Vanessa Redgrave is part of a British acting dynasty that spans more than five generations — and includes her three children, Joely Richardson, Carlo Gabriel Nero and the late Natasha Richardson.

The daughter of British actors Sir Michael Redgrave and Rachel Kempson, Redgrave’s acting roots can be traced back to the 1800s, when her grandparents performed in silent films and in the theater.

The next generation of family talent arrived when Redgrave had three children of her own. The award-winning actress had two daughters with her first husband, the late British filmmaker Tony Richardson: Natasha Richardson, born in 1963, and Joely Richardson, born in 1965.

Following her split with Richardson, Redgrave welcomed a son, named Carlo Gabriel Nero, in 1969 with Italian actor Franco Nero. All three of Redgrave’s children continued the family’s legacy in the entertainment world, with Natasha and Joely pursuing acting and Carlo working as a writer, producer and director.

And while Redgrave has experienced years of success onstage and on-screen, her most treasured role is that of being a mom.

“Even if you’ve got a job you love and a husband you adore, once you have children that’s what you live for,” she told The Standard in 2015.

Here is everything to know about Vanessa Redgrave’s three children, Joely Richardson, Carlo Gabriel Nero and the late Natasha Richardson.

Natasha Jane Richardson

Redgrave and Richardson welcomed their first child, Natasha, on May 11, 1963, in London.

The daughter of an actress and a director, Natasha began performing from a young age: She made her first movie appearance as an extra at the age of 4 in a film directed by her father and starring her mother, 1968’s The Charge of the Light Brigade, according to The New York Times.

It would not be the last time Natasha worked with her parents. At 22 years old, she appeared alongside her mother in the 1985 London production of The Seagull. Natasha revealed that working with her mother was “a dream come true,” but also intimidated her.

“She rehearsed like a tornado,” Natasha told The New York Times Magazine in 1993. “I was terrified of being on stage with her.”

In the early 1990s, Natasha moved to New York to continue her acting career and build a reputation of her own, outside of her family’s acting history. Over the next 15 years, her success spanned from the stage to the small and big screen. Some of her most famous roles came on Broadway — where she won a Tony Award for her 1998 performance in Cabaret — and on the silver screen, including her fan-favorite performance in the 1998 Disney remake of The Parent Trap, opposite Dennis Quaid and Lindsay Lohan.

“It just didn’t matter how much work I did in England, I continued to be seen simply as a Redgrave,” she told The Guardian in 2003. “I did feel I could be who I am in New York and we all like to feel appreciated.”

In her personal life, Natasha was married twice: First, to British producer Robert Fox from 1990 to 1992, and then to actor Liam Neeson, whom she met in 1992 while they performed together in the Broadway revival of Anna Christie. The couple married in 1994 and had two sons together, Michéal Richardson and Daniel Neeson.

However, their love story was tragically cut short when Natasha died on March 18, 2009, following a ski accident on Quebec’s Mont Tremblant. She was 45 years old.

Natasha’s untimely death devastated her family, including Neeson, her children and her mother, who opened up to PEOPLE in 2019 about the heartbreaking loss.

“Time does not heal; that would seem to me to say that suddenly it’s okay, and it’s not,” Redgrave told PEOPLE a decade after her daughter’s passing. “It never becomes OK.”

Joely Kim Richardson, 60

Redgrave and Richardson welcomed a second daughter, Joely Kim, on Jan. 9, 1965. As a teen, she had ambitions to become a professional tennis player — even moving from London to Tampa, Fla., to train — but eventually gave up the sport to pursue acting.

As an actress, Joely’s early successes came primarily on-screen: She nabbed her first major film role in 1988’s Drowning by Numbers and earned critical praise for her starring role in the 1993 television adaptation of Lady Chatterley. But Joely is best known for her roles on the FX hit television show Nip/Tuck, where she starred as Julia MacNamara from 2003 to 2010 (and Redgrave made guest appearances as her mother), and the Showtime period drama The Tudors.

Redgrave and Joely appeared in four films together, as well: In 1968, Joely appeared as an extra alongside her mother and sister in The Charge of the Light Brigade; Joely then played the younger versions of her mother’s characters in 1985’s Wetherby and 2011’s Anonymous. The two reunited on-screen once again in 2018’s The Aspern Papers.

Given her family’s legendary history with theater, Joely also embraced stage roles later in her career, performing in London and off-Broadway in New York.

“People would say, ‘Oh, you’re from this big theatrical dynasty,’ and I’d think, ‘Well, I’m doing an American TV show.’ I felt like a phoney,” she told The Telegraph in 2015. “I thought, I have to earn my stripes and I’ll do it slowly, and that’s sort of what I’ve done.”

Joely married film producer Tim Bevan in 1992; the couple had one daughter, Daisy, the same year. Bevan and Joely split in 1997 and divorced in 2001, which Joely described as “a pretty low time” to The Guardian. However, it was the death of her older sister, Natasha, that left her forever changed, as she revealed to Tatler in 2009.

“The shock shatters you on a cellular level, and it takes time for the pieces to come back together, albeit in a different formation,” she said about Natasha’s tragic death. “I cannot imagine that there will ever be a day when I don’t think of Tasha.”

The loss of her sister gave Joely a new appreciation for life and for family, including her mother, who suffered a near-fatal heart attack in 2015.

“Try to find the joy in life because we are so lucky to be here,” Joely told PEOPLE in 2019. “Every day, every birthday that goes by, I’m just so grateful.”

Carlo Gabriel Nero, 55

Redgrave and director Nero welcomed a son named Carlo Gabriel on Sept. 16, 1969. The former couple reunited more than three decades later, rekindling their romance and marrying on Dec. 31, 2006.

During his childhood, though, Carlo split his time between his mother in London and his father in Italy.

“Seeing us unhappy made Carlo unhappy,” Redgrave told The Times in 2016. “I hated that. I didn’t want us to fight over his future, so we did our best to share the time with him. He had his life with his father and his life with me.”

Despite their best efforts, Carlo found some elements of his childhood “difficult” — particularly shuffling between two homes in two different countries.

“That left me with a bit of a dual personality, constantly adapting to whichever country I was in,” Carlo told The Times. “I’m sure it affected my sense of security. I never grasped that idea of ‘home.’ ”

While his mother and sisters preferred acting, Carlo has made his career behind the camera. After attending film school in Italy and at NYU, Carlo has worked as a writer, producer and director — even directing his mother and sister Joely in the 2004 psychological drama The Fever.

Carlo and his mother teamed up once again to form a small film company together, Dissent Projects, that produces documentaries, including 2017’s Sea Sorrow.

“It’s no surprise that Carlo has ended up in the film business; he just happens to prefer being on the other side of the camera,” Redgrave told The Times about her only son. “I’m not sure if he’s learnt anything from me, but I’ve certainly learnt things from him. Yes, he’s my son, but he’s also a great director who’s earned respect through hard graft.”

Outside of his filmmaking career, Carlo is married to actress Jennifer Wiltsie. They share three children together.