Kate Henshaw: Biography, Career, Movies & More

Kate Henshaw is a popular Nollywood actress. She has featured in over 100 movies since she began her acting career.

In this post, we take a look at the life of this screen goddess and how she evolved from a lab scientist to a fantastic actress.

Early life & Education

Kate Henshaw was born on the 19th of July 1971 in Cross River State. She is the first from a family of four children.

After completing her primary and secondary school in Lagos and Calabar respectively, Henshaw spent one year at the University of Calabar reading remedial studies, and then majored in Medical Microbiology at the School of Medical Lab Science, LUTH (Lagos University Teaching Hospital) in Lagos.

After graduating, Henshaw worked at the Bauchi State General hospital before venturing into acting.

Career

Kate Henshaw was taken to her first audition by the later actor, JT Tom West in 1993. Henshaw auditioned for the lead role in the movie, ‘When the Sun Sets’.

The actress revealed that she was on set with the likes of Franca Brown, Bob Manuel, the late Funmi Martins, and Sandra Achums and the presence of these stars made the whole setting look overwhelming. But she was encouraged by these celebrities and things got a lot better.

The actress has featured in over 100 movies since her acting debut. A few years ago, Henshaw was appointed alongside Dan Foster and Yibo Koko as the judges in Nigeria Got Talent. The program was launched in 2012 and currently airs on AIT and NTA.

Movies

Her acting debut was in the movie, ‘When the Sun sets’ where she starred alongside Bob Manuel Udokwu. The movie also featured Kanayo O Kanayo and the late Funmi Martins. It was released in 1993 and produced by Ifeanyi Anyakora

 

Some of the other movies she has featured in include:

  • Above Death: In God We Trust (2003)
  • Aremu the Principal (2015)
  • Stronger than Pain (2007)
  • Games Men Play (2006)
  • The Meeting (2012)
  • Couples Award
  • A Million Tears
  • Broken Tears
  • The Women (2017)
  • Iquo’s Journal
  • Roti
  • The Assasin’s Practice
  • Scars of Womanhood
  • New Money (2017)
  • Fighting for Nothing
  • Consequences
  • Broken Ambition
  • End of Battle
  • Busted (2017)

Her latest movie is titled, ‘The Women’ where she starred alongside Omoni Oboli Ufuoma Mcdermott, Kalu Ikeagwu, Femi Branch, Anthony Monjaro, Gregory Ojefua and Lilian Afegbai.

The movie is about what happens when a group of women and their partners decide to go on a weekend getaway.

The Women was released in September 2017 and was produced by Blessing Egbe who is known for movies like Two Brides and A Baby and One Room,

Awards

Henshaw received the Africa Movie Academy Award in 2008 for Best Actress in a Leading Role for her role in the movie, Stronger than Pain. 

Endorsements

In the past, Henshaw has had endorsements with the likes of Glo and Samsung Mobile. Currently, the actress is “The Face of Onga”. She is also a Judge on the TV show, Nigeria’s Got Talent. 

Marriage

Henshaw was married to a British man, Roderick James Nuttal in 1999. James Nuttal is the Managing Director of Ledrop Nigeria Ltd, an agency for Jack Daniels and Piper Hiedsieck Champagne.

The marriage produced a baby girl in 2000, Gabrielle Nuttal but the union broke down in 2011 over allegation of infidelity and irreconcilable differences.

There were reports that the marriage failure was based on allegations of infidelity leveled against Kate by her husband, Rod.

It was said that the actress had romantic relationships with the likes of Rotimi Amaechi, former Governor of Cross River State, Donald Duke and popular comedian, Bright Okpocha also known as Basketmouth.

It was also alleged that Ayo Sonaiya, Chief Executive Officer of R70 Media who also runs a record label and artistes’ promotions outfit had dated the actress while she was married to James Nuttal.

A close source revealed that Henshaw may have cheated because of the absence of her husband from their home because of the nature of his job.

Another version of the divorce revealed that Rod Nuttal fell in love with his secretary, Angela Gordon whom he later impregnated.

However, when Henshaw was asked about the reason for her marital failure, the actress finally revealed that it just wasn’t working anymore so she had to call it quits rather than choosing to live in rancour and strife with her spouse.

Fire incident

On the 25th of June, 2015, Kate Henshaw’s house was gutted by fire.  The incident happened while she was on set of the TV series, ‘Do Good.

According to Henshaw, when the house got burnt, it was only her maid that was home. The actress revealed that she lost everything as a result of the fire.

She also disclosed that it took 2 hours for the fire service to arrive and by the time they did it was too late to recover anything.

Henshaw was adequately support by the Do Good crew as they were available to help her move elsewhere.

My Nigeria

In 2015, Kate Henshaw featured in a six and a half-hour documentary – “My Nigeria” which documented the story of Nigeria.

The documentary was aired on Al Jazeera and was shown to over 250 million views across 130 countries.

Politics

Henshaw has been quite vocal about injustice in the country. Recently, she took this a step further by getting involved in politics.

According to the actress, this was part of why she got involved in the My Nigeria project which showcased her state, Cross River as the cleanest in Nigeria.

In 2015, Henshaw contested for the House of Reps Position in her constituency but she failed to scale through the PDP Primary Election.

But she was later appointed by the Governor of Cross River State as the Special adviser, Liaison, Lagos in December 2015.

Nollywood

Henshaw had some things to say about Nollywood in a recent interview. The actress disclosed that lack of funds and cohesion between guilds and associations as well as the inability to use certain equipment to shoot movies are some of the challenges facing the industry.

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