Early life

McGovern was born in Evanston, Illinois, the daughter of Katharine Wolcott (née Watts), a high school teacher, and William Montgomery McGovern, Jr., a university professor. Her paternal grandfather was adventurer William Montgomery McGovern, her maternal great-grandfathers were U.S. diplomat Ethelbert Watts and Admiral Charles P. Snyder, and her maternal great-great-grandfather was Congressman Charles P. Snyder. The McGovern family moved to Los Angeles, where her father accepted a teaching position with the law school at UCLA. Her younger sister is novelist Cammie McGovern.

Agent Joan Scott saw her performance in The Skin of Our Teeth by Thornton Wilder, was impressed by her talent, and recommended she take acting lessons. McGovern studied at the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco, then at The Juilliard School in New York City.

Career

In 1980, while studying at Juilliard, McGovern was offered a part in what became her first film, Ordinary People, in which she played the girlfriend of troubled teenager Conrad Jarrett (Timothy Hutton). The following year she completed her acting education at the American Conservatory Theatre and Juilliard, and began to appear in plays, first Off-Broadway and later in famous theaters.

In 1981 she earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress for her role as Evelyn Nesbit in the film Ragtime.

In 1984, she starred in Sergio Leone's gangster epic Once Upon a Time in America as Robert De Niro's romantic interest Deborah Gelly. She had leading roles in two other films that year, Racing with the Moon, a coming-of-age story also starring Sean Penn and Nicolas Cage, and the comedy Lovesick, as a patient whose psychiatrist (Dudley Moore) falls in love with her, risking his practice.

In 1989, she played Mickey Rourke's girlfriend in Johnny Handsome, directed by Walter Hill, and the same year she appeared as a rebellious lesbian in Volker Schlöndorff's film The Handmaid's Tale.

McGovern co-starred with Kevin Bacon in a romantic comedy, She's Having a Baby, directed by John Hughes, and starred in the thriller The Bedroom Window, directed by Curtis Hanson. She teamed with Michael Caine in 1990's A Shock to the System, a comic mystery about a man who plots the murder of his wife.

In a 1997 comedy, The Favor, McGovern played a woman who cheats on her boyfriend (played by Brad Pitt) by becoming her married best friend's proxy in a tryst with a man the friend has fantasized about.

McGovern has appeared in a number of films in the 2000s, including the film Woman in Gold, a drama starring Helen Mirren.

Television

McGovern has also appeared in several television productions, mostly in the UK. In 1999 and 2000, McGovern played Marguerite St. Just in a BBC television series loosely based on the novel The Scarlet Pimpernel.

On American TV, she appeared in a 2006 episode of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit titled "Harm," in which her character of Dr. Faith Sutton was a psychiatrist accused of complicity in detainee abuse. Her other television work includes Broken Glass (Arthur Miller, 1996); Tales from the Crypt; The Changeling; Tales from Hollywood; the HBO series Men and Women; The Man in the Brooks Brothers Shirt; Shelley Duvall's Faerie Tale Theatre ("Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs"); and If Not For You (CBS 1995, own series).

In May 2007, she played Ellen Doubleday, Daphne du Maurier's paramour, in Daphne, a BBC2 television drama by Amy Jenkins, based on Margaret Forster's biography of the author.

In December 2008, McGovern appeared as Dame Celia Westholme in "Appointment with Death", an episode of Agatha Christie's Poirot.

In the same year, she appeared in the three-part BBC comedy series Freezing, written by James Wood, and directed and co-produced by her husband Simon Curtis. First broadcast on BBC Four, it was also shown on BBC2 in February 2008. McGovern played an American expatriate actress named Elizabeth, living in Chiswick with her publisher husband, played by Hugh Bonneville, and co-starring Tom Hollander as her theatrical agent.

From 2010 to 2015, she portrayed Cora, Countess of Grantham, wife of Robert, the Earl of Grantham (played by Bonneville), in the British TV series Downton Abbey.

Music

McGovern is also a singer-songwriter. In 2008 she began fronting the band Sadie and the Hotheads at The Castle pub venue in Portobello Road, London. The band released an album of songs she developed with The Nelson Brothers, who are now part of the band. The album also includes Ron Knights on bass and Rowan Oliver, borrowed from Goldfrapp, as drummer for the recording sessions. Michelle Dockery, who plays McGovern's eldest daughter in Downton Abbey, has occasionally sung with the band.

Theatre

Roles in New York include:

• Melissa Gardner in Love Letters (A R Gurney) at the Edison Theatre, October 1989
• Ophelia in Hamlet with the Roundabout Theater Company at the Criterion Center Stage Right, April 1992.

In her theatre programme CVs (below), McGovern lists her other theatre work in the U.S. as including:

• My Sister in This House (Wendy Kesselman)
• Painting Churches (Tina Howe)
• The Hitch-Hiker
• A Map of the World (David Hare)
• Aunt Dan and Lemon (Wallace Shawn)
• A Midsummer Night's Dream at the New York Shakespeare Festival, Winter 1987
• When I Was a Girl I Used to Scream and Shout (Sharman McDonald)
• Maids of Honour
• Three Sisters (Chekhov)
• As You Like It

Since moving to London, McGovern's stage work has included:

• Jenny in The Misanthrope (Molière freely adapted by Martin Crimp) at the Young Vic Theatre, February 1996
• Darlene in Hurlyburly (David Rabe) at the Old Vic Theatre, March 1997
• Nan and Lina in Three Days of Rain (Richard Greenberg) at the Donmar Warehouse, March and November 1999
• Beth in Dinner With Friends (Donald Margulies) at the Hampstead Theatre, June 2001
• Hester Prynne in The Scarlet Letter (Nathaniel Hawthorne adapted by Phyllis Nagy) at the Minerva Theatre, Chichester August 2005
• Jackie Kennedy in Aristo at the Minerva Theatre, Chichester Festival Theater September - October 2008
• Judith Brown in Complicit by Joe Sutton in The Old Vic, January 2009
• Miss A in The Shawl by David Mamet in the Arcola Theatre, September 2009

McGovern was awarded the 2013 Will Award by the Shakespeare Theatre Company.

Personal life

When she was 23, McGovern was engaged to actor Sean Penn whom she met on the set of Racing with the Moon. In 1992, she married British film director and producer Simon Curtis; the couple have two daughters: Matilda and Grace.

Filmography

Film

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1980	Ordinary People	Jeannine Pratt
1980	Last Year's Model	Unknown	Short film
1981	Ragtime	Evelyn Nesbit	Nominated—Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress Nominated—Golden Globe Award for New Star of the Year - Actress
1983	Lovesick	Chloe Allen
1984	Once Upon a Time in America	Deborah Gelly (adult)
1984	Racing with the Moon	Caddie Winger
1986	Native Son	Mary Dalton
1987	The Bedroom Window	Denise
1988	She's Having a Baby	Kristy Briggs
1989	Johnny Handsome	Donna McCarty
1990	The Handmaid's Tale	Moira
1990	A Shock to the System	Stella Anderson
1990	Tune in Tomorrow...	Elena Quince
1993	King of the Hill	Lydia
1993	Me and Veronica	Fanny
1994	The Favor	Emily
1995	Wings of Courage	Noelle Guillaumet	Short film
1997	The Wings of the Dove	Susie "Sue" Stringham
1998	The Man with Rain in His Shoes	Diane
1998	The Misadventures of Margaret	Till Turner
2000	Manila	Elizabeth
2000	The House of Mirth	Mrs. Carry Fisher
2001	Buffalo Soldiers	Mrs. Berman
2006	The Truth	Donna
2008	Inconceivable	Tallulah "Tutu" Williams
2010	Kick-Ass	Mrs. Lizewski
2010	Clash of the Titans	Marmara
2011	Angel's Crest	Jane
2012	Cheerful Weather for the Wedding	Mrs. Thatcham
2015	Unexpected	Samantha's mother
2015	Woman in Gold	Judge Florence Cooper
2015	Swung	Dolly
2016	Showing Roots	Shirley	Completed

Television

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1979	California Fever	Lisa Bannister	Episode: "The Girl from Somewhere"
1984	Faerie Tale Theatre	Snow White	Episode: "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs"
1990	Women and Men: Stories of Seduction	Vicki	Television film
1991	Ashenden	Aileen Somerville	Television film Nominated—CableACE Award for Best Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie
1992	Tales from Hollywood	Helen Schwartz	Television film
1993	Performance	Beatrice-Joanna	Episode: "The Changeling"
1995	If Not for You	Jessie Kent	8 episodes
1995	Broken Trust	Janice Dillon	Television film
1996	Broken Glass	Margaret Hymen	Television film
1996	The Summer of Ben Tyler	Celia Rayburn	Television film
1996	Tracey Takes On...	Judge Loring	Episode: "Vanity"
1996	Tales from the Crypt	Laura Kendall	Episode: "Horror in the Night"
1997	Clover	Sara Kate	Television film
1999	The Scarlet Pimpernel	Lady Marguerite Blakeney	3 episodes
2000	Thursday the 12th	Candice Hopper	Television film
2001	The Flamingo Rising	Edna Lee	Television film
2001	Hawk	Susie Hawkins	Television film
2001	Table 12	Mel	Episode: "Preserves"
2003	The Brotherhood of Poland, New Hampshire	Helen Shaw	7 episodes
2006	Three Moons over Milford	Laura Davis	8 episodes
2007	Daphne	Ellen Doubleday	Television film
2007	A Room with a View	Mrs. Honeychurch	Television film
2007	Law & Order: Special Victims Unit	Dr. Faith Sutton	Episode: "Harm"
2007-08	Freezing	Elizabeth	3 episodes
2008	Agatha Christie's Poirot	Dame Celia Westholme	Episode: "Appointment with Death"
2009	10 Minute Tales	The Ex-Wife	Episode: "The Running of the Deer"
2010-2016	Downton Abbey	Cora, Countess of Grantham	52 episodes Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series Nominated—Golden Globe Award for Best Actress - Miniseries or Television Film Nominated—Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie Nominated—Satellite Award for Best Actress - Miniseries or Television Film Nominated—Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series

[ Source: Wikipedia ]