Naomi Ackie

Naomi Ackie was born on 2 November 1992[2] in Walthamstow, London,[3] the daughter of second-generation immigrants from Grenada.[4] Her father was a Transport for London employee and her mother worked for the National Health Service.[3] She is one of three children and has an older brother and sister.[3] She went to Walthamstow School for Girls.

Her first role was at the age of 11, playing the angel Gabriel in a school nativity play.[4] She studied at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama and graduated in 2012.[3][5]

Ackie's breakthrough film role was in Lady Macbeth (2016),[6] for which she won the British Independent Film Award for Most Promising Newcomer in 2017.[7] She subsequently appeared in Idris Elba's directorial debut Yardie (2018) and Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (2019).[8][9] She also portrayed Bonnie in the second season of Netflix's black comedy series The End of the F***ing World,[10] and a school inspector in Education, an hour-long drama part of Steve McQueen's anthology film series Small Axe.[11]

Ackie portrayed American singer Whitney Houston in the biographical film Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance with Somebody.[12] The film opened to mixed reviews but widespread praise for Ackie's performance, with Variety calling her "a veritable artist of lip-syncing."[13] The Hollywood Reporter noted that Ackie herself is "a capable singer" and can be heard briefly in a few early scenes.[14]

• Naomi Ackie at IMDb