’t think she would get the role after auditioning as she didn’t have confidence in her Yorkshire accent.

In 2015 she landed herself the lead role in gritty ITV drama Unforgotten as DCI Cassie Stuart alongside Sanjeev Bhaskar’s Sunil ‘Sunny’ Khan.

However, viewers were left devastated at the end of series four when Cassie died in a car crash.

After her exit from the show, ITV bosses sung Walker’s praises.

They said in a statement: ‘ITV would like to thank Nicola Walker for playing the brilliant role of Cassie Stuart in four series of Unforgotten which has become one of the best loved and most critically acclaimed police dramas on TV.’

Walker explained Cassie’s stint on the show was never supposed to be long-term.

She told Radio Times: ‘I felt that to have her keep coming back would make her seem like a superhero. So it was very much a joint and long-planned decision.’

For the last few years Walker’s schedule has been jam-packed as she juggled filming for Unforgotten, Last Tango in Halifax and The Split, alongside Stephen Mangan.

Playing high-powered lawyer Hannah Stern who has been married to Mangan’s Nathan for 20 years, Walker’s character finds her life thrown into disarray when her estranged father Oscar comes back into the picture, which leads her back into the arms of an old flame.

As Walker’s Marriage makes its debut, her career is as busy as ever.

In the last week it was confirmed she would be returning as Glasgow-based detective Annika Stranded in Annika on the Alibi network.

The DSI is tasked with solving grisly murders within Scotland’s waterways as part of the Marine Homicide Unit – while also managing to strike up a relationship with her daughter’s psychiatrist.

While Walker has made a name for herself playing spies and cops, she said she wouldn’t rule out taking on more similar roles in future, as long as the script was right.

She said: ‘I’d play another detective. But I can’t believe I’d ever find one I loved as much as Cassie.’

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