Florence Pugh is one of the best actors of the current generation, with an impressive list of movies and TV shows that have been critically and commercially well-received.
Born on 3 January 1996 in Oxford, Pugh made a name for herself working in her home country of England. She is the younger sister of Toby Sebastian, best known for playing Prince Trystane Martell in Game Of Thrones, and theatre actor and comedian Arabella Gibbins.
Pugh made her acting debut in 2014 as a teenager. In less than a decade, she has become one of the most sought-after stars in entertainment as well as an icon in the world of fashion with her sartorial choices, making heads turn at every event she graces.
“She has movie star written all over her, but she’s also a character actor, which is the best kind of movie star,” Greta Gerwig, who cast her in the role of Amy March in her film Little Women (2019), described Pugh to The New York Times in 2020.
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Her screen presence and ability to transform into any character she portrays have left movie-goers in awe. Indeed, Pugh has essayed diametrically different dramatic roles, including an action superhero with an élan matched only by seasoned actors.
She has appeared as both the leading face and strong supporting characters in her films and TV shows, building a resume that speaks volumes about her acting calibre. Driven by her performances, three of her works are certified fresh on Rotten Tomatoes with 95 per cent. Four others, including the TV movie King Lear (2018) in which she plays Cordelia, are above 90 per cent.
Her outstandingly executed roles are testimony to the high anticipation for Dune: Part Two, one of the two upcoming movies of Florence Pugh, which is set for release on 3 November 2023. In it, Pugh plays the Emperor’s daughter Princess Irulan.
Her success in recent years has also led to a renewed interest in the characters she has essayed so far, particularly in the British Nordic noir detective series Marcella (2016) in which she appears in a minor role in three episodes in the first season.
All the movies and TV shows starring Florence Pugh according to RT ratings
Little Women
Directed by: Greta Gerwig
Other cast members: Saoirse Ronan, Emma Watson, Eliza Scanlen, Laura Dern, Timothée Chalamet, Meryl Streep
Release date: 25 December 2019
RT rating: 95 per cent
Synopsis: Jo March (Ronan) and her three sisters, Meg (Watson), Amy (Pugh) and Beth (Scanlen), are brought together when Beth develops an illness. Despite differences, all four sisters are determined to live life on their own terms.
More about the film: Based on the 1868 novel of the same name by Louisa May Alcott, Little Women is the highest-rated of all Florence Pugh movies in which she has played a protagonist.
Critical praise was particularly reserved for Pugh, Ronan and Gerwig’s direction. Both Pugh and Ronan were nominated for Oscars in the Best Supporting Actress and Best Actress categories, respectively. The film won the Oscar for Best Costume Design, of its six nominations in total. It also received five BAFTA and two Golden Globe nods, among other accolades.
Puss in Boots: The Last Wish
Directed by: Joel Crawford and Januel Mercado
Other voice cast members: Antonio Banderas, Salma Hayek Pinault, Harvey Guillén, Olivia Colman, Ray Winstone, Samson Kayo, Wagner Moura
Release date: 21 December 2022
RT rating: 95 per cent
Synopsis: Puss in Boots (Banderas) has burned through eight of his nine lives in his quest for adventure. In order to restore his lost lives, he journeys to the Black Forest to find the Wishing Star with the help of his former partner Kitty Soft Paws (Hayek). But they face stiff competition from the crime family led by Goldilocks (Pugh) and her three bears.
More about the film: Puss in Boots: The Last Wish is a sequel to Puss in Boots (2011), which is a spin-off set in the Shrek animated franchise. It received unanimous critical acclaim upon release and was nominated in respective best animated feature film categories at the Academy Awards, BAFTA, Golden Globe and other major awards.
Watch 'Puss in Boots: The Last Wish' Here
The Little Drummer Girl
Directed by: Park Chan-wook
Other cast members: Alexander Skarsgård, Michael Shannon, Michael Moshonov, Simona Brown, Jeff Wilbusch, Amir Khoury
Release date: 19 November 2018
RT rating: 95 per cent
Synopsis: Charlie (Pugh) is a young, idealistic English actor who is recruited by Mossad to infiltrate a Palestinian terrorist cell in the late 1970s.
More about the series: The show is most notable for being the first TV series directed by South Korean auteur Park Chan-wook. The six-part miniseries is based on John le Carré’s best-selling 1983 novel of the same name.
The show propelled Florence Pugh to global stardom. Her performance was praised by critics and was instrumental in its worldwide popularity.
Oppenheimer
Directed by: Christopher Nolan
Other cast members: Cillian Murphy, Robert Downey Jr., Emily Blunt, Matt Damon, Josh Hartnett, Casey Affleck, Rami Malek, Kenneth Branagh
Release date: 21 July 2023
RT rating: 93 per cent
Synopsis: Physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer is appointed to head a team of scientists to make the world’s first atomic bomb during World War II. His work ends with the world’s first nuclear explosion on 16 July 1945, but politics at home threatens to undo his legacy.
More about the film: Oppenheimer is one of the highest-rated movies by Christopher Nolan and is the director’s second film set during World War II.
It was released on the same day as Greta Gerwig’s Barbie, which led to the creation of the term ‘Barbenheimer’ on the internet. The term refers to the massive influence the two movies — both opposite of each other in terms of their subject matter — had on cinema lovers. Eventually, both emerged as winners at the worldwide box office, with Barbie becoming the first film helmed by a solo female director to earn over USD 1 billion.
Florence Pugh plays Jean Tatlock in Oppenheimer. Tatlock was a psychiatrist and member of the Communist Party USA. Her romantic involvement with Oppenheimer and her eventual suicide is depicted in the movie.
Fighting With My Family
Directed by: Stephen Merchant
Other cast members: Jack Lowden, Lena Headey, Nick Frost, Vince Vaughn, Dwayne Johnson
Release date: 22 February 2019
RT rating: 93 per cent
Synopsis: Paige (Pugh) comes from a family of English wrestlers. When she earns a dream-come-true opportunity to join World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), she has to leave her tight-knit family life behind and make it on her own in the highly competitive world of pro wrestling.
More about the film: The film is a biopic of Saraya Jade Bevis, a real-life former WWE superstar who wrestled in the American promotion under the ring name Paige. The film also has Dwayne Johnson playing himself in his world-famous in-ring avatar ‘The Rock.’ Other WWE wrestlers who appear as themselves in the film include Big Show, Sheamus, The Miz and John Cena.
Hawkeye
Directed by: Rhys Thomas and Bert & Bertie
Other cast members: Jeremy Renner, Hailee Steinfeld, Tony Dalton, Vera Farmiga, Alaqua Cox, Fra Fee, Linda Cardellini, Vincent D’Onofrio
Release date: 24 November 2021
RT rating: 92 per cent
Synopsis: Clint Barton, aka Hawkeye, (Renner) becomes an unwilling mentor to a young archer named Kate Bishop, who wants to become an Avenger. But his past as the vigilante named Ronin comes to haunt him as he attempts to reach home before Christmas.
More about the series: Florence Pugh plays Yelena Belova aka Black Widow in this series set after the events of Avengers: Endgame (2019). This was her second appearance as the character in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) franchise. Hawkeye is one of the highest-rated MCU TV shows and was the last of the first five series that was released by Marvel. It was nominated for two Primetime Emmy Awards, both in stunt categories.
Lady Macbeth
Directed by: William Oldroyd
Other cast members: Cosmo Jarvis, Paul Hilton, Naomi Ackie, Christopher Fairbank
Release date: 14 July 2017
RT rating: 88 per cent
Synopsis: Katherine Lester (Pugh) is a young woman in rural England in 1865 who is trapped in a loveless marriage to Alexander Lester, the son of a wealthy landowner. When Katherine meets a young Sebastian, a worker on the estate, she begins a passionate affair with him which also triggers in her an unquenchable desire for control.
More about the film: Pugh shot to fame in the UK with Lady Macbeth, whose story was based on the 1865 novella Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District by Nikolai Leskov.
Her performance was underlined by critics as the reason behind the brilliance of the film. She won the British Independent Film Awards (BIFA) for Best Actress. Pugh was nominated for acting categories at other UK-based film awards ceremonies and won some of them as well.
The Wonder
Directed by: Sebastián Lelio
Other cast members: Kíla Lord Cassidy, Tom Burke, Niamh Algar, Elaine Cassidy
Release date: 16 November 2022
RT rating: 86 per cent
Synopsis: Lib Wright (Pugh), an English nurse, arrives at a remote village in the Irish Midlands in 1862 to keep an eye on an 11-year-old girl named Anna O’Donnell (Kíla). The girl has stopped eating but remains healthy and alive, leading to a surge of pilgrims and tourists to the village to see her. What appears seemingly strange is further complicated by a series of events that affect both the nurse and the girl.
More about the film: The film was nominated for a BAFTA for Outstanding British Film of the Year. It is based on the 2016 novel of the same name by Emma Donoghue, who co-wrote the screenplay with Lelio and Alice Birch.
Fans and critics see The Wonder as one of the movies most notable for the performance of Florence Pugh. She was nominated in acting categories across several UK-based film award shows, winning the honour at the London Film Critics’ Circle.
Midsommar
Directed by: Ari Aster
Other cast members: Jack Reynor, William Jackson Harper, Vilhelm Blomgren, Ellora Torchia, Archie Madekwe, Will Poulter
Release date: 3 July 2019
RT rating: 83 per cent
Synopsis: Dani (Pugh) and Christian (Reynor) are a couple whose relationship is falling apart. A family tragedy makes a grieving Dani travel with Christian to a rural area in Sweden for a mid-summer festival. Everything seems peaceful and paradisiacal to the two, but they soon discover a horror from which there is no escape.
More about the film: Midsommar is Aster’s second film as a director. It was received with overwhelming praise by critics, with particular laudatory notes for both Pugh and Aster.
Black Widow
Directed by: Cate Shortland
Other cast members: Scarlett Johansson, David Harbour, O-T Fagbenle, Olga Kurylenko, William Hurt, Ray Winstone, Rachel Weisz
Release date: 9 July 2021
RT rating: 79 per cent
Synopsis: Following the events of Captain America: Civil War (2016), Natasha Romanoff, aka Black Widow (Johansson), who is on the run, returns to her ‘family’ in Russia. Uniting with those she left behind to become an Avenger, Romanoff must face a powerful force from her past bent on killing everyone she knows.
More about the film: Black Widow marks Florence Pugh’s first appearance in the MCU. Her performance as Romanoff’s adopted sister Yelena Belova, who is another trained Black Widow, was particularly well received. The film, however, received mixed reviews from critics who were not particularly impressed with the lack of connection to a larger MCU storyline.
It is noteworthy that the film’s post-credits scene sets up the events depicted in Hawkeye.
The Falling
Directed by: Carol Morley
Other cast members: Maisie Williams, Maxine Peake
Release date: 7 August 2015
RT rating: 74 per cent
Synopsis: Abbie (Pugh) and Lydia (Williams) are best friends at an all-girl English school in 1969. A troubled Abbie dies due to a mysterious illness following a fainting spell. As the fainting epidemic spreads throughout the school and Lydia descends into a downward spiral, it is only her mother (Peake) who can save her.
More about the film: The Falling marks Florence Pugh’s acting debut and is to date one of her best movies. The film received positive reviews from critics, but it was released on limited screens only in the UK and New Zealand.
Outlaw King
Directed by: David Mackenzie
Other cast members: Chris Pine, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Billy Howle, Tony Curran, Stephen Dillane
Release date: 9 November 2018
RT rating: 62 per cent
Synopsis: Robert the Bruce (Pine) is forced into exile by the English in the 14th century after he is crowned King of Scotland. He decides to rebel against the English crown by forging a band of outlaws into an army against the much larger English forces led by the newly crowned King Edward II (Dillane).
More about the film: Outlaw King is a Netflix original film and was released on the streaming platform alongside select theatres. In the film, Pugh plays Robert’s wife Elizabeth de Burgh.
Malevolent
Directed by: Olaf de Fleur Johannesson
Other cast members: Ben Lloyd-Hughes, Scott Chambers, Georgina Bevan, James Cosmo, Celia Imrie
Release date: 5 October 2018
RT rating: 58 per cent
Synopsis: Angela (Pugh) and Jackson (Lloyd-Hughes) are siblings who run a scam posing as paranormal investigators in 1980s Scotland. Things go out of hand when one day they are invited to a country estate which is actually haunted.
More about the film: Malevolent is based on the novel Hush by American writer Eva Konstantopoulos. It was the last theatrical film by Pugh before her rise to global stardom with the miniseries, The Little Drummer Girl.
The Commuter
Directed by: Jaume Collet-Serra
Other cast members: Liam Neeson, Vera Farmiga, Patrick Wilson, Jonathan Banks, Sam Neill
Release date: 12 January 2018
RT rating: 55 per cent
Synopsis: Michael (Neeson) is a former cop-turned-insurance salesman who gets entangled in a dangerous conspiracy on his daily train ride home. At stake are the lives of everyone on board.
More about the film: The Commuter is Pugh’s first American film. She plays a punk girl named Gwen, a fellow traveller who grows suspicious of Neeson’s character and has a secret of her own.
A Good Person
Directed by: Zach Braff
Other cast members: Morgan Freeman, Molly Shannon, Chinaza Uche, Celeste O’Connor
Release date: 24 March 2023
RT rating: 58 per cent
Synopsis: Allison (Pugh) is involved in a fatal accident that causes the death of Daniel’s (Freeman) daughter. When the two are brought together by a twist of fate at a therapy session sometime later, a still grieving Daniel and a depressed Allison must find a way to move on together.
More about the film: Despite positive reviews for the performances from both Florence Pugh and Morgan Freeman, the critics gave the movie an overall mixed-to-negative rating. Much of the criticism was reserved for Braff, who is otherwise renowned for his starring role as John “J.D.” Dorian Scrubs in the long-running TV series Scrubs (2001–2010), for which he received three Golden Globe nominations and an Emmy nod.
Don’t Worry Darling
Directed by: Olivia Wilde
Other cast members: Harry Styles, Olivia Wilde, Gemma Chan, KiKi Layne, Nick Kroll, Chris Pine
Release date: 23 September 2022
RT rating: 38 per cent
Synopsis: Alice (Pugh) and Jack (Styles) are a seemingly happy couple in a small company settlement named Victory in the 1950s. The utopia that Alice thinks she lives in begins to crumble as she starts taking note of the suspicious behaviour of the wives in the neighbourhood whose husbands work in the top-secret facility where Jack is employed.
More about the film: Though one of the most-anticipated films of 2022, Don’t Worry Darling was met with highly negative critical reviews upon release and is the worst-rated of all Florence Pugh movies. Except for Pugh’s performance, critics were unforgiving of almost everything else about the film using words such as “hollow,” “abysmal,” “disappointing,” and even “forgettable” to describe Wilde’s second feature-length directorial.
Above all, the film is remembered for the litany of controversies it unexpectedly created. Rumours included an affair between Styles and Wilde, talks of a rift between Wilde and Pugh, and the most notable viral moment that involved Styles apparently ‘spitting’ on Pine while taking a seat next to him at the Venice Film Festival 2022, leading to the birth of the term “#spitgate.”
Watch 'Don’t Worry Darling' Here
(Hero and Featured images: Niko Tavernise/Niko Tavernise – © 2022 Warner Bros. Pictures, Inc. All Rights Reserved./IMDb)
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
– Why is Florence Pugh so popular?
Florence Pugh is immensely popular due to her phenomenal acting prowess and the ability to slip into any character she portrays on screen. She is also famous for her fashion choices.
– What movies has Florence Pugh starred in?
Florence Pugh has starred in 14 feature-length movies on the big screen to date. Among some of her most notable films are Oppenheimer, Little Women, Fighting With My Family and Lady Macbeth.
This story first appeared on Lifestyle Asia Kuala Lumpur
