Miranda Raison

Biography: Miranda Raison is a British television and film actress best known for her role as the MI-5 agent Jo Portman in the BBC action-drama Spooks. Born in Burnham Thorpe on the North Norfolk coast of England, she was raised alone by her mother, a former announcer for Anglia Television, after she separated with her father, a jazz pianist and wildlife artist. Miranda has two younger sisters, Rosie and May, and two younger brothers, Sam and Ed, who plays bass guitar for Stonewall Jackson. As a teen, she developed an interest for television and the arts and asked her parents to enroll her in theater school. She, however, was sent to prestigious boarding schools by her grandmother.

Miranda then attended Felixstowe College, where she played the lead in George Bernard Shaw's The Millionairess, a performance which so impressed her English teacher that he believed acting was what she was meant to do. Raison, urged by her teacher, went to Webber Drama School for three years. After several stints on stage, she got her television break appearing in the Stephen Poliakoff TV movie drama Perfect Strangers. On the big screen, Miranda has had the fortune of working with the likes of Woody Allen and Scarlett Johansson in Match Point and Ralph Fiennes in Land of the Blind.

After several guest appearances in UK TV shows, Miranda got her big break in 2005 as she was cast as a series regular for the BBC series, Spooks. It was while working on set of the show where she met her husband Raza Jaffrey, who played fellow spook Zaf Younis. Her departure from the show led her to explore her comedic side as she joined the British sitcom Plus One in early 2009.… Expand