Academy Award glory next for Irish star and her film Hamnet?

From TV talent shows to the pinnacle of film acclaim – could this be the year Jessie Buckley writes her name into history with an Academy Award win?

The actor is now a hot favourite to take home one of the major prizes in Hollywood after winning a Golden Globe for best actress in a drama for her portrayal of William Shakespeare’s wife in Hamnet, which was also named best film.

And there could be a double Oscar success for the island of Ireland as Northern Ireland-born author Maggie O’Farrell, who wrote the award-winning novel the film is based on, could be in line for recognition as co-writer of the screenplay.

Hamnet, which was released in the UK on Friday, was co-produced by Steven Spielberg, who told the Golden Globes audience he “loved” O’Farrell’s book.

Accepting her award, Buckley said: “This is a real honour, I love being part of this industry.”

She added: “It was such an extraordinary set to be part of, because we were telling the story of probably the most famous Brit that ever lived, and we had a Chinese director, a lot of Irish, a mostly Polish crew, beside our British family.”

Her Irish co-star Paul Mescal, who took on the role of Shakespeare, was nominated in the best supporting actor category but lost out to Stellan Skarsgård.

Buckley, who first came to attention as a teenage contestant on the BBC West End talent show I’d Do Anything 18 years ago, was previously nominated for an Academy Award in 2022 for her role in The Lost Daughter.

But the Golden Globe win means she is firmly in the frame to become just the fifth Irish actor to take home the famous gold statuette, after Barry Fitzgerald, Brenda Fricker, Daniel Day Lewis and Cillian Murphy.

The awards are a major milestone of the film awards season, taking place less than a fortnight before the Academy Award nominations on 22 January.

Buckley, who grew up in Killarney, County Kerry, has been working in film and theatre for almost two decades, and is known for her musical talents as well as her acting ability.

She is a former pupil of the Royal Irish Academy of Music (RIAM) in Dublin, where she studied singing as well as the piano, clarinet, saxophone and the harp.

As a young girl, Buckley was chosen out of about 40,000 performers to receive RIAM’s nationwide High Achiever award in 2001.

She was just 17 when she auditioned for the BBC TV show I’d Do Anything, about the search for an actress to play Nancy in a West End production of Oliver!

She was the runner-up in the competition, losing out to Jodie Prenger.

Last week, reflecting on her time on the show, she said she was “brutalised”, claiming there was a “lot of body shaming and bringing me to femininity school” during the production.

Composer Andrew Lloyd Webber, who led the search for Nancy during the 2008 talent show, has described Buckley as a “force of nature”.

Buckley later turned down an offer to be the understudy to Prenger’s Nancy, instead going on to pursue her own role on the London stage.

She secured a role in Stephen Sondheim’s A Little Night Music at the Menier Chocolate Factory theatre.

Staying in London, Buckley enrolled in the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (Rada) in London, graduating with a degree in acting in 2013.

In the years since, her star has been on a consistent rise – TV roles in Taboo, Fargo and Chernobyl; an acclaimed turn opposite Jude Law in a West End production of Henry V; and a steady stream of film work, such as Beast, Men and Wild Rose, in which she was also able to highlight her singing skills.

In 2022, she was nominated for a best supporting actress Academy Award for The Lost Daughter and won an Olivier Award for her role in Cabaret.

She got married in 2023 and welcomed her first child last year.

Following her Golden Globe win, RIAM’s head of artistic programming, Ciara Higgins, said its staff were “very, very proud” of their former pupil.

She also stressed Buckley was “a person that has carved her own pathway” and had achieved her success “on her own terms”.

“I don’t think we can claim any of that, but it’s just wonderful to be a little of a part of that Golden Globes history and fingers crossed, a little bit of that Oscar history in the weeks ahead,” Higgins added.

Based on Maggie O’Farrell’s award-winning novel of the same name, Hamnet is a fictional account exploring the lives of William Shakespeare, his wife Agnes and their family.

It delves into the impact of the death of Agnes and William’s son, Hamnet, and how it could have influenced one of Shakespeare’s most enduring masterpieces, Hamlet.

It received six nominations at the Golden Globes, winning two of them, including best film.

“I think what’s very different about winning an award like this is [that] it signifies a really communal effort, you know?” O’Farrell said.

“It’s a kind of family – it’s the Hamnet family and we all made the film together and everybody has been recognised which is just really, really lovely.”

O’Farrell was born in Coleraine, County Londonderry, to Irish parents, but grew up in Wales and Scotland.

Earlier this month she told BBC News NI that her native country has had a huge influence on her life.

“I mostly grew up in Britain but we would visit Ireland all the time throughout my childhood, it is a very important part of my identity and who I am,” she said.

O’Farrell researched Shakespeare’s life extensively for her novel, but said there is still “awful lot about his biography we don’t know”.

“There is not a lot written about Shakespeare’s wife or his mother or his daughters,” she said.

“They are people whose history has been written in water and they are very much footnotes in his story.”