Nicola Walker is not related to Anna Maxwell Martin!
From time to time, viewers may mistake one actor/actress for another actor/actress, thinking that they look very much alike, or that they might be related to each other. We fully accept that if you’re not as fanatical about someone as we are about Nicola, you could easily make the mistake of thinking that either Nicola is someone else, or that another actress is Nicola.
When we went to see Mrs Klein, we overheard one gentleman asking his companion, “the actress who plays Paula, I swear I have seen her in something else before!” We kept quiet because it might have been regarded as rude if we turned around and started to recite Nicola’s CV in the hope that it would jog that gentleman’s memory. When we went to see Season’s Greetings, the man sitting behind us was very busy, during the intermission, explaining to his companions that Rachel on stage is actually Ruth in Spooks. When we were at The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time, one man was so busy trying to convince his female companion that the mother, Judy, in the play, is actually Ruth from Spooks, whilst said female companion was in the queue for the Ladies Room, that he almost ended up in the Ladies Room himself!
Every so often, there appears to be a whole lot of confusion amongst viewers who cannot tell Nicola apart from actress, Anna Maxwell Martin. Ever since The Bletchley Circle started to air in September 2012, this fansite has received a disturbingly large number of visitors who land here after googling for terms such as :
- Nicola Walker Anna Maxwell Martin
- Anna Maxwell Martin Spooks
- Is Anna Maxwell Martin related to Nicola Walker
- Does Nicola Walker have a sister?
- Is Anna Maxwell Martin Nicola Walker’s sister?
Compare these two images of Anna Maxwell Martin with any of the Nicola pics on the right panel. Do you see any resemblance?
We only know what search terms people used before they land on this fansite. We don’t actually know who these people are, only that the confusion seems to be on a global scale. Don’t get us wrong, we love to have new visitors all the time, but only for the right reasons and not because they confuse Nicola with someone else. Frankly, we cannot see the resemblance at all. What do you think? Both are brilliant actresses, but their style of acting is quite different.
So, as a public service to all fans, we state categorically here that
- Anna Maxwell Martin has never appeared in Spooks [TV]
- Anna Maxwell Martin is not related to Nicola Walker
- Nicola Walker does not have any sisters, she only has one older brother
- Anna Maxwell Martin IS NOT Nicola Walker.
Nicola is a friend of Anna Maxwell Martin’s but they have never appeared in the same programme. In September 2008, in celebration of the playwright Caryl Churchill’s 70th birthday, the Royal Court staged a special table reading of one of her plays, Top Girls. Both Nicola and Anna were involved in that reading, but apart from that one occasion, the two have not appeared on stage together. Maybe someone should cast these two actresses in the same programme so that once and for all, viewers will come to the realisation that these are two different actresses.
There have been similar confusions with other actresses. For example, some think that Nicola looks like Sofie Gråbøl of The Killing fame (see pic above). What do you think? In The Killing, Sofie does a lot of acting with her eyes, which are very expressive like Nicola’s, so maybe that might explain the occasion mix-up. However, to the best of our knowledge, Nicola doesn’t speak any Danish 😛
We’ve also received one suggestion from a fan that Nicola looks like Dame Flora Robson (1902- 1984) (see pic above) and he was wondering whether those two are related! As far as we know, they are not related. What do you think? Can you see the resemblance?
2 May 2015
In an interview released today by BBC America about Orphan Black, dialect coach John Nelles disclosed that “popular singer-songwriter Lily Allen and MI-5 star Nicola Walker provided the spark for con-artist Sarah”. Click on the BBC America link and hear how Nicola is described as having an “estuary accent”!
Do you think another actress looks like Nicola? Send us your “suggestions” and we’ll put their pics up side by side so that people can judge for themselves.
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It’s not so much that they look alike, but the way they speak and some of their mannerisms are extremely similar.
I think Olivia Morgan is how I would imagine a young NW
It’s definitely the mannerisms and the way they talk and pause i between a sentence. Uncanny and like others I’m glad I’m not the only one 🙂
I’m here because the resemblance between the two actors is uncanny!!
Great news, because we now have a spare if, God forbid, anything unfortunate should happen to one of the ladies…..
Jeremy, they are not batteries, man! 😂😭
Mali Tudno Jones, actress who played Rachel West in Hidden series 2, 2020. Same voice, same smile.
Nicola Walker and Anna Maxwell Martin have been my favourite Actors for years l love them both and never miss anything they appear in and never mistake one for the other but must now admit there is a marked resemblance.
Not just me then 🙂
Sian Reese-William! looks like her sister!
Ha! I recently saw Anna Maxwell Martin in Death at Pemberly and Nicola Walker in Collateral. Both have incredibly similar facial expressions, pacing, mannerisms and cadence. They don’t actually look a lot alike aside from a vague expression about their eyes, but share a penchant for sudden smiling after a blank faced dramatic stare and a few other manneristic acting tropes they both use quite a bit. I was driven to find out how one actress could be so stylistically similar to someone else. Guess I’m not the only one who thins so!
Looks nothing like Sophie Grabol. Most alike to Dame Flora Robson and Anna Crilly. I can also see a resemblance to Green Party leader Sian Berry.
Is Nicola Walker related to the actess Lisa Walker?
No, she is not.
I’m an American psychiatrist fascinated with BBC dramas. I did mistake the two, Anna Maxwell Martin and Nicola Walker. Both have such intreguing expressive faces, and both cast in such excellent roles, frequently as self possessed, intelligent, inquisitive, sensuous, quirky, and yet purposive women. Am glad to learn I’m not the only one who mixes them up. I can’t think of any role I’ve ever seen either of them in where I didn’t enjoy the character and admire the actress.
I don’t pay much attention to the voice but I think they have similar cheeklines that run alongside the nose to the corners of the lip. Perhaps they could both act in one of those films where a younger version becomes older over time.
I just watched the first episode of Bletchley Circle. And I was convinced the main character was the daughter from Last Tango in Halifax – who had impressed me, but I didn’t know her name. So I looked for cast list of Bletchley, and was really surprised not to see the last tango credit. the checked that and realised – two different people and ended up here. I think the similarity is more in the way they move, and their expressions.
They sound alike more than they look alike (although they are not dissimilar). Watching The Bletchley Circle I could hear Rufh from Spooks. This what made me think they may be related.
Nicola and Anna look like cousins at most.
Frankly I don’t see any resemblance between the two of them but there seems to be a lot of fans out there who have trouble telling the two actresses apart. 🙁