Tatler Cover Girl Joely Richardson Reflects on Late Sister Natasha Richardson’s Death

“Renegade Nell” star Joely Richardson, 59, looks like a duchess on the cover of Tatler’s April 2024 issue!

For the cover, Richardson, who is the daughter of actress Vanessa Redgrave and director Tony Richardson, channeled her “Renegade Neil” character Lady Moggerhanger.

This is Richardson’s third cover with Tatler. Her first cover was in 1991, in which she wore a Catherine Walker gown from Catherine Walker. Her second one came 19 years later with her wearing a Dior gown on the set of “The Tudors.”

In the issue, Joely touched on how the death of her late sister Natasha Richardson, who died in 2009 at the age of 45 after a ski accident, affected her career choices.

After Natasha’s death, Joely moved to New York to be closer to her nephews, Natasha’s kids with Liam Neeson.

She noted, “It wasn’t a wise choice career-wise to go from mainstream television to doing sort of off-off-Broadway theatre, but that was the stuff I most wanted to do then.”

Joely pointed out that she went into “soldier mode” after attending “a run of funerals.” She explained, “I didn't know that's what I was doing… It's called 'soldier mode,' where you carry on but something's not right.”

She elaborated, “I was permanently on alert and I worked off cortisol energy for a long time anyway, even before that. It's not good. It has no shelf life and it's an exhausting way to live."

Joely recently opened up about the impact of Natasha’s death while promoting the Netflix hit show “One Day.”

On taking over as the family organizer after Natasha’s death, she told The Times UK, “It was a very strange transition that took years to happen.”

“I wasn't doing it consciously. I was just getting on with it as anyone does when someone dies and the family absolutely goes into crisis,” she went on. “It wasn't just about children being left without a mother. It was about the ramifications for me. I hadn't lived a day of my life without Tash. I didn't know the world without her."

Joely admitted that she needed “about five years to get over the shock and trauma and horror” of Natasha’s sudden passing.

Nowadays, things are better. She said, “Now we've had a decade of this new life and I feel we've done really well. It's become second nature.”