Rhona Natasha Mitra (born 9 August 1976) is a British actress. Mitra is known for her roles as Sonja in Underworld: Rise of the Lycans (2009); as Major Rachel Dalton on the second and third seasons of Strike Back (2012–2013); as Rachel Scott in the first two seasons of The Last Ship (2014–2015); Holly Marie Begins on the sixth season of Party of Five (1999–2000); as Kate Hedges in Ali G Indahouse (2002); as Tara Wilson on the final season of The Practice (2003–2004) and the first and second seasons of Boston Legal (2004–2005); as Detective Kit McGraw on the third season of Nip/Tuck (2005); in the lead role of the science fiction/action film Doomsday as Major Eden Sinclair (2008); as an assassin in the Netflix film Game Over, Man! (2018); and as Mercy Graves in the CW series Supergirl (2018).

Early life

Rhona Mitra was born in 1976 in the Paddington area of London, the daughter of Anthony Mitra, a surgeon, and Nora Downey. Her father is of Bengali Indian and English descent, while her mother is Irish.

Career

In 1997, Mitra appeared as the live-action model for Lara Croft, the lead character in Eidos Interactive's Tomb Raider video game series before Angelina Jolie took the role for the two Tomb Raider films (2001–2003). She played the romantic interest of Christopher Lambert in Beowulf (1999). Her first main role came as Scott Wolf's illicit love interest on Party of Five (1999–2000). In 2000, Mitra had a small role in the film Hollow Man as a neighbour who is raped by Kevin Bacon's character. She had a main role in the medical drama Gideon's Crossing (2001), as Alejandra "Ollie" Klein. Mitra was ranked No. 46 on the Maxim Hot 100 Women of 2001. Mitra then had roles in Ali G Indahouse, Sweet Home Alabama (2002), Stuck on You, The Life of David Gale (2003), and leading roles in Highwaymen and Spartacus (2004). Mitra appeared in the final season of The Practice (2003) as Tara Wilson, and continued that role into its spin-off Boston Legal (2004–2005) with James Spader, but left not long into the second season. In 2005, Mitra played the role of Kit McGraw during season 3 of Nip/Tuck. Mitra then went on to appear in Skinwalkers (2006), The Number 23 and Shooter (2007). In 2008, Mitra starred in the lead role of the science fiction/action film Doomsday as Major Eden Sinclair (sometimes mistakenly named in some databases as being Caryn Peterson), and in 2009 went on to star in Underworld: Rise of the Lycans as Sonja, the daughter of the powerful vampire elder Viktor (played by Bill Nighy). While filming, she grew fond of her vampire fangs, even declining to remove them when they could not be seen. "I put those fangs on the first day and I felt they should always have been there; it's strange. So I kept them in through the entire time of shooting, throughout all my dialogue and everything." In 2009, she was nominated for Scream Awards for Best Actress for this role. She also appeared in three episodes of Stargate Universe as Commander Kiva. She stars in the 2010 Anders Anderson thriller film Stolen, alongside Josh Lucas, Jon Hamm and James Van Der Beek. She portrayed Claire Radcliff in the 2010 ABC supernatural series The Gates. She played Major Rachel Dalton on Cinemax's series Strike Back: Vengeance and Strike Back: Shadow Warfare (2012–2013), replacing Amanda Mealing. In 2014 and 2015, she played Rachel Scott in the first two seasons of Michael Bay's post-apocalyptic television series, The Last Ship. In 2017, she portrayed Charlotte in the fourth season of The Strain. In 2018, Mitra was cast as Mercy Graves in the CW television series Supergirl. In 2020, Mitra starred in the science fiction film Archive as Simone. She also starred in the science fiction film Skylines as Dr Mal. In 2023, she joined the film Hounds of War, alongside Frank Grillo, and historical film Prisoners of Paradise. She also stars in the lead role in science-fiction film The Experiment, alongside Famke Janssen and Stefanie Martini, where she plays Captain Ava Stone.

Personal life

Her life on the farm rescuing horses has been featured in 2023 on the Channel 5 TV show Ben Fogle: New Lives in the Wild.

Filmography

Film

Television

Video games

Discography

Studio albums Singles