San Francisco Frontiers - Jessie Buckley: From reality TV hopeful to Oscar winner

The 36-year-old actress from a small town in Ireland's remote southwest received the award for her work as William Shakespeare's wife Agnes, devastated by the death of their son, the eponymous child in director Chloe Zhao's acclaimed film.

Her expressive intensity as the grieving heart of the story -- an adaptation of Maggie O'Farrell's 2020 bestselling novel of the same name -- captivated audiences, moving many moviegoers to tears.

"This is really something," an emotional Buckley said, hailing her fellow nominees and saying she wanted to work with all of them.

The bewitching Agnes has "a strong, wide open heart and a mother with an epic landscape inside her", Buckley told The Irish Times, underscoring the emotional depth of the role.

In February, on becoming the first Irish woman to win a BAFTA best actress award for her performance, she dedicated it to "the women past, present and future that have taught me and continue to teach me how to do it differently".

"You brought the mother out of the shadows, and you stood her in absolution beside the giant that is Shakespeare", she said to O'Farrell in the audience.

Buckley was the closest thing to a shoo-in this awards season, sweeping the precursor prizes including the Golden Globe and Critics Choice Awards.

On Sunday, she bested Rose Byrne ("If I Had Legs I'd Kick You"), Renate Reinsve ("Sentimental Value"), Emma Stone ("Bugonia") and Kate Hudson ("Song Sung Blue").

Buckley didn't have a child when she took on the role of Agnes.

But she became pregnant "a week" after finishing "Hamnet", she told The New York Times, and gave birth to a baby girl in autumn 2025.

- 'Nurtured and respected' -

Born on December 28, 1989 to a poet, Tim Buckley, and Marina, a former opera singer and vocal coach, the actress was encouraged to join school theatre productions from a young age.

Growing up in Killarney, County Kerry with four siblings, she credits her upbringing for shaping her artistic instincts.

At home, "music, writing and expressing yourself was really nurtured and respected," she told The Irish Times.

Buckley first made waves as a reality TV hopeful in 2008's "I'd Do Anything", a BBC talent show scouting for a production of "Oliver" in London's West End.

Although she lost in the final, judges urged her to pursue formal dramatic training.

She graduated from London's prestigious Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in 2013 and immersed herself in the works of The Bard.

That same year, she secured roles in adaptations of "Henry V" and "The Winter's Tale" in London.

Television roles followed including in a BBC dramatisation of "War and Peace" (2016), and the HBO hit miniseries "Chernobyl" (2019).

Buckley made her film debut in "Beast" (2017), a psychological thriller set on Jersey in the Channel Islands, and earned a BAFTA nomination for her lead role in the 2018 film "Wild Rose" about an aspiring country singer and ex-convict from Glasgow.

She has often returned to her Shakespearean theatrical roots, playing Juliet at the National Theatre in 2021 with another rising star, Josh O'Connor.

She earned her first Oscar nomination in 2022 for best supporting actress for her portrayal of a tormented mother in Maggie Gyllenhaal's tense psychological drama "The Lost Daughter".

An accomplished singer, she won an Olivier Award in 2022 for best actress in a musical for her portrayal of Sally Bowles in the West End revival of "Cabaret".

That same year, she released a folk album with Bernard Butler, former guitarist of the band Suede.

Buckley lives in the English countryside in Norfolk with her husband, a mental health worker, who she married in 2023.

She has spoken openly about previous struggles with anxiety and panic attacks, and said therapy helped her learn to feel rather than repress her emotions.

Her current project, in theatres now, is Gyllenhaal's "The Bride!" -- a genre-hopping take on the bride of Frankenstein's monster in which she co-stars opposite fellow Oscar winner Christian Bale.

M.Powell--SFF