Gillian Anderson

Gillian Anderson

Gillian Leigh Anderson, OBE, is an American actress. She is best known for her role as FBI Special Agent Dana Scully in the long-running series The X-Files. She has also played Lily Bart in Terence Davies’ film The House of Mirth, DSU Stella Gibson in the BBC crime drama television series The Fall, and sex therapist Jean Milburn in the Netflix comedy-drama Sex Education. In 2020, she joined the cast of The Crown as Margaret Thatcher.

About Gillian Anderson in brief

Summary Gillian AndersonGillian Leigh Anderson, OBE, is an American actress. She is best known for her role as FBI Special Agent Dana Scully in the long-running series The X-Files. She has also played Lily Bart in Terence Davies’ film The House of Mirth, DSU Stella Gibson in the BBC crime drama television series The Fall, and sex therapist Jean Milburn in the Netflix comedy-drama Sex Education. In 2020, she joined the cast of The Crown as Margaret Thatcher. Anderson is the co-writer of The Earthend Saga novel trilogy and the self-help guide book WE: A Manifesto for Women Everywhere. She was appointed an honorary Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire in 2016 for her services to drama. Anderson was born in Chicago and grew up in London and Grand Rapids, Michigan. She graduated from theater school at DePaul University in Chicago, then moved to New York City to further her acting career. Anderson has resided in London since 2002, after earlier years divided between the United Kingdom and the United States. Her film work includes the dramas The Mighty Celt, The Last King of Scotland, Shadow Dancer, Viceroy’s House and two X- Files films: TheX-Files: Fight the Future and The X -Files: I Want to Believe. Other notable television credits include: Lady Dedlock in Bleak House, Wallis Simpson in Any Human Heart, Miss Havisham in Great Expectations, Dr. Bedelia Du Maurier on Hannibal, and Media on American Gods.

In 2019, she began playing Jean Mil Burn in theNetflix drama Sex Education, and will appear in the fourth season of Netflix drama series The Crown in 2020. Her stage work includes Absent Friends, for which she won a Theatre World Award for Best Newcomer; A Doll’s House, and a portrayal of Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire. She also portrayed Margo Channing in the stage production of All About Eve, and received her third Laurence Olivier Award nomination for Best Actress. She is an honorary spokesperson for the Neurofibromatosis Network and a co-founder of South African Youth Education for Sustainability. Anderson also served as an intern at the Grand Rapids Civic Theatre of Theatre Arts in 1990, where she earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Fine Arts. Her parents moved to Puerto Rico for 15 months, then to London so that her father could attend the London Film School. She later said that she had always intended to return to England. Anderson went through a rebellious stage as a teenager; taking drugs, dating a much older girlfriend, and cultivating a punk appearance. She was put in therapy at the age of 14. Anderson listened to bands such as Dead Kennedys and Dead Skinny Puppy as a class clown as well as Dead Skiny Puppy and was arrested on graduation night for breaking and entering her high school in an attempt to glue the doors of the school.