Hailed from the Redgrave family and described as “the Princess Royal of the Redgrave clan. One of British most intense and enduring theatrical dynasties of all time, stage/movie/TV actress Natasha Richardson was popular for several leading roles in films, but she also was perhaps most renowned for her award-winning performances on theater, including as Sally Bowles in Broadway production of “Cabaret,” where she received a number of accolades like a Tony Award, “Anna Christie” (1992) and Anton Chekhov’s “The Seagull” (1986). On the big screen, she picked up a London Evening Standard Award for roles in The Comfort of Strangers (1990) and The Handmaid’s Tale (1990) and a Karlovy Vary International Film Festival Award for starring in Widows’ Peak (1994). Other notable credits include Gothic (1986), A Month in the Country (1987), the biopic film Patty Hearst (1988), Fat Man and Little Boy (1989) and The Favour, the Watch and the Very Big Fish (1991).

As for her marriage life, the swan-necked, smoky-voiced champagne blonde actress was married to theatrical producer Robert Fox from 1990-1994 and she also married to actor Liam Neeson, whom she wed shortly after her first marriage ended in divorce.She gave birth two sons, Micheál Richard Antonio Neeson and Daniel Jack Neeson. In October 1998, Natasha and husband Liam won a slander case against the publishers of the London Daily Mirror which had claimed that their marriage was in trouble. After winning the case, the couple was awarded $85, 000. Outside the limelight, Natasha was an expert cook. She was well-known for the fulsome dinners she and her husband commonly throw at their upstate New York estate. Among their regular dinner guests are Meryl Streep, Laura Linney, Ralph Fiennes and Griffin Dunne.

Natasha Jane Richardson Redgrave was born on May 11, 1963, in London, England, UK. She was named after the heroine in Leo Tolstoy’s celebrated novel “War and Peace” by her famous parents, the late director Tony Richardson and Academy Award-winning British actress Vanessa Redgrave. She was the granddaughter of the late actors Sir Michael Redgrave and Rachel Kempson, a cousin of Jemma Redgrave, and a niece to actor Corin Redgrave and actress Lynn Redgrave. Her younger sister, Joely Richardson (born on January 9, 1965) is also an actress.

With such showbiz background family, Natasha, whose nicknamed is Tasha, was exposed to the business at a very young age, making her first movie appearance at age 4 with her mother in her father’s film The Charge of the Light Brigade. She was trained at St Paul’s Girls School in London for several years and at London’s Central School of Speech and Drama before beginning her fruitful career with the Leeds Playhouse in England.

As a child, Natasha Richardson made her film debut with a bit part as a bridesmaid to her mother in The Charge of the Light Brigade (1968), directed by her father, and five years later added her movie credits with an unaccredited appearance as a girl playing hopscotch in High Crime. After completing her drama studies, she perfected her craft in regional theater with Leeds Playhouse and later joined the New Shakespeare Company. She returned to movie acting by playing a small role as Miss Bridle in the 1983 drama film Every Picture Tells a Story and was cast in her first American TV series as young whore in “Ellis Island,” the next years, followed by TV roles in In the Secret State (1985) and in an episode of “The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes” (1985).

Natasha portrayed Mary Shelley in the 1986 film Gothic, a fictionalized account of the author’s creation of Frankenstein. The following year she starred opposite Kenneth Branagh and Colin Firth in A Month in the Country, directed by Pat O’Connor. Director Paul Schrader signed her for the title role in Patty Hearst, his 1988 docudrama about the heiress and her alleged kidnapping. Her performances opposite Robert Duvall and Faye Dunaway in The Handmaid’s Tale and Christopher Walken, Rupert Everett, and Helen Mirren in The Comfort of Strangers (directed by Schrader) won her the 1990 Evening Standard British Film Award for Best Actress. She was named Best Actress at the 1994 Karlovy Vary International Film Festival for Widows’ Peak, and that same year appeared in Nell opposite Jodie Foster and future husband Liam Neeson. Additional film credits include The Parent Trap (1998), Blow Dry (2001), Chelsea Walls (2001), Waking Up in Reno (2002), Maid in Manhattan (2002), Asylum (2005), which won her a second Evening Standard Award for Best Actress, The White Countess (2005), and Evening (2007). Her last screen appearance was as headmistress of a girls’ school in the 2008 comedy Wild Child. During the last week of January 2009, she recorded her offscreen role of the wife of climber George Mallory, who disappeared while climbing Mount Everest during a 1924 expedition, in the unreleased documentary film The Wildest Dream, for which Liam Neeson provides narration. Director Anthony Geffen described listening to the film since her death as “harrowing.

She also made her American television debut in a small role in the 1984 CBS miniseries Ellis Island. That same year she made her UK television debut in an episode of the BBC series Oxbridge Blues. The following year she appeared as Violet Hunter alongside Jeremy Brett and David Burke in The Adventures Of Sherlock Holmes, in the episode entitled “The Copper Beeches”. She starred with Judi Dench, Michael Gambon, and Kenneth Branagh in a 1987 BBC adaptation of the Henrik Ibsen play Ghosts; with Maggie Smith and Rob Lowe in a 1993 BBC adaptation of Suddenly, Last Summer by Tennessee Williams; portrayed Zelda Fitzgerald in the 1993 television movie Zelda; and starred in Haven (2001) on CBS and The Mastersons of Manhattan (2007) on NBC.

Natasha helped raise millions of dollars in the fight against AIDS; her father, director Tony Richardson, died of AIDS-related causes in 1991. She was actively involved in amfAR, becoming a board of trustees member in 2006, and participated in many other AIDS charities including Bailey House, God’s Love We Deliver, Mothers’ Voices, AIDS Crisis Trust and National AIDS Trust, for which she was an ambassador. She received amfAR’s Award of Courage in November 2000.

On 16 March 2009, Natasha sustained a head injury, when she fell while taking a skiing lesson at the Mont Tremblant Resort in Quebec, Canada. The injury was followed by a lucid interval, when Natasha seemed to be fine and was able to talk and act appropriately. Paramedics and an ambulance which initially responded to the accident were told they were not needed and left. Refusing medical attention, she returned to her hotel room and about three hours later was taken to a local hospital after complaining of a headache. She was transferred from there by ambulance to the Hôpital du Sacré-Cœur de Montréal in critical condition and was admitted about seven hours after the fall. The following day she was flown to Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, where she died on 18 March.

An autopsy conducted by the New York City Medical Examiners Office on 19 March revealed the cause of death was an “epidural hematoma due to blunt impact to the head”, and her death was ruled an accident.[15]

On 19 March, theatre lights were dimmed on Broadway and in London’s West End as a mark of respect to Richardson.[17] The following day, a private wake was held at the American Irish Historical Society in Manhattan.[18] On 22 March, a private funeral was held at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church in Millbrook, New York [19] and Richardson was interred near her grandmother Rachel in the church cemetery, close to the family’s upstate home.

Finally, as the loved ones of Natasha Richardson continue to mourn, a family decision made in the wake of the Tony-winning actress’s sudden death March 18 has brought a measure of comfort: After Natasha was taken off life support at Manhattan’s Lenox Hill Hospital, her family requested that her organs be donated to other patients whose lives they might save.

© Various Sources
Last Updated: March 25, 2009.
Click here for more information on Natasha.