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The British siren has Hollywood under her spell.Kate Beckinsale was born in London, England, in 1973, to actor parents. Her father, Richard Beckinsale, the star of sitcoms like Rising Damp and Porridge, died tragically of a heart attack at the age of 32. A talented writer, she twice won the WH Smith Young Writers' competition whilst attending a public school. Beckinsale got her big break studying at Oxford University, when she won a part in Kenneth Branagh's Much Ado About Nothing in 1993. After starring in British movies Cold Comfort Farm, Haunted and Shooting Fish, Beckinsale took on Hollywood in 1998 in The Last Days Of Disco. America took her to their hearts after Pearl Harbour, in which she played the love interest to both Ben Affleck and Josh Hartnett. Beckinsale starred as a vampire in Underworld, before becoming a vampire hunter, alongside Hugh Jackman, in Van Helsing in 2004.
