Miranda Otto

Miranda Otto

  • Birthday: 1967-12-16
  • Place of birth: Brisbane, Queensland, Australia
  • Also know as: Μιράντα Ότο

Biography

Miranda Otto (born December 16, 1967) is an Australian actress. The daughter of actors Lindsay and Barry Otto and the sister of actress Gracie Otto, she began acting at age eighteen, and has performed in a variety of independent and major studio films. Her first major film appearance was in the 1986 film Emma's War, in which she played a teenager who moves to Australia's bush country during World War II. In 1996, director Shirley Barrett cast Otto as a shy waitress in the film Love Serenade. She starred in the 1997 films Doing Time for Patsy Cline and The Well, for which earned her third Australian Film Institute nomination. Her next project was the romantic comedy Dead Letter Office (1998). The film was Otto's first with her father, Barry, who makes a brief appearance. Later that year, she starred in the film In the Winter Dark, directed by James Bogle, for which she was nominated for her fourth Australian Film Institute Award. After a decade of critically acclaimed roles in Australian films, she gained Hollywood's attention after appearing in supporting roles in The Thin Red Line (1998) and What Lies Beneath (2000). In 2001, she was cast as a naturalist in the comedy Human Nature and appeared in the BBC adaptation of Anthony Trollope's The Way We Live Now, as a strong-willed American Southerner. Her breakthrough role came in 2002, when she portrayed Éowyn in The Lord of the Rings trilogy. Her character was introduced in the trilogy's second film The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers in 2002 and appeared in the third film, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, the following year. Her performance earned her an Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films nomination for Best Supporting Actress. Director Steven Spielberg, impressed by Otto's performance in The Lord of the Rings, called her to ask if she would play opposite Tom Cruise in the big-budget science fiction film War of the Worlds (2005). Otto, pregnant at the time, believed she would have to turn down the role, but the script was reworked to accommodate her. Her next project was playing the lead in the Australian film Danny Deckchair (2003). She then took on the Australian television miniseries Through My Eyes: The Lindy Chamberlain Story (2004). At the 2005 Logie Awards, Otto won Most Outstanding Actress in a Drama Series for her role. In 2007, Otto starred as Cricket Stewart, the wife of a successful director, in the television miniseries The Starter Wife. She had a starring role in the 2008 American television series Cashmere Mafia, and Australian films such as In Her Skin and Blessed (2009). She starred opposite Stephanie Sigman and Anthony LaPaglia in the horror prequel Annabelle: Creation. She portrayed Zelda Spellman in Netflix's Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (2018-2020). She made her theatrical debut in the 1986 production of The Bitter Tears of Petra Von Kant for the Sydney Theatre Company.[28] Three more theatrical productions for the Sydney Theatre Company followed in the late 1980s and early 1990s. In 2002, she returned to the stage playing Nora Helmer in A Doll's House opposite her future husband Peter O'Brien. Otto's performance earned her a 2003 Helpmann Award nomination and the MO Award for "Best Female Actor in a Play". Her next stage role was in the psychological thriller Boy Gets Girl (2005).

Filmography

Julie Walking Home

2002

As Julie Makowsky

South Solitary

2010

As Meredith Appleton

Kin

2000

As Anna

Reaching for the Moon

2013

As Elizabeth Bishop

Daydream Believer

1992

As Nell Tiscowitz

Dead Letter Office

1998

As Alice Walsh

Love Serenade

1996

As Dimity Hurley

At the Gates

2023

As Marianne Barris

Danny Deckchair

2003

As Glenda Lake

Blessed

2009

As Bianca

The Well

1997

As Katherine

The Nostradamus Kid

1993

As Jennie O'Brien

Emma's War

1986

As Emma Grange

Schadenfreude

2009

As Waitress

My Freaky Family

2024

As Aneska Flood

In My Father's Den

2004

As Penny Prior

Doctor Sleep

2002

As Clara Strother

In Her Skin

2009

As Mrs. Barber

Initiation

1987

As Stevie

The 13th Floor

1988

As Rebecca

The Silence

2019

As Kelly Andrews

War of the Worlds

2005

As Mary-Ann

Human Nature

2001

As Gabrielle

Flight of the Phoenix

2004

As Kelly

The Jack Bull

1999

As Cora Redding

In the Winter Dark

1998

As Ronnie

True Love and Chaos

1997

As Mimi

The Homesman

2014

As Theoline Belknap

What Lies Beneath

2000

As Mary Feur

I, Frankenstein

2014

As Leonore

Annabelle: Creation

2017

As Esther Mullins

The Daughter

2015

As Charlotte

Downhill

2020

As Charlotte

The Portable Door

2023

As Countess Judy

Talk to Me

2023

As Sue

Zoe

2018

As The Designer

The Chaperone

2019

As Ruth St. Dennis

Mabo

2012

As Margaret White

Dance Academy: The Movie

2017

As Madeline Moncur

The Raid

2017

As Rebecca Ingram

Locke & Key

2011

As Nina Locke

The Thin Red Line

1998

As Marty Bell

The Turning

2013

As Sherry

Production

Talk to Me

2023

As Executive Producer

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