"She was a remarkably complete actress even in her early twenties, when physically she looked little more than a child. With her dark soulful eyes she could command a stage, and the Royal Shakespeare Company saw her talent very early on."
She worked regularly with the RSC in Stratford-upon-Avon and London from 1983 to 1991, including playing the role of Juliet to Daniel Day-Lewis's Romeo; a very young Lady Macbeth; Cressida to Ralph Fiennes's Troilus, and Rosaline to his Berowne.
She was the voice of Sophie in the animated film of Roald Dahl's The BFG (1989).
In 1995, she starred as Anne Elliot in Persuasion, co-starring Ciarán Hinds and John Woodvine. The film (made for TV, then released theatrically) was based on the novel by Jane Austen and was her first leading role in a film.
She was the voice of Fanny in the 2-cassette 1997 BBC radio dramatisation of Jane Austen's Mansfield Park.
She portrayed Joan la Pucelle in the Arkangel Shakespeare's 2000 production of Henry VI, Part 1.
She had previously recorded an abridged 3-hour reading of Jane Austen's Persuasion, published by Hodder & Stoughton Audiobooks in July 2004: ISBN 1-84456-035-X.
In 2006, Amanda Root undertook the marathon task of recording an unabridged audiobook of Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre. Published by Naxos it has a running time of 20 hours 30 minutes, spread across 17 audio CDs: ISBN 978-962-634-357-9.
In November 2007 for BBC Radio 4 she played in the Woman's Hour Drama serial adaptation of F. Tennyson Jesse's novel A Pin to See the Peep Show, and on 2 December 2007 was heard in Arnold Wesker's 75-minute radio play The Rocking Horse, commissioned by the BBC World Service to celebrate its 75th anniversary.
As part of the BBC Radio 4 Hopes and Desires season, she played Lindsey, an incurable romantic who yearns to meet a modern-day Heathcliff, in Nick Warburton's 30-minute comedy Catching Heathcliff, broadcast at 11 pm on 15 January 2008.
