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Rachel Ward

Rachel Ward

Acting

Biography

Rachel Claire Ward (born September 12, 1957) is an English-Australian actress, film and television director, screenwriter, and former model who has primarily pursued her career in Australia. During her modelling career, she was featured on the covers of Vogue, Harper's & Queen, and Cosmopolitan magazines. After moving to the United States in 1977, she appeared in television advertisements such as the Lincoln Mercury "Cougar Girl" and Revlon's "Scoundrel Girl". In 1981, she received a Golden Globe Award nomination for "New Star of the Year" for her role in the film Sharky's Machine starring with Burt Reynolds. The following year, she starred in Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid with Steve Martin. Her big break came in 1983, when she starred opposite Richard Chamberlain as the lead role portraying Meggie Cleary in the television miniseries The Thorn Birds, for which she was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Miniseries or Television Film. Also in 1983, U.S. audiences voted Ward one of the world's 10 most beautiful women. In 1984, she played Jess in the film noir remake Against All Odds, with Jeff Bridges. After filming Fortress in 1985, she then disappeared from film for a few years to study acting. In 2001, she was again nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Miniseries or Television Film for her role in On the Beach (2000). Also in 2001, she won the Australian Film Institute Award for Best Short Fiction Film for The Big House, and Best Australian Film at Flickerfest. The film also won the Film Critics Circle of Australia award, as did her 2003 film Martha's New Coat — which also won the 2003 ATOM Award. In 2005, she was made a Member of the Order of Australia "for service to raising awareness of social justice through lobbying, mentoring and advocacy for the rights of disadvantaged and at-risk young people, and support for the Australian film and television industry". In 2009, she directed her first feature-length film titled Beautiful Kate, adapted by Ward from a 1982 Newton Thornburg novel, and premiered at the Sydney Film Festival. She has been married to the Australian actor Bryan Brown since 1983. They have three children: Rosie, Matilda, and Joe. Matilda Brown is an actress, writer and director.

Known For

Dynasty
6.5

The saga of a wealthy Denver family in the oil business: Blake Carrington, the patriarch; Krystle, his former secretary and wife; his children: Adam, lost in childhood after a kidnapping; Fallon, pampered and spoiled; Steven, openly gay; and Amanda, hidden from him by his ex-wife, the conniving Alexis. Most of the show features the conflict between 2 large corporations, Blake's Denver Carrington and Alexis' ColbyCo.

Dynasty

1981
The Thorn Birds
7.2

Follows the Cleary family over several decades, focusing on the central, tragic romance between Meggie and Father Ralph, who is torn between his vows and his love for her.

The Thorn Birds

1983
Peter Rabbit
6.7

Peter Rabbit's feud with Mr. McGregor escalates to greater heights than ever before as they rival for the affections of the warm-hearted animal lover who lives next door.

Peter Rabbit

2018
Darby and Joan
6.0

An English widow on a reluctant quest. An Australian detective escaping his past. When lives collide, two strangers embark on an epic outback odyssey together.

Darby and Joan

2022
A Bite to Eat with Alice
N/A

A Bite to Eat with Alice is a cooking show dedicated to creating delicious food. No matter your skill level, host Alice and her guest - who may not be able to cook toast - will inspire you to experiment in the kitchen.

A Bite to Eat with Alice

2024
Blackbeard
5.5

Bristol, England, 1717. Lieutenant Robert Maynard of the Royal Navy scouts the seas in order to restore safe passage to the sea lanes. He meets his match when he's taken by a fearsome hulk of a menace in the West Indies—a pirate sailing off the Island of St. Vincent. Edward Teach has no plans for retirement. In fact, his goal-to find and lay claim to the fabled treasures of Captain Kidd.

Blackbeard

2006
Against All Odds
5.7

Having been cut from his professional football team, down-and-out athlete Terry Brogan is in desperate need of money. Crooked nightclub owner and bookie Jake Wise offers Terry a hefty sum to go to Mexico and find his girlfriend, Jessie Wyler. Terry cannot turn the offer down. When Terry locates Jessie, the two fall in love. Terry reports that he failed to find her, but Jake sends someone else. Terry and Jessie's love must endure unexpected twists.

Against All Odds

1984
The Straits
6.2

Set among the turquoise waters and lethal wildlife of Australia’s Far North Queensland and the Torres Strait, The Straits is an exotic, darkly humorous crime drama. The Montebellos are not your average Australian family. Modern day smugglers, their family business is transporting drugs into Australia and guns and exotic wildlife out, making use of ties of blood and loyalty in the Torres Strait Islands.

The Straits

2012
An Accidental Soldier
5.7

An unexpected love story set in WW1 France between a young Australian baker who has deserted the front line, and a grieving French woman, who puts her own life at risk by sheltering him from the authorities.

An Accidental Soldier

2013
Beautiful Kate
5.7

Ned Kendall is asked to return to the remote and isolated family home by his sister, to say goodbye to his father who is dying. Ned also brings his young aspiring actress fiancee who struggles with the isolation. When home he starts having memories of his childhood many involving his beautiful twin sister and his older brother. These memories awaken long-buried secrets from the family's past.

Beautiful Kate

2009
Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid
6.7

Juliet Forrest is convinced that the reported death of her father in a mountain car crash was no accident. Her father was a prominent cheese scientist working on a secret recipe. To prove it was murder, she enlists the services of private eye Rigby Reardon. He finds a slip of paper containing a list of people who are 'The Friends and Enemies of Carlotta'.

Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid

1982
Twisted Tales
8.0

Stories of the bizarre and the supernatural, as introduced by Bryan Brown. Sometimes serious, often comical, but always with a twist at the end of the story.

Twisted Tales

1996
Two Twisted
6.8

Two Twisted is an Australian TV mystery anthology drama which premiered on the Nine Network on 14 August 2006. Narrated by Bryan Brown, who also produced the series' predecessor, Twisted Tales, each episode of the series contains two short half-hour stories, that have a twist ending. Also present in each episode is a link or connection between the two tales.

Two Twisted

2006
Sharky's Machine
6.2

Police officer Tom Sharky gets busted back to working vice, where he happens upon a scandalous conspiracy involving a local politician. Sharky's new 'machine' gathers evidence while Sharky falls in love with a woman he has never met.

Sharky's Machine

1981
Wide Sargasso Sea
4.9

In the wake of Jamaican emancipation, French colonist Annette Cosway falls into poverty and marries racist Englishman Paul Mason. But when Annette's young son dies in a fire started by former slaves, Mason flees to England, leaving his grief-stricken wife and her Creole daughter Antoinette behind. Soon Antoinette learns she must marry to claim her inheritance and sets her sights on Rochester, an Englishman eerily similar to Mason.

Wide Sargasso Sea

1993
Seasons of Love
8.0

Thomas Linthorne is a farmer, who, with his bride, Kate, settles a parcel of untilled Midwestern farmland in 1866. Linthorne is a dynamic and driven man who eventually becomes a pillar of the close-knit community. But there are trials and tribulations that eventually plague his dreams of the perfect life he has tried to create for his family. Over the span of fifty years, the Linthorne family will weather more than their share of hardship that affects each of them in dramatic ways. The Linthorne saga, set against the daily rituals and chores of life on the land, reveals the determination, strength and indomitable spirit of the families who settled America.

Seasons of Love

1999
Fortress
6.9

After being kidnapped by four masked men, a teacher and her students rebel by plotting against the criminals.

Fortress

1985
No image
9.5

Monarch Cove is a prime time telenovela that premiered on Lifetime Television on November 4, 2006. It ran for 14 episodes, ending on December 16, 2006.

Monarch Cove

2006
How to Get Ahead in Advertising
6.3

Pressure from his boss and a skin-cream client produces a talking boil on a British adman's neck.

How to Get Ahead in Advertising

1989
On the Beach
6.2

The world has finally managed to blow itself up and only Australia has been spared from nuclear destruction and a gigantic wave of radiation is floating in on the breezes. One American sub located in the Pacific has survived and is met with disdain by the Australians. The calculations of Australia's most renowned scientist says the country is doomed. However, one of his rivals says that he is wrong. He believes that a 1000 people can be relocated to the northern hemisphere, where his assumptions indicate the radiation levels may be lower. The American Captain is asked to take a mission to the north to determine which scientist is right.

On the Beach

2000