Career
Macdonald's career began while working as a barmaid. She saw a leaflet advertising an open casting session for Trainspotting and decided to audition, winning the part of Diane, the underage seductress to Ewan McGregor's Renton. Other roles include Mary O'Neary in Two Family House and an actress playing Peter Pan in Finding Neverland. She also had major roles in Robert Altman's British period piece Gosford Park, where she played an aristocrat's maid, as well as in Intermission (2003), as Deirdre.
On television, her highest-profile roles have been in two BBC dramas, the Paul Abbott serial State of Play (2003) and the one-off Richard Curtis piece The Girl in the Café (2005). Both of these were directed by David Yates, and both also starred Bill Nighy. For her performance in The Girl in the Café, Macdonald was nominated for a Golden Globe in 2006, and won an Emmy.
Macdonald starred in the 2005 film Nanny McPhee, as the scullery maid Evangeline, and has since had supporting roles in A Cock and Bull Story (2006) and the Coen brothers' Academy Award-winning No Country for Old Men (2007). Her agent was originally unsure she was right for the latter part, and Macdonald is reported as having to "fight for the role". Her persistence paid off, however, as she was nominated for a BAFTA for Best Supporting Actress. Other films where she had supporting roles include Choke (2008), as Paige Marshall, the film adapted by Clark Gregg from the 2001 Chuck Palahniuk novel; In the Electric Mist (2009) (based on James Lee Burke's In the Electric Mist with Confederate Dead (1993), as Kelly Drummond, alongside Tommy Lee Jones and John Goodman; and Skellig (2009), as Louise. She also played the lead in The Merry Gentleman (2008), as Kate Frazier. She plays Margaret Schroeder on HBO's Boardwalk Empire. In 2010, she played her first comedy role, in the British independent romantic comedy film The Decoy Bride opposite David Tennant. The Decoy Bride was released in 2012, on cable TV On-Demand.
During 2011, she played the Grey Lady, revealed to be Helena Ravenclaw, in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2, the final instalment of the Harry Potter film franchise. She replaced Nina Young, the original actress in the role. In 2012, she provided the voice of Merida, the heroine of the Disney/Pixar movie Brave.
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