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1-50 of 14,701
- Actor
- Additional Crew
- Director
Toby Stephens began his acting career while a stagehand at the Chichester Festival Theatre, in end-of-season productions mounted by the crew. In his brief professional career, he has already won the Sir John Gielgud Prize for Best Actor and the Ian Charleson Award for his performance in the title role of "Coriolanus" at the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1994. His other work at the RSC includes "Measure for Measure", "A Midsummer Night's Dream", "Antony and Cleopatra", "Wallenstein", "All's Well That Ends Well" and "Unfinished Business". Stephens also starred in Peter Hall's production of "Tartuffe" at the Aldwych Theatre and has just finished filming The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1996). His television appearances include A View from the Bridge (2012) and The Camomile Lawn (1992). He made his screen debut in Sally Potter's Orlando (1992).- Actor
- Soundtrack
A graduate of the prestigious LAMDA in London, Aaron Pierre has recorded a lead role as Mufasa in Barry Jenkins' highly anticipated Lion King prequel for Disney. He played Caesar in Barry Jenkins' award-winning limited series, The Underground Railroad for Amazon and also starred in M. Night Shyamalan's film Old, in which he played a rapper and for which he wrote and performed a song. Pierre was nominated for the 2018 Ian Charleson Award for his professional stage debut as Cassio in Othello, opposite Mark Rylance, at Shakespeare's Globe.
Earlier this year, Aaron shot a three-hander opposite Saoirse Ronan in Garth Davis's Foe for Amazon Studios. He just completed shooting the lead in Jeremy Saulnier's Rebel Ridge for Netflix. Pierre can be seen next as one of the leads in Clement Virgo's Brother, which is premiering at the upcoming Toronto Film Festival.- Actress
- Producer
- Director
Purnell was born in London, U.K. She recently received the Madame Figaro Rising Star Award at the 2024 Canneseries Festival on behalf of her exciting and versatile career to date. She can be seen starring as 'Lucy MacLean' in Fallout, Prime Video's post-apocalyptic series and the platform's highest-rated show. Upcoming, she will executive-produce and star in the Sky drama series Sweetpea.
Purnell's film roles include Tim Burton's Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Children, Never Let Me Go, Army of the Dead, and Churchill, among others. Her other television credits include Sweetbitter, Showtime's Yellowjackets, Belgravia, and a voice role as 'Jinx' in Arcane, a Netflix animated series.- Chris Larkin was born on 19 June 1967 in Middlesex Hospital, London, England, UK. He is an actor, known for Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (2003), Valkyrie (2008) and Official Secrets (2019). He has been married to Victoria "Suki" Steadman since June 2005. They have two children.
- Actor
- Producer
- Director
Gary Oldman is a talented English movie star and character actor, renowned for his expressive acting style. One of the most celebrated thespians of his generation, with a diverse career encompassing theatre, film and television, he is known for his roles as Sid Vicious in Sid and Nancy (1986), Drexl in True Romance (1993), George Smiley in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011), and Winston Churchill in Darkest Hour (2017), among many others. For much of his career, he was best-known for playing over-the-top antagonists, such as terrorist Egor Korshunov in the 1997 blockbuster Air Force One (1997), though he has reached a new audience with heroic roles in the Harry Potter and Dark Knight franchises. He is also a filmmaker, musician, and author.
Gary Leonard Oldman was born on March 21, 1958 in New Cross, London, England, to Kathleen (Cheriton), a homemaker, and Leonard Bertram Oldman, a welder. He won a scholarship to Britain's Rose Bruford Drama College, in Sidcup, Kent, where he received a B.A. in theatre arts in 1979. He subsequently studied with the Greenwich Young People's Theatre and went on to appear in a number of plays throughout the early '80s, including "The Pope's Wedding," for which he received Time Out's Fringe Award for Best Newcomer of 1985-1986 and the British Theatre Association's Drama Magazine Award as Best Actor for 1985. Before fame, he was employed as a worker in assembly lines and as a porter in an operating theater. He also had jobs selling shoes and beheading pigs while supporting his early acting career.
His film debut was Remembrance (1982), though his most-memorable early role came when he played Sex Pistol Sid Vicious in the biopic Sid and Nancy (1986) picking up the Evening Standard Film Award as Best Newcomer. He then received a Best Actor nomination from BAFTA for his portrayal of '60s playwright Joe Orton in Prick Up Your Ears (1987).
In the 1990s, Oldman brought to life a series of iconic real-world and fictional villains including Lee Harvey Oswald in JFK (1991), the title character in Bram Stoker's Dracula (1992), Drexl Spivey in True Romance (1993), Stansfield in Léon: The Professional (1994), Jean-Baptiste Emanuel Zorg in The Fifth Element (1997) and Ivan Korshunov in Air Force One (1997). That decade also saw Oldman portraying Ludwig van Beethoven in biopic Immortal Beloved (1994).
Oldman played the coveted role of Sirius Black in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004), giving him a key part in one of the highest-grossing franchises ever. He reprised that role in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2005) and Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007). Oldman also took on the iconic role of Detective James Gordon in writer-director Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins (2005), a role he played again in The Dark Knight (2008) and The Dark Knight Rises (2012). Prominent film critic Mark Kermode, in reviewing The Dark Knight, wrote, "the best performance in the film, by a mile, is Gary Oldman's ... it would be lovely to see him get a[n Academy Award] nomination because actually, he's the guy who gets kind of overlooked in all of this."
Oldman co-starred with Jim Carrey in the 2009 version of A Christmas Carol in which Oldman played three roles. He had a starring role in David Goyer's supernatural thriller The Unborn, released in 2009. In 2010, Oldman co-starred with Denzel Washington in The Book of Eli. He also played a lead role in Catherine Hardwicke's Red Riding Hood. Oldman voiced the role of villain Lord Shen and was nominated for an Annie Award for his performance in Kung Fu Panda 2.
In 2011, Oldman portrayed master spy George Smiley in the adaptation of John le Carré's Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011), and the role scored Oldman his first Academy Award nomination. In 2014, he played one of the lead humans in the science fiction action film Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014) alongside Jason Clarke and Keri Russell. Also in 2014, Oldman starred alongside Joel Kinnaman, Abbie Cornish, Michael Keaton, and Samuel L. Jackson in the remake of RoboCop (2014), as Norton, the scientist who creates RoboCop.
Aside from acting, Oldman tried his hand at writing and directing for Nil by Mouth (1997). The movie opened the Cannes Film Festival in 1997, and won Kathy Burke a Best Actress prize at the festival.
Oldman has three children, Alfie, with first wife, actress Lesley Manville, and Gulliver and Charlie with his third wife, Donya Fiorentino. In 2017, he married writer and art curator Gisele Schmidt.
In 2018 he won an Oscar for best actor for his work on Darkest Hour (2017).- Actress
- Producer
- Soundtrack
Hannah Waddingham was born in 1974, in Wandsworth, London. Her family was involved in performing arts as her mother, Melodie Kelly, and both her maternal grandparents were opera singers.
She is best known for her contribution to West End musical theatre, particularly her performances in the original London production of "Spamalot" as the Lady of the Lake and as Desiree Armfelt in Trevor Nunn's acclaimed revival of "A Little Night Music", roles that earned her two Olivier Award nomination.
In October 2000, she released the single "Our Kind of Love", billed simply as Hannah, in the UK Singles Chart where it peaked at No. 41.
In 2008, she made her film debut as Elizabeth Maddox in How to Lose Friends & Alienate People (2008). Her other film credits include Into the Woods (2011), Les Misérables (2012), Winter Ridge (2018) and The Hustle (2019).
In 2015, Waddingham joined the cast of the fifth season of the HBO series Game of Thrones (2011) as Septa Unella. Hannah appeared in Sex Education (2019) as Sofia Marchetti. In 2020, she gained international recognition for her acclaimed portrayal of Rebecca Welton in the Apple+ comedy series Ted Lasso (2020), for which she won Best Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series at the 2021 Critics Choice Awards.
In 2014, Hannah welcomed her first child, a daughter. Hannah has since split up with the father.- Actor
- Producer
- Writer
With his breakthrough performance as Eames in Christopher Nolan's sci-fi thriller Inception (2010), English actor Tom Hardy has been brought to the attention of mainstream audiences worldwide. However, the versatile actor has been steadily working on both stage and screen since his television debut in the miniseries Band of Brothers (2001). After being cast in the World War II drama, Hardy left his studies at the prestigious Drama Centre in London and was subsequently cast as Twombly in Ridley Scott's Black Hawk Down (2001) and as the villain Shinzon in Star Trek: Nemesis (2002).
Edward Thomas Hardy was born on September 15, 1977 in Hammersmith, London; his mother, Elizabeth Anne (Barrett), is an artist and painter, and his father, Chips Hardy, is a writer. He is of English and Irish descent. Hardy was brought up in East Sheen, London, and first studied at Reed's School. His education continued at Tower House School, then at Richmond Drama School, and subsequently at the Drama Centre London, along with fellow Oscar nominee Michael Fassbender. After winning a modeling competition at age 21, he had a brief contract with the agency Models One.
Tom spent his teens and early twenties battling delinquency, alcoholism and drug addiction; after completing his work on Star Trek: Nemesis (2002), he sought treatment and has also admitted that his battles with addiction ended his five-year marriage to Sarah Ward. Returning to work in 2003, Hardy was awarded the Evening Standard Most Promising Newcomer Award for his theatre performances in the productions of "In Arabia, We'd All Be Kings" and "Blood". In 2003, Tom also co-starred in the play "The Modernists" with Paul Popplewell, Jesse Spencer and Orlando Wells.
During the next five years, Hardy worked consistently in film, television and theatre, playing roles as varied as Robert Dudley in the BBC's The Virgin Queen (2005), Bill Sikes in Oliver Twist (2007) and starring in "The Man of Mode" at the National Theatre. On the silver screen, he appeared in the crime thriller Layer Cake (2004) with Daniel Craig, Sofia Coppola's Marie Antoinette (2006), and the romp Scenes of a Sexual Nature (2006).
In 2006, Hardy created "Shotgun", an underground theatre company along with director Robert Delamere, and directed a play, penned by his father for the company, called "Blue on Blue". In 2007, Hardy received a best actor BAFTA nomination for his touching performance as Stuart Shorter in the BBC adaptation of Alexander Masters' bestselling biography Stuart: A Life Backwards (2007). Hailed for his transformative character acting, Hardy was lauded for his emotionally and physically convincing portrayal in the ill-fated and warmhearted tale of Shorter, a homeless and occasionally violent man suffering from addiction and muscular dystrophy.
The following year, he appeared as gay hoodlum Handsome Bob in the Guy Ritchie film RocknRolla (2008), but this would be his next transformation that would prove his extensive range and stun critics. In the film Bronson (2008), Hardy played the notorious Charles Bronson (given name, Michael Peterson), the "most violent prisoner in Britain". Bald, pumped-up, and outfitted with Bronson's signature strongman mustache, Hardy is unrecognizable and gives a harrowing performance that is physically fearless and psychologically unsettling. Director Nicolas Winding Refn breaks the fourth wall with Hardy retelling his tales directly to viewers as well as performing them outright before an audience of his own imagining. The performance mixes terrifying brutality, vaudevillian showmanship, wry humor, and an alarming amount of commitment, and won Hardy a British Independent Film Award for Best Actor. The performance got Hollywood's attention, and in 2009, Hardy was named one of Variety's "10 Actors to Watch". That year, he continued to garner praise for his starring role in The Take (2009), a four-part adaptation of Martina Cole's bestselling crime novel, as well as for his performance as Heathcliff in a version of Wuthering Heights (2009).
Recent work includes the aforementioned breakthrough appearance in Inception (2010) alongside Leonardo DiCaprio, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Cillian Murphy, Tom Berenger, Ken Watanabe, Michael Caine, Marion Cotillard and Elliot Page. The movie was released in July 2010 and became one of top 25 highest grossing films of all time, collecting eight Oscar nominations (including Best Picture) and winning four.
Other films include Warrior (2011), opposite Joel Edgerton, the story of two estranged brothers facing the fight of a lifetime from director Gavin O'Connor, and This Means War (2012), directed by McG and co-starring Reese Witherspoon and Chris Pine. Tom also starred in the heralded Cold War thriller, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011) with Colin Firth and Gary Oldman. Hardy rejoined Christopher Nolan for The Dark Knight Rises (2012); he played the villain role of Bane opposite Christian Bale, Anne Hathaway, Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Gary Oldman. Hardy's menacing physique and his character's scrambled, hard-to-distinguish voice became a major discussion point as the film was released.
Outside of performing, Hardy is the patron for the charity "Flack", which is an organization to aid the recovery of the homeless in Cambridge. And in 2010, Hardy was named an Ambassador for The Prince's Trust, which helps disadvantaged youth. On the recent stage, he starred in the Brett C. Leonard play "The Long Red Road" in early 2010. Written for Hardy and directed by Philip Seymour Hoffman, the play was staged at Chicago's Goodman Theater.
In 2015, Hardy starred as the iconic Mad Max in George Miller's reboot of his franchise, Mad Max: Fury Road (2015). He also collected a British Independent Film Award for his portrayal of both the Kray twins, Ronnie and Reggie, in Legend (2015), and an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor for his role as John Fitzgerald in The Revenant (2015). Hardy also starred on the BBC series Peaky Blinders (2013), alongside Cillian Murphy, and on the television series Taboo (2017), both created by Steven Knight.
He has an outlaw biker story among other projects in development. In 2010, Hardy became engaged to fellow English actress Charlotte Riley, whom he starred with in The Take (2009) and Wuthering Heights (2009), and is raising a young son, Louis Thomas Hardy, with ex-girlfriend Rachael Speed. He was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire at the 2018 Queen's Birthday Honours for his services to drama.- Kaya Rose Scodelario was born in Haywards Heath, Sussex, England, to Katia (Scodelario) and Roger Humphrey. Her father was English and her mother is Brazilian, of Italian and Portuguese descent. Her surname comes from her mother's Italian grandfather. Thanks to her mother, Kaya grew up fluent in Brazilian Portuguese, as well as English. At the age of fourteen, she auditioned for Skins (2007), the debut series for new channel E4 that would become known for casting real teenagers like her, who had no professional acting experience, rather than experienced adult actors. She won the role of "Effy Stonem" and joined the show in January 2007. After an challenging debut in which she never spoke, Scodelario and Effy made quite an impression on viewers. At the forefront of many disasters, including stalkers, death, and sexual pressures, Effy became a fan favorite for her ability to resolve testing life situations while keeping her head above water. As the character and the role grew, Scodelario enjoyed depicting what she described as the realistic trials and challenges Effy faced with friendships, relationships, and adolescence. After two seasons of Skins (2007), the series endured an overhaul at the end of 2007. Feeling that most of the characters had run their course, the writers wrote out every character except Effy. This put significantly more pressure on Scodelario because it meant that she would be the most recognizable face for season three. As she waited for the new season of Skins (2007) to begin, she took advantage of her recent clout to seek out additional career opportunities. She joined the elite agency Models 1 and soon was featured as the cover model for SuperSuper Magazine. She made her feature film debut with a role in Moon (2009), starring Sam Rockwell as an astronaut suffering from surreal encounters while on the moon. With a blossoming film career and her successful TV series to fall back on, Kaya Scodelario is certainly someone to watch.
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Jared Francis Harris was born in London, England. He is the son of Irish actor Richard Harris and Welsh actress Elizabeth Harris (Elizabeth Rees), and brother of Damian Harris and Jamie Harris. Despite his lineage, Jared showed little interest in becoming an actor, until he was cast in a college production while attending North Carolina's Duke University (USA), where he studied drama and literature, in the early 1980s.
After graduation, Jared returned to the UK where he attended Central School of Speech and Drama and then joined the Royal Shakespeare Company, performing in Mark Rylance's "Hamlet", "Romeo & Juliet", "The Silent Woman" and "A Clockwork Orange". In 1989, he had his screen debut in The Rachel Papers (1989).
In 1990, while on vacation in New York, Jared auditioned for the role of Hotspur in "Henry IV, Part 1", which he played at the New York Shakespeare Festival following his brilliant course as an excellent theater artist in the off-Broadway play "Ecstasy", for which he was honored with an Obie Award in 1992.
Widely regarded as the one of greatest stage and screen actors both in his native Great Britain and internationally, from his breakthrough role as Andy Warhol in I Shot Andy Warhol (1996) and VH1's Two of Us (2000) where he portrayed John Lennon to Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (2011) and Lincoln (2012), Jared Harris expressed his unparalleled qualities as a sublime "chameleon" in a wide range of roles full of profoundness, intelligence and insights through his praised performances, among others, in The Last of the Mohicans (1992), Natural Born Killers (1994), Smoke (1995), Happiness (1998), How to Kill Your Neighbor's Dog (2000), Igby Goes Down (2002), B. Monkey (1998), Shadow Magic (2000), Mr. Deeds (2002), Resident Evil: Apocalypse (2004) and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008).
His tour-de-force mesmerizing, staggering and fascinating interpretations of substantial mastery, subtlety, charisma and generosity also include some of his finest precious gems on TV such as in The Other Boleyn Girl (2003), The Riches (2007), Fringe (2008), Mad Men (2007), The Crown (2016), The Terror (2018) and Chernobyl (2019).
Jared is married to Allegra Riggio, lauded intelligent lighting designer and accidental comedian.- Actor
- Composer
- Additional Crew
Sam Hazeldine was born on 29 March 1972 in Hammersmith, London, England, UK. He is an actor and composer, known for Masters of the Air (2024), Slow Horses (2022) and Peaky Blinders (2013).- Actor
- Producer
- Writer
Robert Douglas Thomas Pattinson was born May 13, 1986 in London, England, to Richard Pattinson, a car dealer importing vintage cars, and Clare Pattinson (née Charlton), who worked as a booker at a model agency. He grew up in Barnes, southwest London with two older sisters. Robert discovered his love for music long before acting and started learning the guitar and piano at the age of four. He became a big cinephile for love of auteur cinema in his early teens and preferred to watch films rather than doing his homework. In his late teens and early twenties, he used to perform solo acoustic guitar gigs at open mic nights in bars and pubs around London where he sung his own written songs. Thinking about becoming a musician or going to university to study speech-writing, he never thought about pursuing an acting career and his drama teacher in school even advised him not to join the drama club because she thought he wasn't made for the creative subjects. But as a teenager, he joined the local amateur theatre club after his father convinced him to attend because he was quite shy. At age 15 and after two years of working backstage, he auditioned for the play 'Guys and Dolls' and he got his first role as a Cuban dancer with no lines. He got the lead part in the next play 'Our Town', was spotted by a talent agent who was sitting in the audience and he began looking for professional roles.
His first screen role was a small part in Vanity Fair (2004), but he'd been cut out of the final film and didn't know about it until he attended the premiere. The casting director felt so guilty for not telling him, that she got him the audition for Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2005). He was lucky and succeeded in gaining the role of Cedric Diggory, which brought him to a wider audience at the age of 19 and he continued to star in mostly smaller British TV productions. Hollywood expressed only mild interest in him and he was still debating whether or not he wished to pursue acting. Throughout that period, Pattinson would occasionally send audition tapes for roles in America. One, for a rom-com, led to the opportunity for an in-person audition in Los Angeles. That audition did not pan out, but while in town he went in for another, with Thirteen (2003) director Catherine Hardwicke, for a part in what he understood to be an indie movie based on a low-profile book about a vampire. Being the last one out of 3000 male actors to audition for the part, the role of Edward Cullen in the film adaptations of the Twilight novels written by Stephenie Meyer brought him to unexpected worldwide stardom at age 22 and the five films between 2008 and 2012 grossed over $3.3 billion in worldwide receipts. Between the Twilight Saga films, he also starred in Remember Me (2010), Water for Elephants (2011) and Bel Ami (2012).
Pattinson's Twilight-era was surreal. He had been catapulted onto Hollywood's A-list as a heartthrob, but also experienced certain preconceptions about what he wanted - or was capable of doing - as an actor. That changed with an unexpected straight offer from auteur director David Cronenberg to star in Cosmopolis (2012), which he described as an eye-opening experience: It reminded him of his love for cinema, why he wanted to become an actor in the first place and solidified his foremost desire for the coming years to work with great filmmakers. With Pattinson being a big cinephile, he since then starred in mostly independent films from respected auteur directors, such as The Rover (2014), Maps to the Stars (2014), Life (2015), Queen of the Desert (2015) and The Childhood of a Leader (2015). His unrecognizable role as an explorer in the amazon jungle in The Lost City of Z (2016) from director James Gray brought him much critical acclaim. His transformation to a sleazy, manic conman in the gritty crime thriller Good Time (2017) earned a six-minute standing ovation at the Cannes Film Festival and brought him a nomination for Best Actor at the Independent Spirit Awards. It was a major step for his transition into a character actor with incredible range, with critics calling his performance a revelation and career-defining. He starred in the western-comedy Damsel (2018) as a cowboy with sociopathic characteristics and played a convict sent to space for sexual experimentation in the psychological mystery drama High Life (2018) from acclaimed French auteur director Claire Denis. He returned to work with director David Michôd in The King (2019) and starred in the black-and-white fantasy-horror movie The Lighthouse (2019) from director Robert Eggers, which earned him his second Independent Spirit Award nomination for Best Actor. In Netflix's The Devil All the Time (2020), Pattinson played a corrupt preacher preying on young girls.
He returned to mainstream films with a leading role in Christopher Nolan's time bending spy film Tenet (2020) and will star as the DC Comics superhero Batman in Matt Reeves' film The Batman (2022).- Actress
- Producer
- Soundtrack
Vanessa Kirby is an English stage, TV, and film actress. From 2016 to 2018, Kirby portrayed Princess Margaret in Peter Morgan's Netflix series The Crown, for which she won the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role in a Television Series in 2018. She starred as Estella in the BBC adaptation of Great Expectations, Joanna in Richard Curtis' romantic comedy About Time and Mission: Impossible - Fallout (2018). She is known mostly for her stage work, having won acclaim and awards for various productions, including Streetcar Named Desire with Ben Foster which transferred to New York; with Variety in 2016 called her "the outstanding stage actress of her generation, capable of the most unexpected choices." After MI6, she had a leading role in another action blockbuster, Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw (2019)- Actress
- Producer
- Soundtrack
Carmen Elizabeth Ejogo was born in Kensington, London, England, to a Nigerian father and a Scottish mother. Her television career began in the United Kingdom in the early 1990s, where she presented the children's series Saturday Disney (1990). Subsequently, she has had an acting career in the United States. She has appeared in Metro (1997) with Eddie Murphy, What's the Worst That Could Happen? (2001) with Martin Lawrence, and Love's Labour's Lost (2000) with Kenneth Branagh, among other films, and also presented "The Carmen Ejogo Video Show" - her own video show on BSB's Power Station channel. She starred as Thomas Jefferson's slave concubine in the television drama Sally Hemings: An American Scandal (2000) as Sally Hemings and also as Sister Anderson in the remake version of the cult classic original film Sparkle (2012).
Ejogo is also a vocalist, having collaborated with several artists in the 1990s. She wrote and sang lead vocals on the song "Candles" by English drum 'n' bass DJ Alex Reece - she appeared in the music video and is listed in the production credits as 'Carmen'. She also sang vocals and duets with British artist Tricky on a song called "Slowly". Aside from "Candles", Ejogo appears on four songs of the Sparkle (2012) original soundtrack album from the movie of the same name, singing lead on "Yes I Do" (as a solo), and co-lead vocals with Jordin Sparks and Tika Sumpter on "Jump", "Hooked on Your Love" and "Something He Can Feel". She is also a member of Mensa International, the largest and oldest high IQ society in the world.- Actress
- Producer
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Emily Olivia Laura Blunt is a British actress known for her roles in The Devil Wears Prada (2006), The Young Victoria (2009), Edge of Tomorrow (2014), and The Girl on the Train (2016), among many others.
Blunt was born in Roehampton, South West London, England, the second of four children in the family of Joanna Mackie, a former actress and teacher, and Oliver Simon Peter Blunt, a barrister. Her grandfather was Major General Peter Blunt, and her uncle is MP Crispin Blunt. Emily received a rigorous education at Ibstock Place School, a co-ed private school at Roehampton. However, young Emily Blunt had a stammer, since she was a kid of 8. Her mother took her to relaxation classes, which did not do anything. She reached a turning point at 12, when a teacher cleverly asked her to play a character with a different voice and said, "I really believe in you". Blunt ended up using a northern accent, and it did the trick, her stammer disappeared.
From 1999 - 2001, Blunt went to Hurtwood House, the top co-ed boarding school where she would excel at sport, cello and singing. She also had two years of drama studies at Hurtwood's theatre course. In August 2000, she was chosen to perform at the Edinburgh Festival. She was signed up by an agent, Kenneth Mcreddie, who led her to the West End and the BBC, scoring her roles in several period dramas on stage as well as on TV productions, such as Foyle's War (2002), Henry VIII (2003) and Empire (2005). In 2001, she appeared as "Gwen Cavendish" opposite Dame Judi Dench in Sir Peter Hall's production of "The Royal Family" at Haymarket Theatre. For that role, she won the Evening Standard Award for Best Newcomer. In 2002, she played "Juliet" in "Romeo and Juliet" at the prestigious Chichester Festival.
Blunt's career ascended to international fame after she starred as "Isolda" opposite Alex Kingston in Warrior Queen (2003). A year later, she won critical acclaim for her breakout performance as "Tamsin", a well-educated, cynical and deceptive 16-year-old beauty in My Summer of Love (2004), a story of two lonely girls from the opposite ends of the social heap. Emily Blunt and her co-star, Natalie Press, shared an Evening Standard British Film award for Most Promising Newcomer. In 2005, she spent a few months in Australia filming Irresistible (2006) with Susan Sarandon and Sam Neill. Blunt gave an impressive performance as "Mara", a cunning young destroyer who acts crazy and surreptitiously provokes paranoia in others. She also continued her work on British television, starring as "Natasha" in Stephen Poliakoff's Gideon's Daughter (2005), opposite Bill Nighy, a role that won her a 2007 Golden Globe Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role.
She continued the line of playing manipulative characters as "Emily", a caustic put-upon assistant to Meryl Streep's lead in The Devil Wears Prada (2006). Blunt's performance with a neurotic twist added a dimension of sarcasm to the comedy, and gained her much attention as well as new jobs: in two dramas opposite Tom Hanks, then in the title role in the period drama, The Young Victoria (2009). Her most recent works include appearances as antiques dealer "Gwen Conliffe" in The Wolfman (2010) and as the ballerina in The Adjustment Bureau (2011).
Emily is a highly versatile actress and a multifaceted person. Her talents include singing and playing cello; she is also skilled at horseback riding.
On August 28, 2009, Blunt and Krasinski announced their engagement. The couple married on July 10, 2010, at the estate of their friend, George Clooney, on Lake Como in Italy. Blunt and Krasinski live in the Los Angeles area, California, and have two children.- Actress
- Soundtrack
Juno Violet Temple was born in London, England, into a showbiz family, the daughter of producer Amanda Temple and film director Julien Temple. She was named 'Juno' after her parents took a visit to the Grand Canyon during pregnancy and found they were standing on a butte of Cape Final known as Juno Temple. She has English and Scottish ancestry.
Her family moved to America, where she spent the first four years of her life. The family then moved back to England and settled in Somerset. At age four, she decided she wanted to be an actress after her father showed her Beauty and the Beast (1946) by Jean Cocteau.
She attended Enmore Primary School in Somerset. It was during this time that her father cast her in his film Vigo (1998). However, her father ended up cutting her out of the film. Two years later, at age 11, her father cast her in another of his films, Pandaemonium (2000).
She became a weekly boarder at King's College boarding school in Taunton. She then moved on to Bedales boarding school in Hampshire to take her A-Levels, one of which was Drama. She left with a B and two C's.
At age 15, she told her parents that she was serious about becoming an actress Her mother saw a call for an open audition for Notes on a Scandal (2006), and Juno was successful in winning the role of Cate Blanchett's daughter. This was her big break and led to a role in another high-profile film, Atonement (2007). She dyed her hair red to play Lola.
In 2009, Juno moved to Los Angeles, partly for her acting career.- Actor
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Joseph Quinn was born on 26 January 1994 in Clapham, London, England, UK. He is an actor, known for A Quiet Place: Day One (2024), Stranger Things (2016) and Overlord (2018).- Actor
- Soundtrack
Stephen Dillane was born on 27 March 1957 in London, England, UK. He is an actor, known for The Hours (2002), Game of Thrones (2011) and Darkest Hour (2017).- Actor
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- Writer
Adam Pearson is an award-winning campaigner, actor, presenter and speaker. Adam was nominated as UK Documentary Presenter of the Year at the 2016 Grierson Awards.
Adam worked as a researcher for the BBC and Channel 4 before becoming a strand presenter on the first series of Beauty And The Beast: The Ugly Face Of Prejudice on Channel 4. He was also one of the team who developed Beauty And The Beast and consulted on the Dutch version of the series. Adam has worked on all series of The Undateables (Channel 4) as the casting researcher.
Adam has fronted the critically-acclaimed documentaries Horizon: My Amazing Twin (BBC Two), Adam Pearson: Freak Show (BBC Three) and The Ugly Face Of Disability Hate Crime (BBC Three), as well as being a reporter on Tricks Of The Restaurant Trade Series 1-3 (Channel 4) and The One Show (BBC One).
Adam appeared in the BAFTA-nominated film, Under The Skin, directed by Jonathan Glazer and starring Scarlett Johansson. He also played himself in the independent feature, DRIB, which premiered at SXSW in 2017.
Adam is an experienced speaker and has given a TEDx talk. He is also an ambassador for Jeans For Genes and The Childhood Tumour Trust. Adam won a RADAR Award and a Diana Award for his campaigning work.- Actress
- Producer
- Soundtrack
Born in 1998 and raised in London, Daisy trained with the National Youth Theatre before landing her first professional job at 17, playing the regular role of Olivia in the returning British series Cold Feet alongside James Nesbitt and Hermione Norris for ITV. Daisy has since gone on to build a varied screen career as well as working on stage in London.- Actor
- Producer
- Director
Born Ryan Thomas Gosling in London, Ontario, Canada, he is the son of Donna (Wilson), a secretary, and Thomas Ray Gosling, a traveling salesman. Ryan was the second of their two children, with an older sister, Mandi. His ancestry is French-Canadian, as well as English, Scottish, and Irish. The Gosling family moved to Cornwall, Ontario, where Ryan grew up and was home-schooled by his mother. He also attended Gladstone Public School and Cornwall Collegiate & Vocational School, where he excelled in Drama and Fine Arts. The family then relocated to Burlington, Ontario, where Ryan attended Lester B. Pearson High School.
Ryan first performed as a singer at talent contests with Mandi. He attended an open audition in Montreal for the TV series "The Mickey Mouse Club" (The All New Mickey Mouse Club (1989)) in January 1993 and beat out 17,000 other aspiring actors for a a spot on the show. While appearing on "MMC" for two years, he lived with co-star Justin Timberlake's family.
Though he received no formal acting training, after "MMC," Gosling segued into an acting career, appearing on the TV series Young Hercules (1998) and Breaker High (1997), as well as the films The Slaughter Rule (2002), Murder by Numbers (2002), and Remember the Titans (2000). He first attracted serious critical attention with his performance as the Jewish neo-Nazi in the controversial film The Believer (2001), which won the Grand Jury Prize at the 2001 Sundance Film Festival. He was cast in the part by writer-director Henry Bean, who believed that Gosling's strict upbringing gave him the insight to understand the character Danny, whose obsessiveness with the Judaism he was born into turns to hatred. He was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award as Best Male Lead in 2002 for the role and won the Golden Aries award from the Russian Guild of Film Critics.
After appearing in the sleeper The Notebook (2004) in 2004, Gosling won the dubious honor of being named one of the 50 Hottest Bachelors by People Magazine. More significantly, he was named the Male Star of Tomorrow at the 2004 Show West convention of movie exhibitors.
Gosling reached a summit of his profession with his performance in Half Nelson (2006), which garnered him an Academy Award nomination as Best Actor. In a short time, he has established himself as one of the finest actors of his generation. Throughout the subsequent decade, he has become all three of an internet fixation, a box office star, and a critical darling, having headlined Blue Valentine (2010), Crazy, Stupid, Love. (2011), Drive (2011), The Ides of March (2011), The Place Beyond the Pines (2012), The Nice Guys (2016), and La La Land (2016). In 2017, he starred in the long-awaited science fiction sequel Blade Runner 2049 (2017), with Harrison Ford.
Ryan has two children with his partner, actress Eva Mendes.- Writer
- Producer
- Director
Best known for his cerebral, often nonlinear, storytelling, acclaimed Academy Award winner writer/director/producer Sir Christopher Nolan CBE was born in London, England. Over the course of more than 25 years of filmmaking, Nolan has gone from low-budget independent films to working on some of the biggest blockbusters ever made and became one of the most celebrated filmmakers of modern cinema.
At 7 years old, Nolan began making short films with his father's Super-8 camera. While studying English Literature at University College London, he shot 16-millimeter films at U.C.L.'s film society, where he learned the guerrilla techniques he would later use to make his first feature, Following (1998), on a budget of around $6,000. The noir thriller was recognized at a number of international film festivals prior to its theatrical release and gained Nolan enough credibility that he was able to gather substantial financing for his next film.
Nolan's second film was Memento (2000), which he directed from his own screenplay based on a short story by his brother Jonathan Nolan. Starring Guy Pearce, the film brought Nolan numerous honors, including Academy Award and Golden Globe Award nominations for Best Original Screenplay. Nolan went on to direct the critically acclaimed psychological thriller, Insomnia (2002), starring Al Pacino, Robin Williams and Hilary Swank.
The turning point in Nolan's career occurred when he was awarded the chance to revive the Batman franchise in 2005. In Batman Begins (2005), Nolan brought a level of gravitas back to the iconic hero, and his gritty, modern interpretation was greeted with praise from fans and critics alike. Before moving on to a Batman sequel, Nolan directed, co-wrote, and produced the mystery thriller The Prestige (2006), starring Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman as magicians whose obsessive rivalry leads to tragedy and murder.
In 2008, Nolan directed, co-wrote, and produced The Dark Knight (2008). Co-written with by his brother Jonathan, the film went on to gross more than a billion dollars at the worldwide box office. Nolan was nominated for a Directors Guild of America (D.G.A.) Award, Writers Guild of America (W.G.A.) Award and Producers Guild of America (P.G.A.) Award, and the film also received eight Academy Award nominations. The film is widely considered one of the best comic book adaptations of all times, with Heath Ledger's performance as the Joker receiving an extremely high acclaim. Ledger posthumously became the first Academy Award winning performance in a Nolan film.
In 2010, Nolan captivated audiences with the Sci-Fi thriller Inception (2010), starring Leonardo DiCaprio in the lead role, which he directed and produced from his own original screenplay that he worked on for almost a decade. The thought-provoking drama was a worldwide blockbuster, earning more than $800,000,000 and becoming one of the most discussed and debated films of the year, and of all times. Among its many honors, Inception received four Academy Awards and eight nominations, including Best Picture and Best Screenplay. Nolan was recognized by his peers with a W.G.A. Award accolade, as well as D.G.A. and P.G.A. Awards nominations for his work on the film.
As one of the best-reviewed and highest-grossing movies of 2012, The Dark Knight Rises (2012) concluded Nolan's Batman trilogy. Due to his success rebooting the Batman character, Warner Bros. enlisted Nolan to produce their revamped Superman movie Man of Steel (2013), which opened in the summer of 2013. In 2014, Nolan directed, wrote, and produced the Science-Fiction epic Interstellar (2014), starring Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway and Jessica Chastain. Paramount Pictures and Warner Bros. released the film on November 5, 2014, to positive reviews and strong box-office results, grossing over $670 million dollars worldwide.
In July 2017, Nolan released his acclaimed War epic Dunkirk (2017), that earned him his first Best Director nomination at the Academy Awards, as well as winning an additional 3 Oscars. In 2020 he released his mind-bending Sci-Fi espionage thriller Tenet (2020) starring John David Washington in the lead role. Released during the COVID-19 pandemic, the movie grossed relatively less than Nolan's previous blockbusters, though it did do good numbers compared to other movies in that period of time. Hailed as Nolan's most complex film yet, the film was one of Nolan's less-acclaimed films at the time, yet slowly built a fan-base following in later years.
In July 2023, Nolan released his highly acclaimed biographic drama Oppenheimer (2023) starring Nolan's frequent collaborator Cillian Murphy- in the lead role for the first time in a Nolan film. The movie was a cultural phenomenon that on top of grossing almost 1 billion dollars at the Worldwide Box office, also swept the 2023/2024 award-season and gave Nolan his first Oscars, BAFTAs, Golden Globes, D.G.A. and P.G.A. Awards, as well as a handful of regional critics-circles awards and a W.G.A. nomination. Cillian's performance as quantum physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer was highly acclaimed as well, and became the first lead performance in a Nolan film to win the Academy Award.
During 2023, Nolan also received a fellowship from the British Film Institute (BFI). In March 2024, it was announced that Nolan is to be knighted by King Charles III and from now on will go by the title 'Sir Christopher Nolan'.
Nolan resides in Los Angeles, California with his wife, Academy Award winner producer Dame Emma Thomas, and their children. Sir Nolan and Dame Thomas also have their own production company, Syncopy.- Actor
- Producer
Joe Cole is an English actor, born in Kingston-upon-Thames, London. He has four younger siblings, including fellow actor Finn Cole.
Cole was taught acting by the National Youth Theatre. He started his career with theatrical roles. In 2010, he had guest star roles in the police procedural "The Bill" (1984-2010) and the medical drama "Holby City" (1999-).
Following a number of minor film and television roles, Cole was cast as a series regular in the crime drama "Peaky Blinders" (2013-). The series takes place in the aftermath of World War I and depicts the activities of a criminal gang called "Peaky Blinders". Cole plays John Shelby, a World War I veteran who serves as one of the gang's leaders.- Actress
- Producer
- Soundtrack
Naomi Ackie was born on 22 August 1991 in Camden, London, England, UK. She is an actress and producer, known for Lady Macbeth (2016), Blink Twice (2024) and Star Wars: Episode IX - The Rise of Skywalker (2019).- Actress
- Soundtrack
Born and raised in London to a Dutch mother and English father, who is himself an accomplished actor, Saskia took an early interest in drama and continues to do so, first studying at the London Guildhall School of Speech and Drama and since working with the likes of Mike Leigh, Stephen Poliakoff and Nicholas Hytner.- Actress
- Producer
- Additional Crew
Kate Beckinsale was born on 26 July 1973 in West Middlesex Hospital, Isleworth, Middlesex, England, and has resided in London for most of her life. Her mother is Judy Loe, who has appeared in a number of British dramas and sitcoms and continues to work as an actress, predominantly in British television productions. Her father was Richard Beckinsale, born in Nottingham, England. He starred in a number of popular British television comedies during the 1970s, most notably the series Rising Damp (1974), Porridge (1974) and The Lovers (1970). He passed away tragically early in 1979 at the age of 31.
Kate attended the private school Godolphin and Latymer School in London for her grade and primary school education. In her teens she twice won the British bookseller W.H. Smith Young Writers' competition - once for three short stories and once for three poems. After a tumultuous adolescence (a bout of anorexia - cured - and a smoking habit which continues to this day), she gradually took up the profession of acting.
Her major acting debut came in a TV film about World War II called One Against the Wind (1991), filmed in Luxembourg during the summer of 1991. It first aired on American television that December. Kate began attending Oxford University's New College in the fall of 1991, majoring in French and Russian literature. She had already decided that she wanted to act, but to broaden her horizons she chose university over drama school. While in her first year at Oxford, Kate received her big break in Kenneth Branagh's film adaptation of William Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing (1993). Kate worked in three other films while attending Oxford, beginning with a part in the medieval historical drama Royal Deceit (1994), cast as Ethel. The film was shot during the spring of 1993 on location in Denmark, and she filmed her supporting part during New College's Easter break. Later in the summer of that year she played the lead in the contemporary mystery drama Uncovered (1994). Before she went back to school, her third year at university was spent at Oxford's study-abroad program in Paris, France, immersing herself in the French language, Parisian culture and French cigarettes.
A year away from the academic community and living on her own in the French capital caused her to re-evaluate the direction of her life. She faced a choice: continue with school or concentrate on her flourishing acting career. After much thought, she chose the acting career. In the spring of 1994 Kate left Oxford, after finishing three years of study. Kate appeared in the BBC/Thames Television satire Cold Comfort Farm (1995), filmed in London and East Sussex during late summer 1994 and which opened to spectacular reviews in the United States, grossing over $5 million during its American run. It was re-released to U.K. theaters in the spring of 1997.
Acting on the stage consumed the first part of 1995; she toured in England with the Thelma Holts Theatre Company production of Anton Chekhov's "The Seagull". After turning down several mediocre scripts "and going nearly berserk with boredom", she waited seven months before another interesting role was offered to her. Her big movie of 1995 was the romance/horror movie Haunted (1995), starring opposite Aidan Quinn and John Gielgud, and filmed in West Sussex. In this film she wanted to play "an object of desire", unlike her past performances where her characters were much less the siren and more the worldly innocent. Kate's first film project of 1996 was the British ITV production of Jane Austen's novel Emma (1996). Her last film of 1996 was the comedy Shooting Fish (1997), filmed at Shepperton Studios in London during early fall. She played the part of Georgie, an altruistic con artist. She had a daughter, Lily, in 1999 with actor Michael Sheen.