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SHE’S the English rose who took on The Mummy and gave Tom Cruise a run for his money in the stunt department.
But while Annabelle Wallis leads a charmed life, having shot to fame on Peaky Blinders, it seems the actress is no strange to a real-life curse.
The 32-year-old, who has been linked with Coldplay’s Chris Martin since 2015, plays archaeologist Jenny in the reboot of Universal’s 1932 horror classic.
Cruise’s character is cursed by the ancient princess mummy in the movie, but Annabelle’s extended family has had more than its share of misfortune, with some speculating they were “cursed”.
Among the most poignant were the tragedies suffered by her great-uncle, the legendary Irish actor Richard Harris. His biographer, Michael Feeney Callan, said the actor was always “lamenting the curse of the Harris womenfolk”.
Richard lost both his sisters and his mother Mildred very young.
He was 16, when in 1946, his sister Audrey, just 21 and engaged to be married, fell ill with pains in her stomach. It was intestinal cancer and she died at home later that year.
Three years later, Richard contracted TB, ending his hopes of being a rugby player, and a decade afterwards he heard his mother had also been diagnosed with cancer.
He said: “I went back to Limerick and stayed with her before she died.” Mildred was just 62.
The “curse” struck again in 1970, when Richard learned another sister, Harmay, was seriously ill. The mother-of-two died that year, aged 46, from complications following emergency surgery.
Annabelle’s mother was Richard’s niece and the curse of the Harris women seemed to end with his generation.
Instead, Annabelle had an almost fairytale upbringing on her family’s farm in Cascais, Portugal, after they emigrated from Britain when she was 18 months old.
Annabelle said: “It was a real outdoor lifestyle. A lot of sports, paintballing and motocross riding. My mother encouraged us to be very independent.”
She went to an international school in Lisbon but it wasn’t long before she got the acting bug.
After graduating, she moved to London to attend drama school and ANNABELLE WALLIS follow in her great-uncle’s footsteps. Annabelle said: “I think it’s in my genes. I grew up very far from that world, and yet here I am.”
But it’s not just Richard who would have passed on the passion for performing. Through her father’s family, Annabelle is also related to the great 1900s music hall star, Marie Lloyd.
And, just like Richard, Marie Lloyd’s life was also as dramatic – and traumatic – as any of her world-class performances.
Married three times, threatened with deportation from the US and even scarred by a poisoned face cream, Marie Lloyd attracted scandal and bad luck at every turn.
Off screen, Annabelle said she’s a “very