Entertainment

Who Is Charlotte Riley?

by Marenah Dobin

After months of the actor saying “my wife this” and “my wife that” in interviews while we all thought they were still engaged, Tom Hardy and Charlotte Riley are married. The wedding actually took place on the 4th of July, so while "wife" is actually a factual title now, it was still a premature term of endearment when he used it in an April interview. While you may know Hardy from his roles in The Dark Night Rises, you may be less familiar with Riley, so let’s untangle Charlotte’s web of mystery and learn more about Riley. Here's some fun facts about the actress because she's more than Bane's (surprise!) wife:

  • She's an actress and her first major role was in the 2008 box office bomb Easy Virtue with Jessica Biel.
  • She met Hardy in 2009 on set for the British adaptation of Wuthering Heights and the pair got engaged a year later.
  • They almost shared the set again, when Riley was considered for the role of Cat Woman/Selina Kyle in Dark Knight Rises. She ultimately lost out to Anne Hathaway, while Hardy went on to land the role of bane in the film.
  • Riley played Nance in 2014's Edge of Tomorrow which stared Tom Cruise and Emily Blunt.
  • She is not on Twitter, so don’t trust any accounts claiming to be official. Riley is preserving her mystery and does not have any verified social media accounts.
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  • She wrote the play Shaking Cecelia and performed in it at the Edinburgh Festival in 2004. She even won the Sunday Times Playwriting Award.
  • Riley is a huge fan of vintage fashion, with a wardrobe full of pieces from the 40s.
  • She formed a singing group called the Flirtinis and sang back up for The Jive Aces, Britain’s Got Talent semifinalists.
  • In addition to writing, singing, and acting, Riley paints in whatever spare time she has left.
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  • Riley is not a fan of email, texting, or Skyping and instead enjoys writing letters back and forth with her fiancé every other day when they are apart.
  • She is a dedicated patron of Bowel Cancer UK, a charity that raises awareness and provides support to people in the UK affected by bowel cancer.
  • If you want to see more of Riley, her next role is in Heart of the Sea which is set for release in March 2015.

Images: Getty Images