Personal details
- Birth Date: 1976-09-06
- Height: 5′ 8½″ (1.74 m)
- Birth Location: London, England, UK
- Parents: Lisselle Kayla
- Professions: Actress
Naomie Harris, born and bred in London, is pretty much a force of nature. Her mom, a TV scriptwriter from Jamaica, raised her solo after splitting from Harris’s Trinidadian dad before Naomie was even born. No contact with the father—just her and her mom, grinding it out. From the jump, Naomie was all about acting—she got her chops at the Anna Scher Theatre School, which is kind of a big deal in the UK acting scene. She started landing small roles as a kid, showing up in stuff like Simon and the Witch and The Tomorrow People. She ended up at Cambridge, studying social and political sciences, but honestly? She didn’t love it there. Academia wasn’t her jam. After graduation, she bounced to the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School and, not long after, started making real waves. Her big break? Danny Boyle’s 28 Days Later—suddenly, everyone knew her name. She kept the momentum up with films like Miami Vice and earned major props for her work in Small Island (the Royal Television Society even gave her Best Female Actor). If you’ve ever watched Pirates of the Caribbean, you probably remember her as Tia Dalma—the voodoo witch with the wild hair and cryptic wisdom. Then she totally owned the role of Moneypenny in Skyfall, shifting the Bond universe a little. But the real clincher was Moonlight—her role there got her an Oscar nomination, and that movie snagged Best Picture. In 2017, the Queen herself gave Naomie an OBE for her services to drama. Not too shabby, right?
Danny Boyle pretty much flipped the switch for her whole film career when he brought her into the cast of 28 Days Later... back in 2002. Before that, she’d been doing her thing, but it was this movie that really threw her into the spotlight. Boyle’s knack for picking raw talent? Yeah, it paid off big time here. Her performance in that gritty, apocalyptic London was just wild—she nailed the mix of terror and toughness, making everyone sit up and pay attention. Honestly, you can’t really talk about her rise without tipping your hat to Boyle for taking the chance. That movie wasn’t just a zombie flick; it was a launching pad. Suddenly, doors started opening left and right, and she went from indie projects to big-league roles. So, if you’re ever tracing her journey, remember, it really kicked off with Boyle and that viral outbreak in 28 Days Later…
Honestly, everything boils down to who’s behind the script. Like, if we actually had more women in those writers’ rooms, movies would look and feel totally different. Right now, it’s mostly guys deciding how women talk, act, and even think—no wonder it feels off half the time. I’ve lost count of how many scripts I’ve read where I just roll my eyes and think, “No woman on earth would ever do that,” but there it is, up on the screen. Women get boxed into these tired stereotypes: the nag, the mom, the bombshell—nothing in between. It gets old. If women got more chances to put their own stories out there, we’d finally see something real, not just some dude’s version of what he thinks women are. Seriously, the perspective shift would be wild.
September 6, 1976
5′ 8½″ (1.74 m)
Konidela Ram Charan
London, England, UK
Lisselle Kayla and Surekha
48 years old