Alice Maud Krige was born in Upington, South Africa on June 28, 1954 her father Dr. Louis Krige is a young physician. The Kriges later went to Port Elizabeth where Alice grew up in what she describes as a (very happy family) a family that included two older brothers (Jake and Luke, who both became physicians) and her mother, Pat, a clinical psychologist. She says - I just remember it as being supremely safe and very warm. It was an absolutely golden childhood) Interestingly, she also grew up without TV, something which the celebrity calls a (huge black hole in my education) (South Africa didn't start getting TV until 1976, after few year she left the country to pursue an acting career in London...the South African system of apartheid would continue for yet another 18 years).

Although she appeared in various local stage productions as a child, including a performance as Juliet in a 1969 production of Romeo and Juliet at the Port Elizabeth Opera House, celebrity had no dreams or aspirations of pursuing an playing career. When she was child, she had actually wanted to become a dancer, but her father disapproved. Later announced her decision to become a doctor, like her father and brothers, she was dissuaded by them for they predicted that she'd quickly abandon the profession for marriage and children and would therefore take up a place at medical school that they felt should go to a man.

Also in 1981, Alice debuted in a West End theatre production of Bernard Shaw's Arms and the Man, for which she received the honors of both a Plays and Players Award and a Laurence Olivier Award for Most Promising Newcomer. Following this early success on the stage, she then focused her career on the theatre by spending some time working with the prestigious Royal Shakespeare Company. During her two seasons with the RSC (1982-83), she performed in such productions as King Lear, The Tempest, The Taming of the Shrew and Cyrano de Bergerac.