Caitriona Balfe, the Irish actress behind Outlander’s Claire Fraser, has brought the character to life for over a decade, cementing her place as a leading lady in historical drama. Her character started as a nurse for the British Army who, after the end of the Second World War, was enjoying a getaway with her husband in Scotland when she came across a group of standing stones that magically transported her to 1700s Scotland, where she meets handsome Scotsman Jamie Fraser, and life as she knows it is no longer as it was. With the second part of Season 7 airing now on Starz, we’re diving into her remarkable career, from early modeling days to starring in Outlander and other acclaimed movies and TV shows.
Caitriona Balfe’s career journey: From modeling to acting
Born and raised in Ireland, before making her way to the screen, a young Balfe was making a name for herself as a model, first within Ireland before making international moves. When modeling was put on the backburner for her pursuit of acting, some of her initial roles included 2011’s Super 8, Lust Life, The Wolf (2012), and appearances in The Beauty Inside. She could also be seen in films like Now You See Me (2013) and Escape Plan (2013). In 2013, Balfe was cast in the role that changed the trajectory of her career.
Caitriona Balfe’s iconic role in ‘Outlander’
In 2014, Balfe first came onto the scene as Claire and the character she’s brought to life has been beloved for over a decade—by both viewers and the actress herself. “For me, Claire is such a survivor,” the actress told Variety in 2016. “It doesn’t matter where she ends up or what has happened to her, she finds a way to get on with her life and make it something great. That’s what I love about her. In season 1, where she first goes through the stones and arrives in this dangerous and dirty place, she doesn’t just cower and fall down and get destroyed. She finds her place and she finds a way to make herself useful, and she finds a way to enjoy herself and then to create a life.”
For a decade, she’s worked alongside the show’s dashing male lead Sam Heughan, and the duo have become incredibly close since bringing their roles to life, with Heughan telling Elle, “She’s not only a great actress, she’s a great friend and a great advice giver, too. And we have each other’s backs. It’s a remarkable journey that we’ve been on, starting this together, being thrown in the deep end and being like, Okay! We’re going to do this together. It’s a nice bond and I think people are fascinated by it, in a weird way—I know the fans are. We respect each other and have got each other’s backs. I’m very fortunate that we have that, it’s great.”
Caitriona Balfe’s movies and TV shows beyond ‘Outlander’
When she wasn’t hopping from century to century in Outlander, Balfe could be seen leaving her mark in movies like Ford v Ferrari (2019), Belfast (2021) and, most recently, The Cut (2024) alongside Orlando Bloom as his character’s (a boxer) trainer and wife. For this role, she hung up her corset, telling Entertainment Weekly that her work for the film was, “undoing a lot of the corset damage, I have to say. A decade of wearing a corset has done wonders to my back.”
Source: womansworld.com