Christian Slater

Christian Michael Leonard Slater was born on August 18, 1969, in New York City, the son of actor Michael Hawkins (born Thomas Knight Slater, also known as Michael Gainsborough) and Mary Jo Slater, a casting executive and producer. His maternal half-brother, Ryan Slater, also pursued an acting career, and his great-uncle was radio personality Bill Slater. Slater attended the Dalton School, the Professional Children's School, and the Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts.

Slater's performing career began at the age of eight with a role on the ABC soap opera One Life to Live, followed by work on Ryan's Hope. His Broadway career spans from 1980 to 2005 and includes productions such as Merlin, Macbeth, Copperfield, Side Man, and The Music Master. He made his Broadway debut in the 1980 revival of The Music Man, playing the lisping Winthrop Paroo opposite Dick Van Dyke. Additional stage work includes The Glass Menagerie on Broadway, as well as appearances in London's West End in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and Swimming with Sharks.

Slater's film career began with The Legend of Billie Jean (1985), in which he played Billie Jean's brother Binx. His profile rose with The Name of the Rose (1986), where he appeared alongside Sean Connery as an apprentice monk investigating murders at a Benedictine abbey. He next played Junior Tucker in Francis Ford Coppola's Tucker: The Man and His Dream (1988). At eighteen, he took on the role of the sociopathic J.D. in the 1989 satire Heathers opposite Winona Ryder, a performance that drew comparisons to a young Jack Nicholson and established him as a significant presence in Hollywood. That same year he appeared in Gleaming the Cube, and he followed those credits with Pump Up the Volume (1990) and Young Guns II (1990), the latter featuring Emilio Estevez, Lou Diamond Phillips, and Kiefer Sutherland.

The early 1990s brought Slater considerable commercial success. He was cast as Will Scarlett in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991) alongside Kevin Costner, Morgan Freeman, and Alan Rickman, a film that earned $390 million worldwide. Shortly after, he accepted a cameo in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, partly due to his mother's role as casting director on that production. He played Clarence Worley in Quentin Tarantino's True Romance (1993) and took on the role of interviewer Daniel Molloy in Interview with the Vampire (1994) following the death of River Phoenix, who had originally been cast; Slater donated his earnings from the film to Phoenix's favorite charities. Other notable credits from the decade include Broken Arrow (1996) opposite John Travolta, Hard Rain (1998) with Morgan Freeman, and the dark comedy Very Bad Things (1998) alongside Cameron Diaz. His voice work during this period included the character Pips in the animated film FernGully: The Last Rainforest (1992).

From 2000 onward, Slater combined television appearances with film roles. He appeared in The West Wing and Alias, starred in the television series My Own Worst Enemy (2008) and The Forgotten (2009), and led two seasons of Breaking In beginning in 2011. Film credits from this period include Windtalkers (2002), Alone in the Dark (2005), Bobby (2006), He Was a Quiet Man (2007), Nymphomaniac (2013), The Wife (2017), We Can Be Heroes (2020), and Blink Twice (2024).

In October 2014, Slater signed on to play the title role in the USA Network series Mr. Robot, portraying a computer hacker who recruits Rami Malek's character into a group called fsociety. The series ran from June 24, 2015, through its fourth and final season in 2019. His performance earned him the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor in a Series, Miniseries, or Television Film in 2016, with additional nominations for the same award in 2017 and 2018. He subsequently starred as Mulgarath in the fantasy series The Spiderwick Chronicles (2024), a role that earned him the Children's and Family Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Performer.

Slater's voice acting work has extended across multiple projects, including the character Slater in the animated series Archer (2014–2023), Ushari in The Lion Guard (2016–2019), Rand Ridley in Inside Job (2021–2022), and Floyd Lawton/Deadshot in the DC Animated Movie Universe. He also voiced John Watson in BBC Radio 4's production of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and narrated television documentaries including Prehistoric Planet and Dinosaur Planet.