Catherine Zeta-Jones was born on 25 September 1969 in Swansea, South Wales, to David Jones, who ran a local sweet factory, and Patricia (nee Fair), a seamstress of Irish Catholic descent. She was named after her grandmothers, Zeta Jones and Catherine Fair. As a child she performed in West End productions of 'Annie' and 'Bugsy Malone', later studying musical theatre at the Arts Educational Schools in London and making her breakthrough as the lead in a 1987 production of '42nd Street'.
Her television break came as a regular in the ITV drama 'The Darling Buds of May' (1991-1993). Hollywood success followed with 'The Mask of Zorro' (1998), in which she starred opposite fellow Welsh actor Sir Anthony Hopkins, then 'Entrapment' (1999) and 'Traffic' (2000), the latter filmed while she was pregnant with her first child.
Zeta-Jones won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in 'Chicago' at the 2003 ceremony, and a Tony Award for the Broadway revival of 'A Little Night Music' in 2010. She was appointed CBE in the 2010 Birthday Honours for services to film and to charity, receiving the award from the Prince of Wales in February 2011.
She married American actor Michael Douglas at the Plaza Hotel in New York on 18 November 2000, following an engagement on 31 December 1999; the couple have two children, Dylan Michael, born in August 2000, and Carys Zeta, born in April 2003.