Josh Hartnett

Joshua Daniel Hartnett (born July 21, 1978) is an American actor and producer. He first came to attention in 1997 for his role as Michael Fitzgerald in the crime drama television series Cracker. He made his feature film debut in the 1998 slasher film Halloween H20: 20 Years Later, followed by roles in films such as the sci-fi horror film The Faculty (1998) and the drama The Virgin Suicides (1999). Hartnett had starring roles in the war film Pearl Harbor, the drama O, the war film Black Hawk Down (all 2001), and the romantic comedy 40 Days and 40 Nights (2002). He starred in the neo-noir crime thriller The Black Dahlia (2006). He next appeared in the drama Resurrecting the Champ (2007), the graphic novel–based vampire horror film 30 Days of Night (2007) and the atmospheric neo-noir thriller I Come with the Rain (2009). From 2014 to 2016, he starred as Ethan Chandler in the horror TV series Penny Dreadful, for which he was nominated for a Fangoria Chainsaw Award. Hartnett acted in the Guy Ritchie films Wrath of Man (2021) and Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre (2023). He also portrayed journalist Victor Malarek in the crime drama Target Number One (2020) and Ernest O. Lawrence in the biographical thriller Oppenheimer (2023). Early life and education Hartnett was born in Saint Paul, Minnesota, though some sources, he has said, erroneously cite San Francisco. The son of Daniel Thomas Hartnett and Wendy Anne (née Kronstedt), he was raised by his father, a building manager and former guitarist for Al Green, and his stepmother, Molly, an artist. He has three younger siblings named Jake, Joe, and Jessica. Hartnett was raised Roman Catholic, attending Nativity of Our Lord Catholic School. At Minneapolis South High School, he played football, but a knee injury forced him off the team when he was 16. He went on to try youth theater, where he acted in productions of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Guys and Dolls and attracted attention from a talent scout. Originally interested in becoming a painter, he decided to become a film actor while working in a video rental shop, where he became acquainted with films such as Trainspotting, 12 Monkeys, and The Usual Suspects.