Maxine Peake is an English stage, radio, film and television actress, who made her name as Twinkle in Victoria Wood's sitcom Dinnerladies. She has since played Veronica in Channel 4's Manchester-based drama series Shameless, barrister Martha Costello in the BBC legal drama Silk and Grace Middleton in The Village. She is also an accomplished stage actress, having played the title role in Hamlet, and had a role in the 2014 film The Theory of Everything.

Peake has appeared in a number of television and stage productions including Victoria Wood's Dinnerladies, Channel 4's Shameless, in the lead role of barrister Martha Costello in the BBC's legal drama Silk and alongside John Simm in the BBC drama The Village, depicting life in a Derbyshire village during the First World War. Following career advice from Victoria Wood, between the two series of Dinnerladies, Peake lost so much weight that an explanation had to be written into the script for her character, Twinkle.

Peake portrayed the Moors murderer Myra Hindley in See No Evil: The Moors Murders. Broadcast in May 2006, it was met with mixed reactions; soon after this Peake announced that she was leaving Shameless. January 2009 saw Peake appear in her first major feature film role, as Angela, in the film Clubbed.