Todd was born in Hartford, Cheshire, England. Although latterly claiming to be born in 1909, 1911 census records show her born in 1907 and christened in March 1907. Her Scottish-born father Thomas was a salesman, and her London-born mother Constance a housewife. She had a younger brother Harold Brooke (who took their mother’s maiden name), who became a screenwriter of light comedies. Her great great uncle was the English painter William Hogarth.

In 1941 she appeared at St Martin’s Theatre in Kenneth Horne’s comedy Love in a Mist. In 1957, post her divorce from David Lean, Todd made her Broadway-debut in the production of Four Winds.

During World War II, Todd was in Poison Pen (1939), Danny Boy (1941), and Ships with Wings (1941). But she concentrated latterly again on theatre roles, putting in a memorable performance in Enid Bagnold’s psychological thriller “Lottie Dundass” at the Vaudeville Theatre in 1943.

Todd returned to film post-WWII with a good support role in a big hit, Perfect Strangers (1945, as a nurse), then had a huge success when she played a suicidal concert pianist in The Seventh Veil (1945), opposite James Mason. She followed this with a musical, Gaiety George (1946) and a noir, Daybreak (shot in 1946, released in 1948).

The Seventh Veil was a hit in the US as well as UK. In 1946, having been signed by producer David O. Selznick, Todd was said to be the “holder of the most lucrative contract ever signed by an English cinema actress, with over a million dollars involved in its clauses.” She commented in subsequent interviews that she continued to do her own grocery shopping, and latterly in her autobiography noted that she paid $880,000 in taxes on the contract.

Todd married film director Lean on 21 May 1949 and starred in a number of his films, including The Passionate Friends (1949), Madeleine (1950) and The Sound Barrier (1952). Lean and Todd divorced 15 July 1957.