Katherine Parkinson

Katherine Jane Parkinson (born 9 March 1977) is an English actress. She is best known for her role as Jen Barber in the Channel 4 comedy series The IT Crowd, for which she received a British Comedy Best TV Actress Award in 2009 and a BAFTA TV Award in 2014[1] (having received a nomination in 2011). She was also a main cast member of the series Doc Martin from series 2 to 4. She also performed the voiceovers for the games Worms: Clan Wars and Worms Battlegrounds.

Early Life
Parkinson grew up in Tolworth, Surbiton[2] and studied at Tiffin Girls' School[3] before going on to read Classics at St Hilda's College, Oxford.[4][5] She studied at London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA) where she met Chris O'Dowd, later to be her co-star in The IT Crowd.[5] Parkinson left her course to star in the play The Age of Consent.

Career
In 2007, she appeared in a new production of Chekhov's The Seagull at London's Royal Court Theatre, alongside Kristin Scott Thomas and Mackenzie Crook.

On New Year's Day 2009 in the UK, she appeared in a feature-length episode of Jonathan Creek entitled "The Grinning Man". In 2009, for the third series of The IT Crowd, Parkinson became one of the highest paid actresses on a Channel 4 commissioned programme. She also contributed sketch characters to Katy Brand's ITV2 show, having been friends with Brand since their time at university.[6] At the end of 2009 she appeared in the play Cock at the Royal Court Theatre.

She has appeared several times on BBC Radio 4, including on Laura Solon: Talking and Not Talking, Mouth Trap,[7] again with Katy Brand, and in The Odd Half Hour.[8] She also starred in a television advertisement for Maltesers alongside fellow actress and comedian Amanda Abbington, and provided her voice for a Herbal Essences shampoo advertising campaign in 2010.

Parkinson is one of the main cast in BBC Four's three-part comedy series The Great Outdoors, which first aired on 28 July 2010.[9] In 2010–2011 she appeared in Season's Greetings at the National Theatre and in 2011 as Lady Teazle in The School for Scandal (directed by Deborah Warner) at the Barbican Centre.

She played the doctor's receptionist, and later phlebotomist, in series 2-4 of Doc Martin, while in series 5 her character was replaced by a new receptionist.

Parkinson starred in The Bleak Old Shop of Stuff, a four-part BBC comedy series which premiered on BBC Two on 19 December 2011. Parkinson next appeared in series 2 episode 3 of Sherlock, "The Reichenbach Fall", as journalist Kitty Riley in January 2012.

In 2013, she filmed The Honourable Woman for the BBC and SundanceTV.