Jacqueline Macaulay was born in Doncaster, England, to a Scottish father, an army officer, and a Hungarian mother.
For her interpretation of Luise Miller in Schiller's Kabale und Liebe (Intrigue and Love), directed by András Fricsay (Bonn, 1994) she was awarded a prize as most talented new actress in North Rhine-Westfalia.
The following year she won the vote for most talented new actress in Germany in a critics' poll of the magazine Theater Heute for her double role as Carol and Klara in Oleanna/ Music directed by Harald Clemen (Bonn).
With Arthur Miller’s Der große Knall (originally:The great depression), directed by David Mouchtar-Samorai, she was invited to the Berlin Theater Meeting and received the award "Ensemblepreis" in NRW.
While she acted in supporting roles in films and on TV she has frequently portrayed main characters on the theatre stage.