From a Wembley estate to the Oscars

Sophie Okonedo is the surprise new toast of Hollywood, nominated for a best supporting actress Oscar alongside Natalie Portman.

She has been shortlisted for her performance in Hotel Rwanda, as the wife of its manager, who sheltered 1,000 Tutsi refugees from the Hutu militia.

In Britain, she is still far from a household name although some may recognise her from her roles in the TV dramas Clocking Off, Spooks andWhose Baby, the movie Dirty Pretty Things or her stage performances for the Royal Shakespeare Company.

But the full story of Okonedo's battle against the odds to reach international acclaim at 36 has never been told before. She was five when her Nigerian father left her Jewish mother to bring her up on Wembley's

Chalkhill Estate. "It was very rough," she says. At school, the half-black, half-Jewish girl faced discrimination from both sides. "I came across as much racism in the Jewish community as I did outside the Jewish community," she says.

Aged 12, she overheard the parents of her friends discuss moving out of the area because of "wogs" moving in. They turned to her with the reassurance: "We don't mean you, Sophie."

During the Eighties, she and her mother moved to a flat above a fish and chip shop in Kenton. "I used to be so ashamed that I lived there," she confesses. "My friends' parents were quite rich and I'd always get them to drop me down the road."

Okonedo came late to acting. "I was about 18, and I read an advert in Time Out, saying, 'Do you want to be a writer? Come along to this workshop,'" she says. The workshop was run by the Royal Court Theatre, and led by writer Hanif Kureishi.

"He'd give us a subject and we'd come in and read them the next week. I realised I wasn't that good at writing. But I was very good at reading out the pieces other people brought in."

She became involved in the Royal Court Theatre, before enrolling at Rada. Her route from there has been slow but steady.