BIOGRAPHY

Kate Hewlett is a famous, brilliant, talented equestrian from New Zealand. She has won many competitions and looks great in a pair of jodhpurs. If this isn’t the Kate Hewlett you’re looking for, keep reading:

The other Kate Hewlett is an actor and writer currently residing in Toronto, Ontario. Kate was born on December 17, 1976, but would rather pretend that she was born on December 17, 1986 because she has felt kind of old since hitting age 30. She was so eager to enter the world that she was born in the hallway of the hospital, much to her mother’s embarrassment. Kate used to run into walls as a child, and lost many a good tooth that way. Her brother David called her “Dracula” for a long, long time.

Kate attended the Bishop Strachan School in Toronto for fifteen years, where she was inspired by many incredible teachers and decided to become an actor…or a teacher. It was a toss-up. She decided to go to Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario to figure out what she wanted to be when she grew up. While attending Queen’s, Kate was lucky enough to play many theatre roles, including a hen, a chicken, a male bank employee and Audrey in Little Shop of Horrors. It was the latter that solidified her decision to become an actor, because she finally gained the confidence to do so (mostly because of the remarkable director, Grahame Renyk.)

Kate lived in Toronto for two years after university and began working as a voice-over actor, as well as starring in a handful of indie films and a Fringe show called Millennium Madness Sale. She worked as a barista for six months, spilling drinks on grumpy people (usually by accident) and giving stuff away for free. She also worked as a tutor, helping students with Math, English, Italian and French (none of which she can remember now.)

In the fall of 2000, Kate decided that she was either going to teacher’s college or theatre school. When she found out the she had been accepted into the National Theatre School of Canada (in Montreal), she actually cried…with happiness, that is. She spent three years at this remarkable institution where she learned a lot, fell in love with Shakespeare, and made the best friends of her life.

Kate graduated from NTS in April of 2003, then began acting full-time in Ontario. She was lucky enough to be directed by Stewart Arnott in Unity (1918) at the Great Canadian Theatre Company and also had roles in Noble Parasites (Theatre Passe Muraille), A Christmas Carol (Theatre Orangeville), Charley’s Aunt (Port Hope Festival Theatre) and more. Her first major film role was in Walter Salles’ Dark Water in which she got to work with Jennifer Connelly and Camryn Manheim. Needless to say, she was completely star struck. Roles in Kevin Hill and 4 Minutes followed, also wonderful experiences. In 2006, she worked with her brother David for the first time on his directorial debut, A Dog’s Breakfast. Even though she would never tell him this, she was incredibly proud of his writing, acting and directing in this project and can’t wait to work with him again in this way. Soon after doing A Dog’s Breakfast, Kate was cast as a series lead in CBC’s 11 Cameras, where she was surrounded by an incredibly talented cast including Deb Grover, Joris Jarsky and Deanna Dezmari.  Recent film credits include The Last New Year (feature film) and Psych.

While in Toronto, Kate began working with UnSpun Theatre, a dynamic up-and-coming theatre company that focuses on collective and collaborative theatre. Together, they created a play called Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump which was performed at the Toronto Fringe Festival. It was here that writer/producer Martin Gero saw her on stage and decided to write the character of Jeannie Miller on Stargate Atlantis. Kate has played Jeannie in four episodes of the show.

Kate now lives in Toronto and is pursuing playwriting, songwriting and acting. She has written three plays: Humans Anonymous, The Swearing Jar and Use My Babies Well, as well as approximately thirty songs for the guitar, which she is not very good at playing!  She recently wrote a short film entitled She Said Lenny, which received BravoFact funding and will start shooting in June 2009.  This July, Kate's newest play, Malus Domestica, will premiere at the Toronto Fringe Festival.

Kate has two cats: Rufus and Martha, named after the Wainwrights. They are very silly and provide her with hours of entertainment when she is procrastinating from writing or line-learning.

When taking time off from work, Kate feeds her addictions to coffee, chocolate, facebook and Bavarian beer.