Catherine Tate

Catherine Tate, born Catherine Jane Ford on 5 December 1969 in Bloomsbury, London, is an English actress, comedian, and writer. She was raised in the Brunswick Centre, where her mother Josephine, a florist, along with her grandmother and godparents, formed the primary household. Tate never knew her father, who left early in her life. As a child she experienced obsessive-compulsive disorder. She attended St Joseph's Roman Catholic Primary School in Holborn and Notre Dame High School in Southwark. When her secondary school abolished its sixth form, she transferred at age 16 to Salesian College in Battersea, a boys' Roman Catholic school, specifically for its drama facilities, though she left without completing her A levels. She subsequently spent four years attempting to gain entry to the Central School of Speech and Drama, succeeding on her fourth try and completing a three-year course there. Before that, she briefly attended the Sylvia Young Theatre School, departing after one week. She was also a member of the National Youth Theatre. When she obtained her Equity card, she adopted the surname Tate, chosen after the character Jessica Tate from the American sitcom Soap.

Tate's stage career began in earnest when she toured with the National Youth Theatre production of Blood Wedding from 1988 to 1990, a production that also featured Daniel Craig and Jessica Hynes. In 1994 she took the role of Lydia Lubey in the Oxford Stage Company's production of Arthur Miller's All My Sons. She subsequently performed at the Royal National Theatre in The Way of the World in 1995 and The Prince's Play in 1996, and joined the Royal Shakespeare Company for its ten-month tour across the UK, Australia, and the United States in Lee Hall's adaptation of The Servant of Two Masters from 2000 to 2001. Her television acting debut came in a 1991 episode of the sitcom Surgical Spirit, with further early roles in serial dramas including The Bill and London's Burning. She began performing stand-up comedy in 1996 and co-wrote and starred in Barking, a late-night sketch show broadcast on Channel 4 in 1998 featuring David Walliams, Peter Kay, and Mackenzie Crook. In 2000 she participated in Lee Mack's Perrier Comedy Award-nominated New Bits show at the Edinburgh Film Festival and appeared in television sketch shows including The Harry Hill Show and That Peter Kay Thing. The following year she returned to Edinburgh with her own sell-out one-woman show. Her first major television role came after being spotted at Edinburgh by casting director Tracey Gillham, leading to her casting as Angela in the comedy series Wild West, which ran from 2002 to 2004 and also starred Dawn French.

Her breakthrough came with The Catherine Tate Show, a BBC Two sketch comedy series she co-wrote with Derren Litten that ran from 2004 to 2007. BBC comedy controller Geoffrey Perkins had approached her at an Edinburgh Festival post-show party and encouraged her to develop her character work. Produced by Perkins at Tiger Aspect, the series featured recurring characters including teenager Lauren Cooper and cockney grandmother Joanie "Nan" Taylor. Tate won a British Comedy Award for Best Comedy Newcomer for the first series and a British Comedy Award for Best British Comedy Actress for the second. The show earned her seven BAFTA nominations and a nomination for an International Emmy Award. In March 2005 she made a guest appearance during the BBC's Red Nose Day as Lauren alongside boy band McFly. That November she appeared in a Children in Need charity sketch crossing EastEnders with The Catherine Tate Show, and she performed as Lauren at the 77th Royal Variety Performance. In January 2005 she appeared as Mitzi Kosinski in the ITV adaptation of Agatha Christie's A Murder Is Announced, and later that year played Mrs Chadband in the BBC television adaptation of Bleak House. She also returned to the stage in the original West End production of Some Girl(s) in 2005, alongside Sara Powell, Lesley Manville, Saffron Burrows, and David Schwimmer.

Tate's Broadway career includes an appearance in 2006 and participation in The 24 Hour Plays in 2004. Her profile in the United States grew further through her recurring role as Nellie Bertram in the American version of The Office, which she joined in 2011 and continued until the series concluded. On British television, she played Miss Sarah Postern in the BBC One sitcom Big School from 2013 to 2014 and voiced Magica De Spell in the Disney Channel animated series DuckTales from 2017 to 2021. She first appeared as Donna Noble in the 2006 Christmas special of Doctor Who, reprised the role for the programme's fourth series in 2008, and returned again for the 60th anniversary episodes in 2023. Following the success of The Catherine Tate Show, she starred as Joanie Taylor in the spin-off series Catherine Tate's Nan from 2009 to 2015 and in the feature film The Nan Movie in 2022. In the early 2020s she created and starred in two additional sitcoms: Netflix's Hard Cell in 2022, which she also co-directed, and BBC One's Queen of Oz in 2023.