Emily Blunt has taken on the British throne, the fashion world and a time loop with effortless grace and talent. We celebrate the 38-year-old’s birthday on Feb. 23, counting down her very best performances in cinema thus far.
Considering Blunt’s resume, it’s almost criminal that she’s yet to find love from the Academy Awards. For her work in film, she’s garnered five nods from the HFPA, two from BAFTA and three from the Screen Actors Guild, including a surprising (and deserving) win for her turn as a pregnant mother inhabiting an alien world in husband John Krasinski’s “A Quiet Place.” That win made her just the second actor to nab a SAG Award, but not receive a nod from the Oscars. The first was Idris Elba for “Beasts of No Nation” (2015).
In 2020, she was a standout opposite Jamie Dornan in John Patrick Shanley’s adaptation of his play “Wild Mountain Thyme.” In the Bleecker Street movie, she plays Rosemary, a woman who, along with star-crossed soulmate Anthony (Dornan), can’t seem to figure life out in a very rainy Ireland. In a December 2020 episode of the “Variety Awards Circuit” podcast, while Blunt was promoting the film with her co-star, she shared her support for diversity and inclusion in Hollywood, saying, “you have to represent the world and how the world exists. The more we can represent everybody, the more enjoyable these films are going to be.”
With an exciting year ahead for the charismatic performer, including “A Quiet Place Part II” and Disney’s “Jungle Cruise” opposite Dwayne Johnson, this list is sure to grow.
Honorable mentions: “The Girl on the Train” (2016), “Into the Woods” (2014) and “The Muppets” (2011).