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Kate Winslet - Biography

Kate is an award-winning actress from Reading 

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Nicky Morris
TV and film writer
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Kate Winslet's early life 

Kate Winslet was born on October 5, 1975, in Reading, England, to a family of thespians. Her grandparents, who were both actors, founded the Reading Repertory Theatre and her father also worked in the industry. Her mother, meanwhile worked as a nanny and waitress. The actress has two sisters, Anna and Beth, both of whom are actresses, and a younger brother, Joss. 

Kate attended theatre school in Maidenhead and made her acting debut opposite the Honey Monster in a Sugar Puffs advert. She made her first stage appearance aged 13, and just four years later burst onto the scene as a homicidal teen in Heavenly Creatures. 

Kate Winslet's rise to fame

After an Oscar-nominated turn in Sense And Sensibility, she went on star alongside Leonardo DiCaprio in James Cameron's Titanic, which went on to gross upwards of $1 billion worldwide and gave her another Oscar nod at the age of 22. 

From there, Kate attempted to avoid being typecast and signed on for a number of contemporary-set films, including the critically-acclaimed sci-fi romance, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

Kate boasts an impressive list of film credits, including Finding Neverland, The Holiday and Flushed Away. In 2008, she reunited with Titanic co-star Leonardo DiCaprio in Revolutionary Road before going on to star in the romantic drama, The Reader, which won her an Academy Award and BAFTA Award for Best Actress.

She has since appeared in various major films including the Divergent series, The Mountain Between Us, Collateral Beauty, Steve Jobs and Avatar: The Way of Water.

As for her small-screen roles, Kate took a guest role in Ricky Gervais' and Stephen Merchant's comedy series, Extras, in 2004 before later starring in the five-part HBO miniseries Mildred Pierce, for which she won an Emmy. 

Her most recent roles include HBO's police drama, Mare of Easttown, which won her a second Emmy Award, and Channel 4's single drama, I Am Ruth, in which she starred alongside her daughter, Mia Threapleton, and picked up a TV BAFTA for Best Actress.

Kate Winslet's personal life 

When she was 15, Kate began a relationship with actor-writer Stephen Tredre, who was 12 years her senior, after meeting on the set of sci-fi drama, Dark Season. The couple went their separate ways in 1995 but remained close until Tredre died of bone cancer two years later. 

While filming the 1998 indie film, Hideous Kinky, Kate met assistant director Jim Threapleton and the pair struck up a romance. They went on to tie the knot in November 1998 at her primary school in Reading, before welcoming their daughter Mia Threapleton in 2000. The couple divorced in 2001 and Kate went on to meet director Sam Mendes.

The pair married in May 2003 on the island of Anguilla, and their son, Joe, was born in the same year. The couple divorced in 2011.

Kate met her third husband, Edward Abel Smith, in 2011. The couple met on the private island of Richard Branson, who is Edward's uncle, and went on to tie the knot in 2012 at an incredibly secret ceremony in New York. Their son, Bear Blaze Winslet, was born in 2013.

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