"Michelle Dockery"

Michelle Dockery (born 15 December 1981) is an English actress of stage and screen, and a singer. She is known for her role as Lady Mary Crawley in the ITV/PBS drama series Downton Abbey. She made her television debut in Fingersmith in 2005.


Dockery is the youngest of three daughters of Michael Dockery, a native of Athlone, Ireland,who worked his way up from driving a van to becoming a surveyor, and his wife Lorraine, from Stepney, East London.

Born and raised in Romford, East London, Dockery was educated at the Chadwell Heath Foundation School in Chadwell Heath, later known as Chadwell Heath Academy. She was trained at the Finch Stage School and the Guildhall School of Music & Drama, graduating from the latter in 2004.

Dockery was a member of the National Youth Theatre, studied at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama where she won the Gold Medal for drama and made her professional debut in His Dark Materials at the Royal National Theatre in 2004. In 2006, she was nominated for the Ian Charleson Award for her performance as Dina Dorf in Pillars of the Community at the National Theatre.

Dockery appeared in Burnt by the Sun at the National Theatre for which she received an Olivier Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress. She won second prize at the Ian Charleson Awards for her performance as Eliza Doolittle in Peter Hall's production of Pygmalion at the Theatre Royal, Bath, which toured the UK and transferred to The Old Vic in 2008, and for the same production was nominated Best Newcomer at the Evening Standard Awards 2008.

In 2010, she played Ophelia in Hamlet at the Crucible Theatre alongside John Simm.

Dockery made her television debut as Betty in Fingersmith in 2005.

In 2006, she starred as Susan Sto Helit in a two-part adaptation of Terry Pratchett's novel Hogfather.

In 2008, Dockery played Kathryn in Channel 4's The Red Riding Trilogy and played the guest lead of tormented rape victim Gemma Morrison in BBC`s Waking the Dead. In 2009, she appeared in the two-part Cranford Christmas special for the BBC, and starred as the lead character in a modernised BBC adaptation of The Turn of the Screw.

Dockery came to public prominence in 2010 when she played Lady Mary Crawley in Julian Fellowes' series Downton Abbey, the first season of which was screened on ITV between September and November 2010. She was nominated for a Southbank Award in January for Best Breakthrough Performance in a TV drama. A second series of Downton Abbey was shown in 2011, followed by a special Christmas Day episode, and a third series has been commissioned for broadcast in September 2012.

Dockery is also a jazz singer. She sang at the 50th Anniversary of Ronnie Scott's Jazz club in London and has occasionally sung with Sadie and the Hotheads, a band formed by Elizabeth McGovern, who plays her mother in Downton Abbey.