Carmen Ejogo

A beautiful British actress of biracial heritage, Carmen Ejogo began her career as a child, landing her first professional gig in a music video at age eight. The London native made her film debut in a small role in Julien Temple's "Absolute Beginners" (1986) and then concentrated on stage and television work (most notably in the Dennis Potter-scripted "Cold Lazarus" in 1996). Stints as a TV host and veejay preceded her return to the silver screen as Eddie Murphy's love interest in the predictable action comedy "Metro" (1997). While the camera clearly captured her undeniable beauty, Ejogo proved less successful in the underwritten girlfriend role. with most critics dismissing her as just another pretty face. Undaunted, she returned to her native England and took roles in the box-office disappointment "The Avengers" and the more modestly received "I Want You" (both 1998). 2000 proved to be the actress' year. Ejogo landed the coveted title role in the four-hour CBS miniseries "Sally Hemmings: An American Scandal" and garnered good notices for her portrayal of the slave with whom Thomas Jefferson carried on a four decade romance. Later that same year, she was cast as one of the servants attending to the Princess of France (Alicia Silverstone) in Kenneth Branagh's musicalization of Shakespeare's "Love's Labour's Lost". Ejogo met her future husband Jeffrey Wright when they were cast opposite one another as Coretta Scott King and Martin Luther King Jr. in the 2001 HBO drama "Boycott".