Jeremy Irons

Jeremy Irons is an English actor born on 19 September 1948 in Cowes on the Isle of Wight, to Paul Dugan Irons, an accountant, and Barbara Anne Brereton Brymer. He has a brother, Christopher, born in 1943, and a sister, Felicity Anne, born in 1944. Educated at Sherborne School in Dorset from 1962 to 1966, he played drums and harmonica in a school band called the Four Pillars of Wisdom. He went on to receive classical training at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, where he later became president of the institution's fundraising appeal.

Irons began his professional acting career in 1969, busking on the streets of Bristol before making his London stage debut as John the Baptist and Judas opposite David Essex in Godspell, which opened at the Roundhouse on 17 November 1971 and transferred to Wyndham's Theatre for a total of 1,128 performances. His West End work included Shakespeare productions of The Winter's Tale, Macbeth, Much Ado About Nothing, The Taming of the Shrew, and Richard II. He worked with the Royal Shakespeare Company on three separate occasions, in 1976, 1986–1987, and 2010.

His Broadway career spans from 1984 to 2011 and includes three productions: The Real Thing, Camelot, and Impressionism. His Broadway debut came in 1984 in Tom Stoppard's The Real Thing at the Plymouth Theatre, where he played Henry, a man engaged in an affair, opposite Glenn Close. The production was directed by Mike Nichols, and Irons received the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play for the role.

On television, Irons first gained significant attention playing Charles Ryder in the ITV adaptation of Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisited in 1981, a role that earned him nominations for the BAFTA TV Award, the Primetime Emmy Award, and the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor. That same year he starred in the film The French Lieutenant's Woman opposite Meryl Streep, receiving a BAFTA Award for Best Actor nomination. Earlier television work included appearances on the children's series Play Away, a portrayal of Franz Liszt in the BBC series Notorious Woman in 1974, a leading role in the 13-part Love for Lydia adaptation for London Weekend Television in 1977, and a key role in Harold Pinter's screenplay adaptation of Langrishe, Go Down in 1978 for BBC Television, in which he appeared opposite Judi Dench.

His film career encompasses a wide range of roles across several decades. Following The French Lieutenant's Woman, he appeared in Jerzy Skolimowski's Moonlighting in 1982, Betrayal in 1983, the Cannes Palme d'Or-winning The Mission in 1986, and David Cronenberg's Dead Ringers in 1988, in which he played twin gynecologists alongside Geneviève Bujold. The New York Film Critics Circle named him Best Actor for Dead Ringers. He received the Academy Award for Best Actor for his portrayal of Claus von Bülow in Reversal of Fortune in 1990. Subsequent film credits include Kafka in 1991, Damage in 1992, M. Butterfly in 1993, Die Hard with a Vengeance in 1995, Lolita in 1997, The Merchant of Venice in 2004, Kingdom of Heaven in 2005, Inland Empire in 2006, Appaloosa in 2008, Margin Call in 2011, The Words in 2012, and The Man Who Knew Infinity in 2015. In 1994 he voiced the antagonist Scar, singing portions of "Be Prepared," in Disney's animated feature The Lion King, appearing alongside Matthew Broderick, Nathan Lane, James Earl Jones, Rowan Atkinson, and Whoopi Goldberg. He later reprised the role in Fantasmic and provided narration for the Spaceship Earth ride at Epcot from October 1994 to July 2007, the Studio Tram Tour at Disneyland Paris, and the former Disney attraction The Timekeeper. He also played Alfred Pennyworth in the DC Extended Universe franchise from 2016 to 2023.

Irons's television work continued with the HBO miniseries Elizabeth I in 2005, in which he portrayed Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester, earning the Primetime Emmy Award for the role. He starred as Pope Alexander VI in the Showtime historical series The Borgias from 2011 to 2013 and received an Emmy nomination for playing Adrian Veidt in HBO's Watchmen in 2019. He had previously received the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Voice-Over Performance for voicing WWI poet Siegfried Sassoon in The Great War and the Shaping of the 20th Century in 1997. In 1985 he directed a music video for Carly Simon's single "Tired of Being Blonde," and in 1994 he appeared in a cameo in the video for Elastica's "Connection." His recording work includes William Walton's Façade with Dame Peggy Ashcroft, Stravinsky's The Soldier's Tale, and songs from Lerner and Loewe's My Fair Lady with Dame Kiri Te Kanawa, released on the Decca label in 1987. He serves as the English-language audio guide voice for Westminster Abbey in London and is among the readers on a four-disc boxed set of The Fairy Tales of Oscar Wilde, produced by Marc Sinden in aid of the Royal Theatrical Fund. In October 2011, he was named Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. Among the accolades accumulated across his career are an Academy Award, a Tony Award, three Primetime Emmy Awards, and two Golden Globe Awards, making him one of a small number of performers to have achieved the Triple Crown of Acting.