Michael Fassbender
Fassbender in March 2012.
Born	(1977-04-02) 2 April 1977 (age 35) Heidelberg, Baden-Württemberg, West Germany
Nationality	Irish, German
Alma mater	Drama Centre London
Occupation	Actor
Years active	1994–present

Michael Fassbender (born 2 April 1977) is an Irish-German actor. He is perhaps best known for having played Lieutenant Archie Hicox in the war film Inglourious Basterds (2009), Magneto in the superhero film X-Men: First Class (2011), and the android David in the science fiction film Prometheus.

His other credits include the fantasy action film 300 (2007); the drama film Fish Tank (2009); the romantic drama film Jane Eyre (2011); the historical film A Dangerous Method (2011), directed by David Cronenberg, in which he plays psychologist Carl Jung; as well as the biographical film Hunger (2008) and the drama film Shame (2011), both directed by Steve McQueen. For his role in Shame, he won the Volpi Cup best-actor award at the 68th Venice International Film Festival held in August 2011 along with being nominated for a Golden Globe Award and BAFTA.

Early life and education[link]

Fassbender was born in Heidelberg, Baden-Württemberg, West Germany (now Germany). His mother is from Larne, County Antrim in Northern Ireland, and his father, Josef Fassbender, is German.^[1][2] According to Fassbender's "family lore", his mother is the great-great-niece of Michael Collins, an Irish leader during the War of Independence.^[1][3] When he was two years old, his parents moved to Killarney, County Kerry, in the Republic of Ireland, where they ran the West End House, a restaurant where his father worked as a chef.^[1][2] Fassbender was brought up as a Roman Catholic and served as an altar boy.^[4]

He attended St. Brendan's, Killarney (The Sem) and the Drama Centre London.^[5]

Career[link]

Early work[link]

Fassbender first played the part of Burton "Pat" Christenson in Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg's award-winning television miniseries Band of Brothers. He played the character of Azazeal in both series of Hex on Sky One and he also starred as the main character in the music video for the song "Blind Pilots", by the British band The Cooper Temple Clause. In the video, he plays the part of a man on a stag night with his friends, only to slowly transform into a goat due to wearing a cowbell necklace.

Fassbender played the part of Jonathan Harker in a ten-part radio serialization of Dracula produced by BBC Northern Ireland and broadcast in the Book at Bedtime series between 24 November and 5 December 2003. He was also seen in early 2004 in a Guinness television commercial, The Quarrel, playing a man who swims across the ocean from Ireland to apologize personally to his brother in New York.

During the 2006 Edinburgh Festival Fringe, Fassbender played Michael Collins in Allegiance, a play by Mary Kenny based on the meeting between Winston Churchill and Collins, of whom Fassbender's mother is a great-niece.^[6] In addition, he produced, directed and starred in the stage version of Quentin Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs, along with his production company.

He appeared in Angel (UK title: The Real Life of Angel Deverell), about the rise and fall of an eccentric young British writer (played by Romola Garai) in the early 20th century. Fassbender plays her love interest and average painter Esmé. The drama – the first English-language effort by French director François Ozon and based on the novel by Elizabeth Taylor – premiered on 17 February 2007 at the Berlin International Film Festival and on 14 March 2007 in Paris. He then made a brief appearance in Wedding Belles as Barney, speaking with a Scottish accent.

Mainstream success[link]

Michael Fassbender at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival

In 2006, Fassbender played the role of Stelios, a young Spartan warrior, in 300, a fantasy action film directed by Zack Snyder. The film was a commercial success.^[7]

In preparation for his role as Provisional Irish Republican Army prisoner Bobby Sands in Steve McQueen's 2008 film Hunger, Fassbender underwent a crash diet that restricted him to 600 calories a day. He received the British Independent Film Award for his performance.^[8]

One year after his success at the Cannes Film Festival with Hunger, he appeared in two films. The first was Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds, in which he played the British officer Lieutenant Archie Hicox. The other film was Fish Tank directed by Andrea Arnold. Both films were critically acclaimed and Fassbender's work in them also well received.

In 2010, Fassbender appeared as Burke in Jonah Hex, a Western film.^[9] In an interview at San Diego Comic-Con International, a comic book convention, Fassbender commented of the role: "I kind of developed this character and really pushed it – I’ll see how far I pushed it ... I had this idea about the character, he’s kind of psychotic, he gets his kicks in perverted ways. I didn’t want to make it very obvious or like something you’ve seen before".^[10] Hex received predominately negative reviews.^[11] Responding to criticism of Jonah Hex in 2011, Fassbender commented: "Pretty awful, was it? I haven't seen it myself."^[12]

He also portrayed Quintus Dias in Neil Marshall's war-thriller-drama film Centurion.^[13] and was cast as 'Richard Wirth' in the Joel Schumacher film Blood Creek alongside Dominic Purcell. The story centers on a West Virginia man who comes to terms with his moral qualms and helps his brother wipe out a family that had been protecting a Nazi occultist and who had kept his brother captive for him to feed off for years.

Fassbender played Edward Rochester in the 2011 film Jane Eyre, featuring Mia Wasikowska in the title role, with Cary Fukunaga directing.^[14]

Fassbender (right), Josh Brolin and Megan Fox promoting the 2010 film Jonah Hex at Comic-Con in 2009.

Fassbender portrayed Magneto in the superhero blockbuster X-Men: First Class, the prequel to X-Men. Set in 1962, it focuses on the friendship between Charles Xavier (played by James McAvoy) and Magneto and the origin of their groups, the X-Men and the Brotherhood of Mutants. The film was released on 3 June 2011 to general acclaim and financial success and promoted Fassbender to being more of a popular movie star.

In 2011, Fassbender starred in A Dangerous Method by director David Cronenberg, playing Swiss psychiatrist and psychologist Carl Jung. The film premiered at the 2011 Venice Film Festival.^[15] He also starred in Shame, as a man in his thirties struggling with his sex addiction. Shame reunited him with director Steve McQueen and premiered at the 2011 Venice Film Festival, where Fassbender won a Volpi Cup best actor award for his portrayal of Brandon.^[16] Fassbender was a serious contender for an Academy Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role, but he was not nominated, and according to various sources his full-frontal nudity and depiction of sexual encounters inspired voters "to fantasize, and not actually vote."^[17][18] Fassbender achieved critical acclaim for his performance in Shame and received nominations for a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor - Motion Picture Drama and a BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role.

In 2012, he appeared in Haywire, an action-thriller directed by Steven Soderbergh.^[19]

Future projects[link]

Due to a schedule conflict, Fassbender had to pull out of negotiations to work with Oscar-winning director, Danny Boyle, in his new film, Trance.^[20]

Fassbender signed to star in actor Brendan Gleeson's directorial debut of At Swim-Two-Birds,^[21] a film adaptation of Irish author Flann O'Brien's novel. He will also team up for a third time with McQueen to co-star in a yet-to-be-determined role, with Chiwetel Ejiofor, portraying Solomon Northup, in Twelve Years A Slave, filming to commence in late summer of 2012.

Together with a screenwriter Ronan Bennett, Fassbender formed a production company Finn McCool Films. Fassbender and Bennett are currently developing a film about the Irish mythological hero Cú Chulainn.^[22]

In February, Fassbender signed on to play a title role as a lawyer in The Counselor, a film directed by Ridley Scott and based on the Cormac McCarthy script, filming is to start in mid-June.^[23]

He is also going to play Thomas Wolfe in a movie Genius about a famous literary editor Max Perkins, to be played by Colin Firth.^[24]

In 2013, Fassbender is set to take on the role of Harry Flashman in a film adaptation of the books by George MacDonald Fraser.

Personal life[link]

Shifting between British films and American films, Fassbender resides in London, England where he has lived for the last 15 years, while making career-related visits to Los Angeles, California.

He speaks conversational German, though he has stated that he needed to brush up a bit on his spoken German before filming Inglourious Basterds, as it was a bit rusty.^[25][26] He has also expressed interest in performing in a German-language film or theater production one day.^[27]

Fassbender is currently dating his Shame costar Nicole Beharie. ^[28]

Filmography[link]

Television[link]

Fassbender was at the Top Gear studios in Surrey, England, on 8 February 2012 to film Star in a Reasonably Priced Car, where celebs try to set a fastest lap time of the Top Gear test track in a low-spec family hatchback. The lap and his interview with Jeremy Clarkson was aired on BBC2 on 19 February 2012.

See also[link]

• List of awards and nominations received by Michael Fassbender

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Michael Fassbender

• Michael Fassbender at the Internet Movie Database

Ewan McGregor
McGregor at the Venice Film Festival in 2009
Born	Ewan Gordon McGregor (1971-03-31) 31 March 1971 (age 41) Perth, Scotland
Occupation	Actor
Years active	1993–present
Spouse	Eve Mavrakis (1995–present)
Children	4

Ewan Gordon McGregor (born 31 March 1971) is a Scottish actor who has had success in mainstream, indie, and art house films. He is perhaps best known for his roles as heroin addict Mark Renton in the drama Trainspotting (1996), Jedi Obi-Wan Kenobi in the Star Wars prequel trilogy (1999–2005), poet Christian in the musical film Moulin Rouge! (2001), and storyteller Edward Bloom in Tim Burton's Big Fish (2003). He has also received critical acclaim for his starring roles in theatre productions of Guys and Dolls (2005–07) and Othello (2007–08). McGregor was ranked No. 36 on Empire magazine's "The Top 100 Movie Stars of All Time" list in 1997.^[1]

Early life[link]

Born in the Royal Infirmary in Perth, Scotland, McGregor was brought up in the nearby small town of Crieff, where he attended the independent Morrison's Academy. His mother, Carole Diane (née Lawson), is a teacher and school administrator, and his father, James Charles Stewart "Jim" McGregor, is a physical education teacher.^[2][3] He has an older brother, Colin, who is a former Tornado GR4 pilot in the Royal Air Force.^[4][5] He is the nephew of actor Denis Lawson and the late actress Sheila Gish, and the step-cousin of the late actress Lou Gish.^[6] McGregor studied drama at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.^[6]

Career[link]

Film and television[link]

In 1993, six months prior to his graduation from Guildhall, McGregor won a leading role in Dennis Potter's six-part Channel 4 series Lipstick on Your Collar.^[6] That same year, he starred in the BBC adaptation of Scarlet and Black with a young Rachel Weisz, and made his film debut in Bill Forsyth's Being Human.^[7] In 1994, McGregor earned critical praise for his performance in the thriller Shallow Grave, for which he won an Empire Award,^[8] and which marked his first collaboration with director Danny Boyle.^[6] His international breakthrough followed in 1996 with the role of heroin addict Mark Renton in Boyle's Trainspotting, an adaptation of Irvine Welsh's novel of the same name.^[6][7] The film was the first of several times that McGregor would appear nude on screen; he told The Scotsman in 2003 that audiences in the United States are "a bit worried about seeing my old chap", referring to his foreskin and the cultural influence of infant circumcision in the U.S.

McGregor at the premiere of The Men Who Stare at Goats at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2009

McGregor played the male romantic lead in the 1998 British film Little Voice. In 1999, McGregor starred in the blockbuster Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace as the young Obi-Wan Kenobi, a role originally made famous by Sir Alec Guinness in the original Star Wars trilogy.^[6] By appearing in Star Wars, he continued a family tradition of sorts: his uncle, Denis Lawson, had played Wedge Antilles in the original trilogy.^[9] In 2001, he starred in Moulin Rouge! as the young poet Christian, who falls in love with the terminally-ill courtesan Satine, played by Nicole Kidman. McGregor reprised his role of Obi-Wan Kenobi for the subsequent prequel Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones in 2002. In 2003, he starred alongside Renée Zellweger in Down With Love,^[6][10]. He also portrayed the younger Edward Bloom in the critically acclaimed film Big Fish alongside Albert Finney, Jessica Lange, Alison Lohman and Billy Crudup. During that year, he also received critical acclaim for his portrayal of an amoral drifter mixed up with murder in the drama Young Adam, which co-starred Tilda Swinton.^[11][12]

In 2005, McGregor appeared for the final time as Obi-Wan Kenobi in Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith. He took very special care—especially in Revenge of the Sith—to ensure that his portrayal of Obi-Wan's mannerisms, speech timings, and accents closely resembled Alec Guinness' version.^[13] That same year, McGregor lent his voice to two successful animated features; he played the robot Rodney Copperbottom in Robots, which also featured the voices of Halle Berry and Robin Williams,^[14] and he voiced the lead character in Gary Chapman's Valiant, alongside Jim Broadbent, John Cleese and Ricky Gervais.^[15] Also in 2005, McGregor played two roles—one a clone of the other—opposite Scarlett Johansson in Michael Bay's The Island, and he appeared in Marc Forster's Stay, a psychological thriller co-starring Naomi Watts and Ryan Gosling.^[16][17]

McGregor was offered the role of James Bond in the 2006 reboot Casino Royale, but he turned it down because he feared becoming typecast.^[18] In 2006, he narrated the Fulldome production Astronaut, created for the National Space Centre.^{[citation needed]} That same year, he also narrated the STV show JetSet, a six-part series following the lives of student pilots and navigators at RAF Lossiemouth as they undergo a gruelling six-month course learning to fly the Tornado GR4, the RAF's primary attack aircraft.^[19] In 2007, McGregor starred opposite Colin Farrell in the Woody Allen film Cassandra's Dream.^[7][20] In 2009, he co-starred with Jim Carrey in I Love You Phillip Morris and appeared in Amelia alongside Hilary Swank. Also in 2009, he portrayed Camerlengo Patrick McKenna in Angels & Demons, the film adaptation of Dan Brown's novel of the same name. McGregor is scheduled to co-star with Daniel Craig in Dan Harris' upcoming film adaptation of Glen Duncan's novel I, Lucifer.^[21]

In 2012, he was named as a member of the Jury for the Main Competition at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival.^[22]

Theatre[link]

From November 1998 to March 1999, McGregor starred as Malcolm Scrawdyke in a production of David Halliwell's Little Malcolm and His Struggles Against the Eunuchs, directed by his uncle, Denis Lawson. The play was first staged at the Hampstead Theatre before transferring to the Comedy Theatre in London's West End.^[23] In November 2001, McGregor made a cameo appearance in The Play What I Wrote.^[24]

From June 2005 to April 2007, McGregor starred alongside Jane Krakowski, Douglas Hodge, and Jenna Russell in the original Donmar Warehouse production of Guys and Dolls at the Piccadilly Theatre in London.^[25] He played the leading role of Sky Masterson, made famous by Marlon Brando in the film of the same name. McGregor received the LastMinute.com award for Best Actor for his performance in 2005,^[26] and he was nominated for a Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actor in a Musical in 2007.^[27]

From December 2007 to February 2008, McGregor starred as Iago in Othello at the Donmar Warehouse alongside Chiwetel Ejiofor as Othello and Kelly Reilly as Desdemona.^[28][29] He reprised the role on BBC Radio 3 in May 2008.^[28]

Motorcycle journeys[link]

A keen motorcyclist since his youth, McGregor undertook a marathon international motorcycle trip with his best friend Charley Boorman and cameraman Claudio von Planta in 2004. From mid-April to the end of July, they travelled from London to New York via central Europe, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Siberian Russia, and Canada on BMW R1150GS Adventure motorcycles, for a cumulative distance of 22,345 miles (35,960 km).^[30] The trip formed the basis of a television series and a best-selling book, both called Long Way Round.^[31]

The Long Way Round team reunited in 2007 for another motorcycle trip from John o' Groats in Scotland to Cape Town in South Africa.^[31] The journey, entitled Long Way Down, lasted from 12 May until 5 August 2007.^[31] McGregor's brother Colin joined the motorcycle team during the early stages of the Long Way Down journey,^[4][31] and his father Jim also rode on sections of both Long Way Round and Long Way Down.^[32][33]

In September 2010, Charley Boorman stated that a third installment of the Long Way series was planned for 2011, riding from Tierra del Fuego to Alaska; this has not taken place, however.

McGregor appeared in a two-part BBC documentary in April 2012 entitled Ewan McGregor: Cold Chain Mission in which he travels by motorbike, boat, plane and foot to deliver vaccines to children in remote parts of India, Nepal and the Republic of Congo. The trip was part of his work as a UNICEF Ambassador.

Personal life[link]

McGregor is married to Eve Mavrakis, a French production designer.^[6] They have four daughters, Clara Mathilde McGregor (born February 1996), Esther Rose McGregor (born 7 November 2001), Jamiyan McGregor (born June 2001 in Mongolia; adopted April 2006),^[34] and Anouk McGregor (born January 2011).^[35][36][37] McGregor has a heart and dagger tattoo of the names of his wife and daughters on his right arm.^[10][38] The family currently resides in Los Angeles, California, after moving from London.^[39]

McGregor is involved in charity work, including with UNICEF and GO Campaign. During the Long Way Round journey in 2004, McGregor and his travelling companions took time out to see some of UNICEF's work in Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and Mongolia,^[31] and during the Long Way Down trip in 2007, he and Charley Boorman did work for UNICEF in Africa. McGregor hosted the annual Hollywood gala for GO Campaign in 2009 and 2010. He has also worked with the Children's Hospice Association Scotland, as featured in Long Way Down. In 2012 McGregor travelled with UNICEF immunisation workers to remote parts of India, Nepal and the Republic of Congo for a BBC2 documentary entitled Ewan McGregor: Cold Chain Mission.

In 2007, on an episode of Parkinson, McGregor stated that he had given up alcohol after a period where he was arguably a functioning alcoholic, and that he had not had a drink in seven years.^[40] In 2008, he had a cancerous mole removed from underneath his right eye.^[41]

Filmography[link]

Discography[link]

• "Choose Life" with PF Project, Trainspotting#2: Music from the Motion Picture, Vol. #2, 1997.
• "TV Eye" with Wylde Ratttz, Velvet Goldmine: Music from the Original Motion Picture, 1999.
• "Come What May" with Nicole Kidman, Moulin Rouge! Music from Baz Luhrmann's Film, 2001.
• "Elephant Love Medley" with Nicole Kidman, Moulin Rouge! Music from Baz Luhrmann's Film, 2001.
• "Your Song" with Alessandro Safina, Moulin Rouge! Music from Baz Luhrmann's Film, 2001.
• "Here's To Love" with Renée Zellweger, Down With Love: Music from and Included in the Motion Picture, 2003.
• "The Sweetest Gift", Unexpected Dreams – Songs From the Stars, 2006.
• "El Tango de Roxanne" with Jose Feliciano, Moulin Rouge! Music from Baz Luhrmann's Film, 2001.

References[link]