Olivia Kate Cooke, born December 27, 1993, is an English actress. From 2013 to 2017, she co-starred as Emma Decody in the A&E drama-thriller series Bates Motel. She has also starred in the horror movies The Quiet Ones and Ouija, the science fiction movie The Signal, the comedy-drama Me and Early and the Dying Girl, the horror-mystery The Limehouse Golem, the thriller Thoroughbreds, and the Steven Spielberg movie Ready Player One. Take a look below for 25 more interesting and fascinating facts about Olivia Cooke.
1. Cooke was born and raise din Oldham, Greater Manchester.
2. Her father, John Cooke, is a retired police officer and her mother, Lindsy, is a sales representative.
3. Cooke has a younger sister named Eleanor.
4. When she a was child, her parents divorced, and she and her younger sister lived with their mother.
5. She attended Royton and Crompton Secondary School and studied drama at Oldham Sixth Form College, leaving before the end of her A-levels to star in Blackout.
6. When she was a child, Cooke practiced ballet and gymnastics.
7. Cooke started acting when she was 8 years old at an after-school drama program in her hometown, called the Oldham Theater Workshop.
8. For years, Cooke performed only as part of the ensemble cast, until she was 17, when she starred as Maria in Oldham Sixth Form College’s production of West Side Story.
9. After her debut in Oldham Sixth Form College’s production of West Side Story, Cooke landed her first and last leading role for the Oldham Theater Workshop, in Prom: The Musical, a remake of Cinderella.
10. When she was 14 years old, Cooke secured her first local talent agent in Manchester, who placed her in a number of commercials.
11. In 2012, she appeared in One Direction’s “Autumn Term” tour video, as a student getting a piggyback ride from Harry Styles.
12. Although Cooke’s agent discouraged her from enrolling in drama school because she was already getting acting work, Cooke was keen on applying to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. She made it to the final round of auditions, but wasn’t accepted.
13. Cooke supported the Save The Children campaign by appearing in Bulgari advertisements in 2014.
14. She explained that does doesn’t have a Twitter account: “I think it’s best for me not to have it because my first thought is never my best; my first reaction is never my best reaction.”
15. Cooke starred in two BBC miniseries productions in 2012: Blackout, as the daughter of Christopher Eccleston’s character, and The Secret of Crickley Hall, as a young teacher at a tyrannical orphanage in the 1940s.
16. Cooke stated that she felt better suited for television than theater, as she was embarrassed by the exaggerated gestures sometimes required for stage acting.
17. Her secondary feature movie The Signal, with Brenton Thwaites and Laurence Fishburne, opened at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival.
18. In October, 2014, Cooke led the cast of Ouija, a horror movie based on Hasbro’s board game. The role of the protagonist, Laine Morris, was a major undertaking for Cooke, who appeared in almost every scene.
19. For her role in the comedy-drama movie Me and Earl and the Dying Girl, Cooke shaved off her hair to play the female lead who battles leukemia.
20. Cooke played the titular character in the independent drama movie Katie Says Goodbye, alongside Jim Belushi, Mireille Enos, Christopher Abbott, and Mary Steenburgen.
21. She is close friends with her Me and Earl and the Dying Girl co-star Thomas Mann, and her Bates Motel co-stars Freddie Highmore and Nicola Peltz.
22. She starred as Art3mis in Steven Spielberg’s science fiction adventure Ready Player One.
23. Cooke has said in an interview that she doesn’t fear anything supernatural, but that she does have a fear of both illness and dogs.
24. She began dating actor Christopher Abbott in 2015.
25. She will star alongside Oscar Isaac, Olivia Wilde and Samuel L. Jackson in Dan Fogelman’s relationship drama movie Life Itself.
