Jenna Coleman

Coleman in May 2013

Coleman landed the part of Jasmine Thomas in Emmerdale in 2005.[9] At the British Soap Awards 2007, she was nominated for the "Best Newcomer" award, and at the National Television Awards 2006, she was nominated for the "Most Popular Newcomer" award.[10] At the 2009 British Soap Awards, she was nominated for the "Best Actress", "Sexiest Female", and "Best Dramatic Performance" awards.[11] She received a nomination for the "Best Actress" award from the TV Choice Awards. In May 2009, it was announced that Coleman would be joining BBC school-based drama series, Waterloo Road, as "hard girl" Lindsay James.[12] As she was 23 at the time of her casting, Coleman found the experience of playing a schoolgirl "surreal".[13]

In December 2010, it was announced that Coleman would be playing Susan Brown in a BBC Four television adaptation of the John Braine novel Room at the Top.[14][15] The adaptation was originally intended to air in April 2011, but this was cancelled due to a rights dispute between the production company and Braine's estate. The dispute was resolved by 2012, and the show aired in two parts on 26 and 27 September 2012.[7] In 2011, she made her feature film debut with a small role in Captain America: The First Avenger.[9][16] She also got the role of Annie Desmond in Julian Fellowes' four part mini-series Titanic, describing her character as a "cheeky little Cockney" and "the Eliza Doolittle of the ship".[17]

Coleman provided the voice for Princess Melia Antiqua in the English dub of the 2010 video game Xenoblade Chronicles and subsequently reprised her role for the 2020 Definite Edition remake's epilogue: Future Connected. In 2012, Coleman was cast as Rosie in Stephen Poliakoff's original drama series Dancing on the Edge, which follows the fortunes of a black jazz band in the 1930s. The show aired on BBC Two in February 2013. She starred as Lydia Wickham in the adaptation of Death Comes to Pemberley.[18] The three episodes were shown on BBC One during Christmas 2013.[19]

On 21 March 2012, Doctor Who producer Steven Moffat confirmed at a press conference that Coleman would play the companion of the Eleventh Doctor (Matt Smith).[20] Moffat chose her for the role because she worked the best alongside Smith and could talk faster than he could.[21] She auditioned for the role in secret, under the pretence of auditioning for Men on Waves (an anagram for "Woman Seven": she would first appear in the show's seventh series).[22]

Coleman in July 2015

Although originally announced as beginning her run as companion in the Christmas special in 2012, Coleman made a surprise appearance on 1 September 2012 in the first episode of the seventh series as Oswin Oswald, a guest character.[23] Coleman subsequently debuted as a series regular in the Christmas special episode "The Snowmen" as Victorian governess and barmaid Clara Oswin Oswald. In that episode, Coleman also played a third version of the character, a resident of twenty-first-century London named simply Clara Oswald. Beginning in "The Bells of Saint John", this version begins her travels as the Doctor's regular companion,[24] including after his regeneration into the Twelfth Doctor, played by Peter Capaldi, in the 2013 Christmas special episode "The Time of the Doctor."[25] In the 2014 Christmas special episode "Last Christmas", it was revealed that Coleman would remain in the role of Clara for Series 9.[26] However, the ninth series was her last, as Coleman had decided to leave the show to take on a role as Queen Victoria in an ITV production.[27][28] In "The Zygon Invasion" and "The Zygon Inversion", Coleman also played the role of Bonnie, the Zygon leader who took the form of Clara Oswald. She returned to the show for Twelfth Doctor's last episode "Twice Upon a Time" where she made a cameo appearance; that episode, Doctor Who's 2017 Christmas special, aired the same evening as the first Christmas special for Victoria. She was first credited on screen as Jenna Coleman in Doctor Who Live: The Next Doctor, which aired on 4 August 2013.[1][29]

In 2016, Coleman starred in ITV's eight-part drama following the reign of the British monarch and Empress of India, Queen Victoria. The actress confessed that she was not totally informed about Victorian history, but researched the role. When interviewed for BBC Radio 4's Woman's Hour, Coleman expressed her admiration for the monarch.[30] She argues that this role meant she was able to break out of her supposed 'box' as a northern working-class character that Emmerdale put her in.[30] Victoria premiered on 28 August 2016 on ITV,[31] and in September 2016, ITV renewed Victoria for a second series.[32] A Christmas special for 2017 was also commissioned and a third series was announced in December 2017.[33]

In December 2017, it was announced that Coleman would be the narrator for a Royal Caribbean UK advertising campaign.[34] On 8 January 2018, Coleman was confirmed to play Joanna in the four-part BBC drama The Cry, an adaptation of the 2013 novel by Helen FitzGerald.[35]

In September 2018, the Old Vic Theatre announced on their website that Coleman would star in a new production of All My Sons in 2019,[36][37] which ran from 13 April to 8 June 2019[38] and included a cinema screening via National Theatre Live on 14 May 2019.[39] In February 2019, it was announced that Coleman would make a guest appearance in an episode from series five of the dark comedy series Inside No. 9, with an expected broadcast date later in the year.[40] Series five returned to the screen on 3 February 2020.[41]

On 11 May 2019, in an interview with Graham Norton on his BBC Radio 2 program, Coleman indicated her intent to return to Victoria for a fourth series should it be renewed by ITV, but stated that the show will be taking "a bit of a breather" before production resumes.[42] On 9 September 2019, it was announced that Coleman had been cast as Marie-Andrée Leclerc in the Netflix and BBC drama The Serpent, a dramatisation of the life of convicted serial killer Charles Sobhraj.[43] Production of The Serpent began in Bangkok in September 2019 and continued into 2020, with an expected BBC broadcast later in the year.[44] As with most other film and television production, work on The Serpent was suspended in March 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Filming resumed on August 17 in the UK and was completed on August 28. Due to the delay in filming, the broadcast date for The Serpent was moved to 2021.[45] It premiered on 1 January 2021.[46]

During the pandemic, it was announced that Coleman would participate in The Remote Read, a planned series of online drama performances to raise funds for theatrical workers left unemployed by the pandemic.[47] The first production under this banner, an adaptation of Tom Stoppard's A Separate Peace (1966), was transmitted via the Zoom platform on 2 May 2020.[48] Coleman also recorded the short story Pressures, Residential by Philip Hensher, in support of UNICEF UK, as well as The Tale of the Flopsy Bunnies by Beatrix Potter, as part of a collection of audiobooks in Beatrix Potter: The Complete Tales.[49]

Nine years after its original English release, Coleman reprised her role as Melia in the video game Xenoblade Chronicles: Definitive Edition which features a brand new epilogue taking place after the main story.[50]