Born Dec. 9, 1934, in York, England, to amateur-thespian parents, Judith Olivia Dench has been acting since she was 5 years old. She rose quickly through the ranks of British theatre, eventually joining the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1961.Dench made her film debut in The Third Secret (1964) and has appeared in several Shakespeare adaptations, including Kenneth Branagh's Henry V (1989) and Hamlet (1996). Dench is best known by many Americans as British spy commander "M" in the James Bond franchise (beginning with 1996's GoldenEye).
Oscar-nominated for Her Majesty, Mrs. Brown (1997), Chocolat (2000), Iris (2001), Mrs. Henderson Presents (2005) and Notes on a Scandal (2006), Dench won the Best Supporting Actress award for an eight-minute performance as Queen Elizabeth in Shakespeare in Love (1998). She received Emmy and Golden Globe nods in 2010 for her work in the miniseries "Return to Cranford."
Mrs. BrownGrieving widow Queen Victoria (Oscar nominee Judi Dench) withdraws into sadness for years until plainspoken manservant John Brown (Billy Connolly) disrupts her mourning. But as their friendship grows, it results in personal and political ramifications for both of them. Exquisitely filmed and fueled... Read More
Mrs. Henderson PresentsHaving already cultivated an offbeat reputation among high society in 1930s London, Laura Henderson (Judi Dench) embarks on her newest adventure: transforming an old movie theater into the Windmill, a space that will host, of all things, a nude musical revue. But members of her social circle don't... Read More
Return to CranfordIn this follow-up to the beloved BBC miniseries, Cranford -- a mid-19th-century traditional English village populated by gossips and eccentrics -- faces impending modernization in the form of a railway line, which ignites a flurry of heated debate. Read More
Ladies in LavenderIt's 1936, and two sisters, Janet and Ursula Widdington (Maggie Smith and Judi Dench), are at their beach house in Cornwall for some rest and relaxation. But their idyll is interrupted when they chance upon a mystery man awash on the beach and decide to nurse him back to health. Turns out he's... Read More
Masterpiece Classic: CranfordAdapted from the novels of celebrated Victorian author Elizabeth Gaskell, this Emmy-winning BBC miniseries follows a group of women in a town wrestling with modernity and the inevitability of change. Read More
