Romola Garai

Garai was born in Hong Kong to British parents. Her father's family is Jewish. Her mother, Janet A. (née Brown), brought up Romola and her three siblings. Her father, Adrian Earl Rutherford Garai (born 1945), was a bank manager.

Garai's great-grandfather, Bernhard "Bert" Garai, an immigrant from Hungary, was made manager when his employers, Press Illustrating Company, merged with Keystone View Company, of the Keystone Press Agency, a photographic agency and archive, in London, in the early 20th century.

Garai is the third of four siblings. Her family moved to Singapore when she was five, and returned to Wiltshire in England when she was eight. She attended an independent boarding school, Stonar School in Wiltshire and, at 16, moved to London to attend the City of London School for Girls, where she completed her A-levels. She appeared in school plays, and was with the National Youth Theatre until the age of 18, when she signed to play the younger version of Dame Judi Dench's character in the BBC Films/HBO co-production for television, The Last of the Blonde Bombshells.

After her A-levels, she studied English literature at Queen Mary University of London before transferring and graduating with a first-class degree from The Open University. She originally intended only to focus on her studies but later began acting full-time during the summer holiday.