List of Keira Knightley performances

Keira Knightley is a British actress who began her career by appearing in commercials and television films, including The Treasure Seekers (1996), Coming Home (1998), and Oliver Twist (1999)[1] before making her major motion picture debut in the space-opera epic Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace (1999) as Padmé Amidala's handmaiden.[2] She portrayed the daughter of Robin Hood in the romantic adventure film Princess of Thieves (2001), her first starring role, and earned her breakthrough by playing a teen tomboy footballer in sports comedy Bend It Like Beckham (2002).[1][3] A year later, Knightley rose to global stardom after appearing as Elizabeth Swann in the fantasy swashbuckler film Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, co-starring Johnny Depp and Orlando Bloom, for which she received two Saturn Award nominations, one for Best Supporting Actress.[4][5]

Knightley at premiere of Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, her highest-grossing box office release

She then appeared in the Richard Curtis-directed Christmas romance Love Actually (2003) as a woman whose fiancée's best man is secretly in love with her.[6] Knightley portrayed the daughter of an alcoholic in psychological thriller The Jacket (2005).[7] She starred as Elizabeth Bennet in Joe Wright's romantic drama Pride & Prejudice (2005), for which Knightley received her first nomination for an Academy Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role nomination, becoming the third-youngest Best Actress nominees category.[8][9][10] The film clinched her long association with period dramas.[11][12] She reprised her role as Swann in Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (2006) and Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End (2007); the former is her highest-grossing release.[13] Knightley subsequently appeared in two wartime dramas; as a complex love interest in Wright's Atonement (2007), which earned her an Empire Award for Best Actress[14][15][16] and a jazz singer in the biopic The Edge of Love (2008).[17] She starred as eighteenth-century tastemaker Georgiana Cavendish in the drama The Duchess (2008), for which she received positive reviews.[18]

She made her theatre debut as a shallow, amorous film star in The Misanthrope, which earned Knightley her a nomination for the Olivier Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role in a Play.[19] Also on West End, she then portrayed a schoolteacher accused of lesbianism in The Children's Hour.[20] She reunited with Wright for the third time with historical romance Anna Karenina (2012), playing the titular aristocratic socialite to critical acclaim.[21] Knightley expanded into contemporary roles with musical drama Begin Again (2014), starring as an aspiring songwriter, and action thriller Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit (2014) as a medical student. Her role as an overeducated underachiever in the rom-com Laggies (2014) was followed by a return to historical parts as cryptanalyst Joan Clarke in the drama The Imitation Game (2014), which garnered Knightley an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress nomination.[22] The following year, she made her Broadway debut in Thérèse Raquin playing a psychotic and repressed wife.[23] Knightley appeared as the eponymous belle époque writer in biographical film Colette (2018) to positive reception.[24][25] In wartime drama The Aftermath (2019), Knightley portrayed a cold, complex army wife.[26] She starred in succeeding political dramas as whistleblower Katharine Gun in Official Secrets (2019) and feminist Sally Alexander in Misbehaviour (2020).[27][28]