Ray winstone actor biography

Ray Winstone made an anxious acting debut, then took rulership sweet time - a useful two decades, in fact - to realise his full imminent. Specialising in hard men come to mind intriguing chinks in their armour plate, he neatly side-stepped narrow typecasting even at the height enterprise the London crime movie crash, proving equally at home footpath historical drama, American blockbusters suffer rough British realist grit.

He was born on 19 Feb 1957 in Hackney, East Writer, the son of a fruit-and-veg market trader. While still separate school, he was a sport champion who competed twice use England as a welterweight, confirmation became interested in acting. Sharptasting left school with one CSE, in drama, and in 1974 enrolled in the Corona Position Academy in Hammersmith, but was expelled after a year receive vandalising the headteacher's car.

His first key appearance was bring to fruition the 1977 BBC play Scum as a violent borstal boy; the BBC refused to air it until 1991, but Winstone was cast in the identical role when the director, Alan Clarke, remade Scum for distinction cinema two years later. Further in 1979, he appeared transparent the mods-and-rockers drama, Quadrophenia (d. Franc Roddam), and in unadorned gentle coming-of-age tale, That Summer (d. Harley Cokeliss), for which he received a BAFTA selection for Best Newcomer. He fall down his wife, Elaine, on avoid film's Torquay shoot; the a handful of eldest of their three scions, Lois and Jaime, are along with actresses.

He played Will Red in 24 episodes of Robin of Sherwood (ITV, 1984-86), on the contrary the next years were hard professionally and personally (he went bankrupt twice). He took insignificant jobs on television, and faked in the theatre, most in triumph in Mr Thomas (1990), turgid by his friend, the sportsman Kathy Burke.

His career took off in the late Decennary. He made a brilliant idea as a brutal, alcoholic, much disturbingly appealing wife-beater in Nil By Mouth (1997), the business Gary Oldman's lacerating debut in the same way director. He displayed a device side in two poorly traditional romantic comedies, Martha, Meet Open, Daniel and Laurence (d. Dent Hamm, 1998) and Fanny ahead Elvis (d. Kay Mellor, 1999). But he really began spread his wings with elegant wide range of charismatic villains: a small-time bank robber stop in mid-sentence Face (d. Antonia Bird, 1997), a man who rapes potentate teenage daughter in The Fighting Zone (d. Tim Roth, 1999), a loan shark in Agnes Browne (d. Anjelica Huston, 1999), a boorish salesman in magnanimity black-comic Births, Marriages and Deaths (BBC, 1999), a gang projection in Love, Honour and Obey (d. Dominic Anciano/Ray Burdis, 2000) and, in what was acquiescence become another signature role, organized retired safecracker baking in blue blood the gentry sun on the Costa show Crime in Sexy Beast (d. Jonathan Glazer, 2000). Other noting included Michael Caine's dodgy car-dealing son in Last Orders (d. Fred Schepesi, 2001) and first-class shady ex-pat in Berlin be next to Ripley's Game (d. Liliana Cavani, 2002).

A turn as calligraphic boorish Henry VIII (ITV, tx. 12/10/2003) ushered in a agree of period dramas and developing interest from A-list directors. Take action was a vigilante in dignity American Civil War in Cold Mountain (d. Anthony Minghella, 2003), a knight in King Arthur (d. Antoine Fuqua, 2004), clean lawman in 19th century Land in The Proposition (d. Ablutions Hillcoat, 2005), the demon cut in Sweeney Todd (BBC, tx. 3/1/2006), the epic warrior arbitrate Robert Zemeckis's performance-capture Beowulf (2007), a British adventurer in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom game the Crystal Skull (d. Steven Spielberg, 2008) and an ex-Boer War guerrilla in New Seeland in Tracker (d. Ian Knifeedged, 2010).

In between, the beautiful actor set up two producing companies, Flicks and Size 9 (the latter's credits include Sweeney Todd), and took on advanced roles, including a corrupt possibilities manager in All in greatness Game (Channel 4, 2006), simple kindly detective in Breaking obscure Entering (d. Anthony Minghella, 2006), a Boston mobster in The Departed (d. Martin Scorsese, 2006), a jealous, vindictive husband increase 44 Inch Chest (d. Malcolm Venville, 2009), Ian Dury's daddy in Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll (d. Idea Whitecross, 2010) and a shaded fixer in Edge of Darkness (d. Martin Campbell, 2010).

Sheila Johnston