Jane Elizabeth Marie Lapotaire (née Burgess; 26 December 1944 – 5 March 2026) was an English actress from Suffolk.
Her performance in the title role of Marie Curie (1977) first brought her to wide attention. In 1978, she performed the title role Édith Piaf for Pam Gems's play Piaf for the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford-upon-Avon and in London. Two years later, the show moved to Broadway where Lapotaire won the Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play. In 2013, she played the Duchess of Gloucester in Richard II with David Tennant in the title role. This was followed in 2015 by a role as Queen Isobel in Henry V. Lapotaire won the Laurence Olivier Award for Actress of the Year in a New Play for Piaf in 1979 and was nominated for the Actress of the Year Award in 1990 for Shadowlands. Additionally, Lapotaire was twice nominated for the British Academy Television Award for Best Actress for Marie Curie and Sea Tales: The Return (1977) and Blind Justice (1988).
Lapotaire also wrote three memoirs. Lapotaire was married twice, latterly to director Roland Joffé. Their son is the screenwriter and director Rowan Joffé.
Early life Lapotaire was born in Ipswich, Suffolk, on 26 December 1944. Her mother, Louise Burgess, was French but had been abandoned as a baby in England and brought up in foster care in Ipswich. She was nineteen and single when Lapotaire was born, and never revealed the identity of her daughter's father. From the age of two months, Lapotaire was raised as a foster child by a widowed pensioner, Grace Chisnall, who had also been her birth mother's foster mother. It was a working-class, impoverished childhood, but, when Lapotaire won a place at the local grammar school, Northgate Grammar School, her horizons were broadened with an introduction to art, music and literature. When Lapotaire was about 12, her birth mother made a bid to reclaim her, but she chose to remain with her foster mother in Ipswich, although she spent holidays with Burgess, by then married to a Canadian oil worker and living in North Africa. She later took her birth mother's married name, Lapotaire. Grace Chisnall died in 1984 aged 96 and Louise Lapotaire died in 1999.Carole Zucker, In the Company of Actors: Reflections on the Craft of Acting (New York: Theatre Arts Books/Routledge, 1999), p. 78.
Acting career Lapotaire studied at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School from 1961 to 1963. At that time, the programme was a two-year course, unlike today's three-year course. Lapotaire had earlier auditioned for the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) in London, but failed to get in. She joined the Bristol Old Vic theatre company in 1965Carole Zucker, In the Company of Actors: Reflections on the Craft of Acting (New York: Theatre Arts Books/Routledge, 1999), pp. 79–80. and the National Theatre in 1967. She was also a founding member of The Young Vic Theatre in 1970/1971 and moved to the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1974.
Her performance in the title role of Marie Curie (1977) first brought her to wide attention. In 1978, she performed the title role Édith Piaf for Pam Gems's play Piaf, directed by Howard Davies for the Royal Shakespeare Company, in Stratford-upon-Avon and in London at the Warehouse Theatre, Covent Garden in 1979. Two years later, the show moved to Broadway. Lapotaire won the Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play that year.
She returned to the Royal Shakespeare Company in October–November 2013 as the Duchess of Gloucester in Gregory Doran's adaptation of Richard II with David Tennant in the title role. This was followed in October–December 2015 as Queen Isobel in Henry V. On Christmas Day in 2014, she appeared as Princess Irina Kuragin in season five, episode nine of Downton Abbey.
Writing Lapotaire wrote a number of memoirs: Grace and Favour (1989), Out of Order: A Haphazard Journey Through One Woman's Year (1999), and Everybody's Daughter, Nobody's Child (2007), which includes an account of her childhood growing up in Levington Road, Ipswich.
Personal life and death Lapotaire was married to Oliver Wood from 1965 to 1967, the relationship ending in divorce. She was then married to director Roland Joffé from 1974 to 1980, with whom she had a son, screenwriter and director Rowan Joffé (born 1973). Following their divorce, she was for a time the partner of actor Michael Pennington.Daniel Farson, "The Latest Prince", The Sunday Telegraph, July 1980.
On 11 January 2000, while preparing to teach a course on Shakespeare at the École Internationale in Paris, Lapotaire suffered a massive cerebral haemorrhage. Four days after her collapse, she underwent a six-hour operation and spent the next three weeks largely unconscious. She wrote about her recovery in Time Out of Mind.
Lapotaire died on 5 March 2026, at the age of 81.
Associations Lapotaire was honorary president of the Bristol Old Vic Theatre Club, and was president of the Friends of Shakespeare's Globe.
Filmography +Film Year Title Role 1970 Crescendo Lillianne 1972 Antony and Cleopatra Charmian 1973 Christina Cunningham 1975 One of Our Dinosaurs Is Missing Miss Prescott 1983 EurekaHelen McCann 1984 To Catch a King Irene Neumann 1986 Lady Jane Princess/Queen Mary 1996 Surviving Picasso Olga Picasso 1997 Shooting Fish Dylan's Headmistress 2000 There's Only One Jimmy Grimble Alice Brewer 2005 Can't Stop Breathing Daisy (short movie) 2016 Sarah 2020 Rebecca Granny 2021 Smyrna Filio Mpaltatzi
+Television Year Title Role Notes Sherlock Holmes Annie Harrison Episode: "The Naval Treaty" Jason King French maid Episode: "Buried in the Cold, Cold Ground" Emily Shaw Episode: "The Case of Laker, Absconded Play for Today Alice Stocker Episode: "Stocker's Copper" Owen, M.D. Jennie Hopkins Episode: "It Never Rains" (2 parts) Callan Kristina Episode: "The Contract" Love and Mr LewishamMiss Alice Heydinger Mini-series Armchair TheatreJean Episode: "On Call" Alice Hoatson Episode: "E. Nesbit" Van der Valk Elly Episode: "Rich Man, Poor Man" Country Matters Orianda Episode: "The Black Dog" (S2E02) Crown Court Juliet Tomlin Episode: "Robin and his Juliet" Edward the Seventh Empress Marie of Russia Play for Today Kim Episode: "The Other Woman" Magdalena Sea Tales NarratorBridget Ritsin Episode: "The Return" Marie Curie Marie Curie Wings Anne Boissier Episode: "Another Country" Eleanor of Aquitaine Jackanory Storyteller Episode: "Fanny's Sister" Antony & Cleopatra Cleopatra TV film (BBC Television Shakespeare) Elizabeth Moulton-Barrett Evangeline Macbeth Lady Macbeth TV film The Testament of John Claire Seal Morning Miriam Spencer Napoleon and Josephine: A Love Story Letizia Bonaparte Theatre Night Aline Solness Episode: "The Master Builder" Blind Justice Katherine Hughes Episodes: "Crime and Punishment", "White Man Listen", "The One about the Irishman", "A Death in the Family", "Permanent Blue" Madame de la Rougierre Murder on the MoonLouise Mackey TV film Screen Two Helen Episode: "Circles of Deceit" 199293 Love Hurts Diane Warburg (Series 1–2, 20 episodes) Elspeth Cost Episode: "Dead Water"1995 Johnny and the Dead Mrs. Sylvia Liberty Casualty Eileen Jarvis Episode: "We Shall Overcome" Anouk Khoori Episode: "Simisola" Giving Tongue Hilda Jacob McCallum Miriam Konrad Episode: "Sacrifice" Ain't Misbehavin' Clara Van Trapp 2000 Arabian Nights Miriam TV film Midsomer Murders Mary Mohan Episode: "Who Killed Cock Robin?" Bella and the Boys Mrs. Rogers TV film He Knew He Was Right Lady Milborough Fiona Deakin-JonesEpisode: "Word of God" Elizabeth David – a Life in Recipes Ernestine Carter Eleventh Hour Gepetto Episode: "Resurrection" Casualty Maureen Episodes: "Crush" and "Better Drowned" Trial & Retribution Tess Episode: "Ghost Train (Part 1)" Lucan Older Susie Maxwell-Scott Episode: 1 Downton Abbey Princess Kuragin Episode: "A Moorland Holiday"2019 Princess Alice of Battenberg 2 episodes Dalgliesh Lady Lavinia Berowne Episode: "A Taste for Death" Endeavour Madame Belasco Episode: "Prelude" 2023 The Burning Girls Joan Hartman Main role
Theatre Her stage credits include:
Date Title Role Director Company / Theatre 1965 When We Are Married (Stage debut) Ruby Birtle Bristol Old Vic / Theatre Royal, Bristol 1965–1967 Mrs. Warren's Profession Vivie Bristol Old Vic / Theatre Royal, Bristol 1965–1967 War and Peace Natasha Bristol Old Vic / Theatre Royal, Bristol 1965–1967 Ruth Bristol Old Vic / Theatre Royal, Bristol 1967 Judith National Theatre, London 1967 Antoinette National Theatre 1969 Mincing, later Mrs. Fainall National Theatre 1969 Macrune's Guevara Tania National Theatre 1969 Zanche National Theatre 1969 The Travails of Sancho Panza Don Quixote's niece National Theatre 1970 Jessica National Theatre 1970–1971 Scapino Zerbinetta Young Vic Theatre, London 1970–1971 Katherina Young Vic Theatre 1970–1971 Oedipus Jocasta Young Vic Theatre 1970–1971 Measure for Measure Isabella Young Vic Theatre 1971 Lieschen National Theatre 1974 Macbeth Lady Macduff Royal Shakespeare Company 1974 Uncle Vanya Sonya Royal Shakespeare Company 1975 As You Like It Rosalind Nottingham Playhouse, Nottingham, then Edinburgh Festival, Edinburgh 1975 Twelfth Night Viola Royal Shakespeare Company, Stratford, then Aldwych Theatre, London 1975 Vera Royal Shakespeare Company / Albery Theatre, London 1975 Lucy Honeychurch Royal Shakespeare Company / Albery Theatre As You Like It Rosalind Riverside Studios, London 1976 Title role Bristol Old Vic / Theatre Royal, Bristol 1979 Love's Labour's Lost Rosaline Stratford, 1978 then Aldwych Theatre 1979 Piaf Édith Piaf The Other Palace, London, then Warehouse Theatre, London, later Aldwych Theatre 1980 Wyndham's Theatre and Piccadilly Theatre, London – Royal Shakespeare Company / Plymouth Theatre, New York City 1983 Kick for Touch Eileen National Theatre – Dear Anyone agony aunt Birmingham Repertory Theatre – Cambridge Theatre 1984 Venice Preserv'd Belvidera National Theatre – Antigone Antigone and Peter Gill National Theatre / Cottesloe Theatre, London 1985 Saint Joan Title role Compass Company 1986 Double Double Fortune Theatre, London 1986 Misalliance Royal Shakespeare Company 1986 Archbishop's Ceiling Royal Shakespeare Company 1988 Greenland Royal Court Theatre, London 1989–1990 Shadowlands Joy Davidman Queen's Theatre, London 1992 Hamlet Gertrude Royal Shakespeare Company / Barbican Theatre, London 1993 Ghosts Mrs. Alving Royal Shakespeare Company / The Other Place Theatre, Stratford – Henry VIII (also known as The Famous History of the Life of Henry VIII) Katherine of Aragon Royal Shakespeare Company / Swan Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon – Royal Shakespeare Company / Young Vic Theatre Royal Shakespeare Company / Swan Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon – Richard II Duchess of Gloucester Royal Shakespeare Company / Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon – Royal Shakespeare Company / Barbican Theatre – Henry V Queen Isobel Royal Shakespeare Company / Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon – Royal Shakespeare Company / Barbican Theatre – Royal Shakespeare Company / New York Major Tours – Henry VIII (also known as The Famous History of the Life of Henry VIII) Katherine of Aragon Royal Shakespeare Company / Brooklyn Academy of Music Majestic Theater, New York – Royal Shakespeare Company / John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Washington, DC 1999 A Master Class with Maria Callas British cities: Theatre Royal, Bath …
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