As Jessie Buckley prepares for the 2026 Academy Awards, we’re taking a look back at her early life and best works
Cementing herself as a household name, Kerry actress Jessie Buckley has soared to new heights after her depiction of Agnes in Hamnet has won her a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress, a BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role and a Critics’ Choice Movie Award for Best Actress.
Her sights are currently set on an Oscar award, as she has made the shortlist for Best Actress in a Leading Role. The Academy Awards will take place on 15 March.
While Irish Country Magazine and the rest of Ireland is backing her all the way on 15 March, let’s take a look at her early life and career.
Background
Born in 1989 to Marina Cassidy and Tim Buckley, Jessie is the eldest of five children, growing up with three younger sisters and one younger brother.
Jessie isn’t the only notable woman in her family either, as she is the great-granddaughter of Irish republican Madge Clifford. Madge was an activist and member of Cumann na mBan, the women’s auxiliary to the Irish Republican Army, who contributed to the independence struggle through intelligence operations during the Anglo-Irish War.
Jessie went to Ursuline Secondary School, an all-girls convent school in Thurles, County Tipperary, which is where her love for performing on stage grew.
Early Career
Fostering her talent from an early age, Her mother, Marina Cassidy, encouraged her to sing as a child. As a vocal coach herself, Marina coached her daughter
In Secondary School, she played a number of male roles at school, including the male lead role of Jets gang founder Tony in the musical West Side Story and Freddie Trumper in Chess. Outside of school, she also attended the Royal Irish Academy of Music, participating in workshops during the summer to hone in on her singing and acting skills.
Taking her talent overseas, she later graduated from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London in 2013. Around this time, Jessie also regularly speaks about an ‘angel’ stranger who helped her get her career started. Speaking on the Late Late Show in 2019, she told the story of how a man named Tony Bernstein supported her in her early career.
“I was completely boundaryless. I just was so hungry and excited to be part of something that I thought would take at least 10 decades to kind of be part of it. And so I had no idea, I didn’t understand what you needed to survive,” she began.
“I was on 300 quid a week, which you can’t really you can’t even get the Tube on that over in London. And anyway, this amazing man, he basically came to see me in A Little Night Music.”
“I wouldn’t be here without him. He paid for my training, he paid for my rent, he paid for food shopping (when) I couldn’t.”
“(The) pure kindness of strangers is incredible, and I’m incredibly lucky to have met amazing people like him in my life,” she concluded.
Notable work
Jessie’s career started in 2008 when she took part in the talent show I’d Do Anything, a reality TV series following the process of finding an unknown actress to play the lead role of Nancy in a West End revival of the British musical Oliver! In the show, we saw Jessie make it to the finale and earn second place.
Bit by the stage school bug, Jessie then performed at several concert events across Ireland and the UK, making her Off-West End debut in a 2008 revival of the Stephen Sondheim musical A Little Night Music.
Aside from Hamnet, Jessie has given outstanding performances in other films and TV shows. Let’s take a look at some of her most notable work.
The Lost Daughter
In this film, Jessie plays the younger version of Leda, the character played by Olivia Colman. Jessie’s scenes appear in flashbacks that explore Leda’s earlier life as a new academic and mother struggling with the pressure of parenting and identity. Her performance earned her a nomination for the an Academy Award and a nomination for a BAFTA for Best Supporting Actress.
The Blue Road
Lending her voice to bring Irish author Edna O’Brien’s life story to life. The Blue Road is a powerful documentary portrait, completed shortly before Edna’s death featuring extracts from her journals read by Jessie.
Chernobyl
If you watched HBO drama miniseries Chernobyl, you will have seen Jessie play the character of Lyudmilla Ignatenko, the wife of one of the first firefighters to die in the Power Plant disaster.
Beast
In the psychological thriller Beast, Jessie leads the motion picture in the role of Moll, a troubled young woman living on Jersey Island and feeling trapped by her controlling family and small-town life. This was Jessie’s feature film debut and the breakout role that first brought her major critical acclaim.
Wild Rose
The role that also landed Jessie a BAFTA nomination for Best Actress in a Leading Role. Jessie plays Rose-Lynn in Wild Rose, a talented but troubles aspiring country singer from Glasgow.
