Joely Richardson admitted she struggled to find an agent after returning to the UK following the death of her sister Natasha and revealed she is single again aged 59 after a series of “heartbreaks”.
Joely's sister tragically died in March 2009, when she was just 45, after hitting her head in a fall on a ski slope in Canada.
After this news, Joely chose the theater over television, partly to be close to her nephews, the sons of Natasha and her husband Liam Neeson, who were only 12 and 13 years old when their mother died. (The eldest, Micheál Richardson, is now an actor himself.)
She told Tatler: “It wasn't a wise decision career-wise to move from mainstream television to some kind of off-off-Broadway theater, but it was what I wanted to do most at the time.”
After a few years she decided to regroup in England. She said: “After 30 years, I just thought, 'Oh God, I don't want to go to work and cry my eyes out and, you know, make big dramas.' I’m really happy to be able to park it all for a while.”
Joely Richardson told Tatler she struggled to find an agent after returning to the UK following the death of her sister Natasha in 2009 – and reveals she is single again at 59 after a series of “heartbreaks”.
She posed on the cover in an elaborate mint green ball gown and spoke about her single romantic status
She said: “I never talk about my love life, which over the years may have given the impression that I don't have one.” I've had a colorful and adventurous time but haven't been able to sign on the dotted line since my first marriage.
She said of marriage: “I was asked but it just never felt right.” I was dating someone for the last few years but we broke up last summer.
“But getting into the English market was… it's ironic because a lot of the companies are American, but it was very difficult,” she laughs.
“I took on many, much smaller roles to keep working because I didn’t want to be away from home and my loved ones for months at a time.”
Joely admits she initially found it difficult to find a new agent in London, but she has made contact [her now agent] Sue Latimer immediately and experienced “something like a reinvention.”
She said: “I started to get a little foot in the door, like Suspect, with Jimmy Nesbitt and then with Mrs Bolton, which happened by chance.” But I had a wonderful time and things started to get easier. So it's strange that sometimes it's actually all about going backwards [made] Casting directors want to hire me again.'
She admits that she had been through a number of funerals at the time, and “I didn't know I was doing this… it's called 'soldier mode' where you carry on but something's not right.”
“I was constantly on alert and had been depleting cortisol energy for a long time, even before that.” It’s not good. It’s unsustainable and it’s an exhausting way to live.”
And while Joely likes to keep a low profile about her personal life, she confirms that she doesn't have a partner at the moment.
She dated Evening Standard owner Evgeny Lebedev in 2020, but says: “I never talk about my love life, which over the years may have given the impression that I didn't have one.” I had a colorful and adventurous one Time, but haven't been able to sign on the dotted line since my first marriage.
“I was asked but it just never felt right. 'I was dating someone for the last few years but we broke up last summer.'
Joely has a daughter, Daisy, 31, with her now ex-husband Tim Bevan.
Daisy lives in London, but Joely says she's “the only one I just don't want to talk about, but she says: “She's the most fabulous, wise, inspiring person I know.”
“Tash in all her glory!” Joely previously shared this stunning picture of her late sister Natasha with widower Liam Neeson, 70
Heartbroken: Joely previously told Tatler: 'I hadn't lived a day in my life without her… The shock shakes you on a cellular level' (pictured together in 1988)
Joely, the daughter of actress Vanessa Redgrave, 87, and the late director Tony Richardson, appears in Netflix hit One Day and Guy Ritchie's The Gentleman and will soon star in Renegade Nell.
It is an eight-part series written by Happy Valley and Gentleman Jack author Sally Wainwright for Disney+
Joely is full of praise for her Renegade Nell co-star Harland, who made a name for herself in Channel 4's Derry Girls.
She said: “With Louisa I knew straight away she was the one.” The dialogue on the page is quite tricky, very funny. Of course the scripts are brilliant, but it's not as easy as it looks.
“You wouldn't know it because everyone has such an easy sensibility, but it can go very wrong because you have to get the right spin and the right joke.” She was funny and charming and it all trickled down from above.
“She absolutely wears Renegade Nell.” After four decades as an actress – she started working professionally at 19 – and with all that world in her genes, Joely can recognize the “real deal” because “it's just something you notice “like construction workers who have been doing things for a long time.”
Joely has been on the cover of Tatler twice; In 1991, as a young actress, she modeled Catherine Walker's designs and in 2010, on set in Ireland for The Tudors, dressed in Dior.
The 2010 Tatler cover shoot took place not long after Tash's death.
Acclaimed actress Vanessa Redgrave will receive her dignity from the Prince of Wales at Buckingham Palace in 2022
Family support: Dame Vanessa Redgrave (second from right) alongside (from left) daughter Joely, son Carlos Nero and his wife Jennifer Nero
Joely preferred theater to television, partly to be close to her nephews, Natasha's sons with her husband Liam Neeson, who were only 12 and 13 when their mother died. The eldest, Micheál Richardson, is now an actor himself – pictured at the premiere of Somewhere Quiet in 2023
Joely describes her parents as two brilliant individuals. When her Yorkshire-born, bisexual father died of AIDS-related complications in 1991, she lost the person she would always turn to for advice (pictured 1988).
She said: “It took me a few years to get over the shock.”
Adding: “They say the earth was made round so you couldn't see too far ahead.” [After that event]I changed and moved away from a lot of nonsense and got involved in things that were important to me: the charities I work with [Save the Children; The Children’s Trust]. I traveled to Uganda, Ethiopia, hospitals, schools and refugee camps. I became much more family-oriented and had more responsibilities.”
She now lives in a flat near Paddington – heavily renovated during the actors' strike – and a house in the country. She goes for a walk in both places: “I am most relaxed when I take a long dog walk in the countryside or when I get lost in my garden,” she says.
She also still loves tennis and has joined a club. '[It’s] more fun than the gym. “On set you have to maintain the same weight for six months and I can't eat anything I want now.”
Joely describes her parents as two brilliant individuals. When her Yorkshire-born, bisexual father died of complications from Aids in 1991, she lost the person she had always turned to for advice.
When Lady Eularia Moggerhanger makes her debut in “Renegade Nell,” Joely is excited about her new phase. “There’s a gravestone near my grandma that says “Courage and Grace,” and I like that, but honestly, all I would say on mine is “Thank you” (pictured in “Renegade Nell”).
Joely Richardson and Tim Bevan during the premiere of Four Weddings And A Funeral in 1994 – no one else got them to sign on the dotted line when it comes to remarriage
She said: “I would say, ‘Should I do this job?’ He would say, ‘Work brings work, so just do it.’ But he was tricky. And cheeky – he encouraged some pretty wild behavior and was a pretty tough disciplinarian for me and Tash when we first started out in the profession.”
As for her mother: “We love each other so much and spend a lot of time together.” “We talk about everything and drive each other crazy, just like mothers and daughters do.”
Joely is currently filming the second season of Surface, the Apple TV+ thriller. “I think it's funny that maybe I've gotten to a point where playing characters is more interesting for me… Maybe I've always been a character actor who didn't know that,” she says.
When Lady Eularia Moggerhanger makes her debut in “Renegade Nell,” Joely is excited about her new phase. “There’s a gravestone near my grandma that says “Courage and Grace,” and that resonates with me, but honestly, all I would say on mine is “Thank you.”
“I'm very lucky in my life. I've had great heartache like most people, but I have great love in my life – I feel loved and I love back.”
Renegade Nell will be available on Disney+ starting March 29th
For the full feature, see the April issue of Tatler, available via digital download and on newsstands from Thursday 29 February.
This article was first published in the April 2024 issue and is in stores Thursday, February 29th