British actor Helen McCrory, who played Narcissa Malfoy in the final three “Harry Potter” movies and starred in a number of other film and TV roles, has died, her husband Damian Lewis said Friday.
She was 52.
“I’m heartbroken to announce that after a heroic battle with cancer, the beautiful and mighty woman that is Helen McCrory has died peacefully at home, surrounded by a wave of love from friends and family,” wrote Lewis, who won both and Emmy and Golden Globe for his role as Marine Sergeant Nicholas Brody in the Showtime series “Homeland.”
“She died as she lived,” he added. “Fearlessly.”
McCrory and Lewis were married in 2007 and have a daughter Manon, born in 2006, and son Gulliver, born in 2007.
Born in London, McCrory, the eldest of three children, studied acting at the Drama Centre, a well-known school, where stars like Pierce Brosnan, Colin Firth and Tom Hardy all trained.
She would go on to play a variety of stage, TV and film roles, winning a string of awards in the U.K. But her break-out role was as “Anna Karenina” in a 2000 TV adaptation of the classic novel. She would later star as Clair Dowar in the James Bond film “Skyfall.”
But to a generation of viewers, she will be best remembered as the wife of Lucius Malfoy, mother of Draco Malfoy, in “Harry Potter,” which she played in the franchise’s final three movies.
