Will Keen

Will Keen is an English actor born William Walter Maurice Keen on 4 March 1970 in Oxford. The son of Charles William Lyle Keen and Lady Priscilla Mary Rose Curzon, daughter of Edward Curzon, 6th Earl Howe, he is the brother of poet Alice Oswald and author Laura Beatty. Keen was educated at Eton College and earned a first-class degree in English literature from the University of Oxford. He is married to Spanish actress, theatre director, and writer Maria Fernandez Ache, and the couple's daughter, Dafne Keen, is also an actress. Beyond his performing career, Keen serves as a trustee of the James Menzies Kitchin Award, which supports young theatre directors.

Keen has accumulated an extensive body of stage work across Britain's leading theatrical institutions. His credits at the National Theatre include The Coast of Utopia, Mary Stuart, The Duchess of Malfi, Hove, and Pericles. At Shakespeare's Globe he appeared in The Two Noble Kinsmen, The Tempest, The Winter's Tale, and Dido, Queen of Carthage. Further stage work includes The Changeling and Macbeth with Cheek by Jowl at the Barbican and on international tours, The Arsonists at the Royal Court Theatre, Kiss of the Spider Woman at the Donmar Warehouse, The Rubenstein Kiss at the Hampstead Theatre, and The Prince of Homburg and Pericles at the Lyric Hammersmith. His West End credits include Quartermaine's Terms, A Midsummer Night's Dream, and Elton John's Glasses, and he has also appeared in Man and Superman, Don Juan, and Hysteria at the Theatre Royal, Bath.

In 2022, Keen originated the role of Vladimir Putin in Peter Morgan's play Patriots at the Almeida Theatre in London, a drama centered on the life of Russian oligarch Boris Berezovsky. He subsequently brought that production to Broadway in 2024, earning a Theatre World Award for his performance.

Keen's screen work spans both television and film. His television credits include Wolf Hall, The Musketeers, Sherlock, Silk, Foyle's War, New Tricks, Titanic, Midsomer Murders, The Colour of Magic, Casualty 1907, Elizabeth I, The Impressionists, and Wired. In 2016 he portrayed Michael Adeane, the Queen's longtime Private Secretary, in the Netflix series The Crown. In 2019 he appeared as Father MacPhail in the BBC adaptation of Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials, a series in which his daughter Dafne Keen plays the lead role. In 2021 he appeared as David Epstein in the BBC series Ridley Road. His film credits include Nine Lives of Tomas Katz and Love and Other Disasters.

Keen has also pursued theatrical work in Spain, performing in Spanish-language productions of Betrayal and The Winter's Tale and directing Hamlet and Romeo y Julieta. In the musical field, he recorded Seven Scenes from Hamlet, composed by Benet Casablancas, in collaboration with the Orquesta de la Comunidad de Madrid conducted by José Ramón Encinar, released on the Stradivarius label in 2010.