Emilia Jones
Emilia Jones is a British actress. She is best known for her lead role as a child of deaf adults in the drama film CODA, for which she received a British Academy Film Award nomination for Best Actress. Jones is also known for starring in the Netflix adventure series Locke & Key and the HBO crime series Task.
Jones began her career as a child actress in West End theatre, Doctor Who and Utopia. Her earlier films include Brimstone, Ghostland, Two for Joy, and Horrible Histories.
Early life
Jones was born on 23 February 2002 in London to Welsh singer and presenter Aled Jones and his wife, English circus performer Claire Fossett. She grew up in Barnes with her younger brother Lucas. Jones attended an improv class run by an agent, through whom Jones was cast in One Day.Career
Jones' acting career began in 2010, at age eight, when she appeared as Jasmine in the film One Day. Jones portrayed Alice in the Channel 4 drama Utopia, and later that year, she played the young Queen of Years Merry Gejelh in the British television series Doctor Who episode "The Rings of Akhaten". The Boston Standard lauded Jones for "carr off her scenes with aplomb" and for "really sell Merry’s mixture of naivety, knowledge and childlike fear," while the website Zap2It praised Jones' performance as "spot on." She had a small role in Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides.In 2011, Jones made her theatrical debut playing the princess Young Fiona in the original production of Shrek the Musical at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. Two years later, Jones appeared in Rebecca Lenkiewicz's stage adaptation of Henry James's The Turn of the Screw as nine-year-old Flora, alternating between two other girls each night. After her performance on press night, Jones said, "I don’t find it scary, I just find it so much fun... I love every bit of it."
In December 2018, it was announced that Jones was cast as Kinsey Locke, one of the main characters in the Netflix fantasy drama series Locke & Key. The first season was released on 7 February 2020. It was Jones' first main role in a television series. She was attracted to the part because of the prospect of playing two versions of the same character: Kinsey before and after she removes her fear.
In 2021, Jones starred in the Apple TV+ comedy-drama film CODA as Ruby Rossi, the only hearing member of her family who dreams of going to Berklee. For the part, Jones spent nine months learning American Sign Language, while also learning how to operate a professional fishing trawler. Principal photography ran from September 2019 to January 2020. The film premiered on 28 January 2021 at the Sundance Film Festival, where it was bought by Apple Original Films for $25 million. It premiered on Apple TV+ on 13 August 2021 and received positive reviews; Jones and co-star Troy Kotsur were critically acclaimed and received several accolades. The film won the award for Best Picture at the 94th Academy Awards, the first Sundance-premiered film to do so.
Jones has most recently starred in the films Cat Person and Winner, both directed by Susanna Fogel, and Fairyland by Andrew Durham. She will next star alongside Nick Robinson in Charlie Harper by Tom Dean and Mac Eldridge, and in Edgar Wright's The Running Man.
Filmography
| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
| 2011 | Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides | English Girl | |
| 2011 | One Day | Jasmine | |
| 2014 | What We Did on Our Holiday | Lottie | |
| 2015 | Youth | Frances | |
| 2015 | High-Rise | Vicky | |
| 2016 | Brimstone | Joanna | |
| 2018 | Ghostland | young Elizabeth "Beth" Keller | |
| 2018 | Patrick | Vikki | |
| 2018 | Two for Joy | Violet / Vi | |
| 2019 | Nuclear | Emma | |
| 2019 | Horrible Histories | Orla | |
| 2021 | CODA | Ruby Rossi | |
| 2023 | Cat Person | Margot | |
| 2023 | Fairyland | Alysia Abbott | |
| 2024 | Winner | Reality Winner | |
| 2025 | Charlie Harper | Harper | |
| 2025 | The Running Man | Amelia Williams | |
| TBA | Nancy | Post-production |
| Year | Show | Role | Notes |
| 2011 | House of Anubis | Young Sarah Frobisher-Smythe | 8 episodes |
| 2013 | Doctor Who | Merry Gejelh | Episode: "The Rings of Akhaten" |
| 2013–2014 | Utopia | Alice Ward | Recurring role |
| 2014 | Residue | Charlotte Jones | 3 episodes |
| 2015 | Wolf Hall | Anne Cromwell | Episode: "Three Card Trick" |
| 2020–2022 | Locke & Key | Kinsey Locke | Main cast |
| 2025 | Task | Maeve | Main cast |
| Year | Artist | Title |
| 2020 | JC Stewart | "I Need You to Hate Me" |