Actress starred in ‘Harry Potter,’ ‘Peaky Blinders’
British actor Helen McCrory, who starred in the television show “Peaky Blinders” and the “Harry Potter” movies, has died, her husband said Friday. She was 52.
Her husband, fellow actor Damian Lewis, said Ms. McCrory died “peacefully at home” after a “heroic battle with cancer.”
Ms. McCrory was one of Britain’s most respected actors, making her mark by playing a succession of formidable and sometimes fearsome women.
She played the matriarch of a crime family on “Peaky Blinders” and the scheming Voldemort ally Narcissa Malfoy in the “Harry Potter” movies. Ms. McCrory also starred as a human rights lawyer dragged into international intrigue in the TV thriller “Fearless,” played lawyer Cherie Blair, wife of British Prime Minister Tony Blair, in the 2006 movie “The Queen,” and had roles in Martin Scorsese’s “Hugo” and the James Bond thriller “Skyfall.”
“Harry Potter” author J.K. Rowling tweeted that Ms. McCrory was ‘‘an extraordinary actress and a wonderful woman who’s left us far too soon.”
Others remembered Ms. McCrory for her charity work, including on FeedNHS, a campaign to provide meals for frontline health care workers during the coronavirus pandemic.
“Helen McCrory will be remembered not just for her remarkable stage and screen performances, but also for her selflessness and generosity,” comedian Matt Lucas tweeted. “She and Damian were the motor driving FeedNHS, working tirelessly during the pandemic to raise millions for others. What a tremendous loss.”
Ms. McCrory and Lewis, star of the TV series “Homeland” and “Billions,” married in 2007 and had two children.