Sophia Di Martino
Sophia Di Martino is an actor, born 1983.
Before Marvel there was a very British career: a stint on Casualty, then Flowers, Will Sharpe's black comedy about a family who cannot say one true thing to each other, where she plays the daughter Amy with an edge the show never sands down. It is still her best work, and almost nobody who found her later has seen it.
Loki changed the scale. As Sylvie, a variant of the title character with none of his charm and all of his stubbornness, she had the awkward job of playing opposite an actor performing the same person, and she solved it by refusing to imitate him. Her Sylvie is blunter, angrier and far less amused by herself. The show ran from 2021 to 2023, the role brought her two MTV Movie and TV Awards and a Critics' Choice nomination, and it made her the rare Marvel addition that fans argued for rather than about.
The film work since has stayed modest and well chosen: Danny Boyle's Yesterday, The Electrical Life of Louis Wain, which reunited her with Sharpe as director, and the vampire-family story The Radleys. On television, the comedy Hitmen let her play stupid on purpose, which is a harder skill than it looks. A feature called Broken English, where she is billed as The Researcher, is still ahead of her.
Movies (7)
TV (5)
Where to start with Sophia Di Martino
If Loki is all you have seen, the correction is Flowers: a bleak Channel 4 comedy about depression and family silence, in which she is the most volatile person on screen. It is a harder watch and a considerably better performance.
Then come back to Loki properly, because Sylvie is the reason its second half holds together at all.
The films are pleasant rather than essential. Yesterday is a soft romantic comedy with a terrific premise, The Electrical Life of Louis Wain is odd and lovely and directed by the man who made Flowers, and The Radleys goes down easily. Hitmen is the one to try if you want to watch her be silly with a straight face.