A look at Hannah Waddingham's impressive rise to fame (2024)

She may have started out in the London theatre scene in her early 20s - but Hannah Waddingham has finally conquered Hollywood and has been hugely successful throughout award season as a result.

The London-born performerwas overcome with emotion as she won Best Entertainment Presenter at the Royal Television Society Awards at The Grosvenor House Hotel in London on Tuesday.

Hannah won for the 2023 Eurovision Song Contest, which she co-hosted with Graham Norton, Alesha Dixon and Julia Sanina.

Accepting her award, the 49-year-old actress shared: 'I feel like I'm going to look back at photos like, "Can you stop grinning like a Cheshire cat?" I'm very pleased. It's a little overwhelming.

Despite all her recent success, it was only four years ago that Hannah got her big break when she bagged the role of Richmond FC owner Rebecca Welton in the hit Apple TV+ series Ted Lasso - which has earned her two Emmys for Best Supporting Actress.

She has since stunned audience and critics alike with her quick wit, old-school glamour and incredible singing voice.

Here MailOnline reveals how Hannah went from a minor West End actress to Hollywood darling and triumphing during awards season.

Born and raised in South-West London, Hannah attended private girls' school Streatham and Clapham High School before going on to study at the Academy of Live and Recorded Arts.

Following her graduation, Hannah - who is the daughter of opera singer Melodie Kelly - concentrated on making it as a theatre actress.

One of her first jobs was in the interactive dinner show Joni and Gina's Wedding - where audience members take on the role of wedding guests and are invited to engage with actors.

Speaking to uInterview in 2022, Hannah credited the improvisation show for allowing her to grow as an actress.

She said: 'It really let me cut my teeth because you have to be quick-witted and on it and go with whatever someone else has said and keep it positive.

'And that’s probably what got me into the worlds of comedy and drama… being able to mix and ebb and flow through each other.'

In 2000, Hannah released the single Our Kind of Love - which was written by Andrew Lloyd Webber for his musical The Beautiful Game - to commemorate the composer's 50th birthday.

After this, Hannah appeared in a 2002 production of Space Family Robinson before going on to star as Lady of the Lake in Spamalot, which earned her an Olivier Award nod.

The show - which was both a West End and Broadway hit - went on to be nominated for seven Laurence Olivier awards in 2012.

However, the actress was left furious when the production failed to walk away with a single award that year.

Speaking to the Evening Standard , Hannah said: 'I don't begrudge the best actor or best actress award at all but I really do begrudge the fact we didn't win best new musical.

'I'm totally p****ed off we didn't win that. I'm actually angry. Surely if you are nominated in seven categories there is a reason for that and at some point that should be acknowledged.'

Later that year, Hannah starred in a production of Kiss Me, Kate and was nominated for her third Olivier.

Alongside her growing stage presence, Hannah also started auditioning for more and more TV and film roles -having made her big screen debut in 2008's How To Lose Friends and Alienate People.

In 2014, Hannah was cast as Tonya Dyke in the hit ITV series Benidorm and later opened up about her her frustrations on set.

In an interview with The Mirror, Hannah said: 'I'd never been groped in my life, but I was groped three times in one week in Benidorm.

'To get on set, I had to walk through the hotel dressed as Tonya in some non-existent bikini and high heels with blokes gawping at me… or rather groping me.

'I had to stop myself doing what I'd instinctively do – knock their blocks off – because I was working.'

Speaking to the Daily Mail's Baz Bamigboye in 2021, Hannah explained how she signed for mainly U.S. productions shot in the UK because she felt mainstream British TV shows were biased against actors from musical theatre.

In 2016, she hit the big-time when she was cast as Septa Unella in the fifth season of Game of Thrones.

The devout follower of the High Sparrow featured in the infamous scene which sees Cersei perform the walk of atonement as Hannah's character yells 'Shame!'

However, Cersei gets revenge on Septa in a later episode by waterboarding her.

During an appearance on Collider Ladies Night, Hannah opened up about the challenging filming process.

She said: 'Other than childbirth, it was the worst day of my life. Because Lena (Headey, who played Cersei Lannister) was uncomfortable pouring liquid in my face for that long, and I was beside myself.'

However, the recognisable role certainly put Hannah on the Hollywood map - leading her to then be cast as Jackon's mother Sofia in the hit Netflix series Sex Education in 2019.

Two years later, Hannah's career reached all new heights when she bagged a starring role as warm-yet-icy football club owner Rebecca Welton in Apple TV+'s Ted Lasso.

At the time, Hannah's daughter Kitty - whom she shares with hotelier Gianluca Cugnetto - had recently been diagnosedHenoch-Schönlein purpura (HSP).

After receiving the terrifying call while filming the Warner Bros seriesKrypton in Belfast, Hannah wasn't sure how she would be able to continue working.

HSP, an autoimmune disorder, is a condition that involves swelling of small blood vessels, often affecting children between ages two and six. In most cases, children will make a full recovery, but can be left with kidney problems.

Finding herself unable to fly home from Belfast, while her daughter lay in a hospital bed with 'giraffe splats of brown' across her, that turned out to be 'capillaries bursting over her little leggies' the actress vowed to make a change.

After finally getting to see her daughter the following day, Waddingham informed her management in both the UK and LA that she could no longer be away from her child.

'I am first and foremost a mum, and more importantly a single mum,' she told her agents over a conference call.

Recounting the story in the US while appearing on The Ellen DeGeneres Show last year, the star revealed how she then 'asked the universe' for a dream role that would enable her to be close to her daughter.

'I'm going to ask the universe for something, which is probably unreasonable but, I'm going to say, "Thank you for making my little girl better," she told Ellen.

'Can I thank you for what you've given me already, but can I just ask you for something that is close to home so I can do my main role, which is to be mama. And also can I ask that it's something that really shows what I can do [as an actress]. And I hope that's not asking too much."'

Waddingham ended the moving story by revealing that it was just 'two months later this meeting came up' for the Ted Lasso role, which is just a half hour drive from her home.

Despite fearing that her theatre background would put casting directors off, Hannah previously told the Daily Mail that it worked to her advantage with Ted Lasso.

She says her stage experience was one of the things Sudeikis and his team were attracted to when 'the little girl from Wandsworth Common' auditioned.

She explained that getting the Ted Lasso role 'was like the universe going, "You've done your hard grafting, you've done your running around . . . here you go: you can have both".'

Appearing on Kate Thornton's White Wine Question Time podcast last year, Hannah highlighted how there's much more crossover between the theatre and TV worlds now.

She said: 'I think casting directors here are now far more open to musical theatre people stepping in front of the camera, but certainly back then we're talking eight to 10 years ago. It was absolutely impenetrable.'

Discussing the difficulties she's faced in her career, Hannah added: 'It's like there was] a reluctance to kind of let me in. For a long while, I was thinking: "Okay, they can't see past the fact that I've done theatre".

'Whereas in America, if you do theatre and certainly musical theatre, they think: "My god, they're a triple threat!"

Last year, Hannah appeared in the highly-anticipated third season of Ted Lasso and is currently filming the movie The Fall Guy opposite Hollywood heavy weights Aaron Taylor Johnson, Emily Blunt and Ryan Gosling.

Her latest triumph was at the Royal Television Society Awards at The Grosvenor House Hotel in London on Tuesday.

Hannah was overcome with emotion as she won Best Entertainment Presenter.

She said: 'I feel like I'm going to look back at photos like, "Can you stop grinning like a Cheshire cat?" I'm very pleased. It's a little overwhelming.

'As a live TV novice, BBC Studios grabbed me in, and, I don't mean to be cheesy, they absolutely made me believe I could do this.

'When we finally went up, I can't tell you how supported we felt. I would not be here if BBC Studios hadn't reached out to me.'