Jamie Bell

Andrew James Matfin Bell (born 14 March 1986) is an English actor and dancer. He rose to prominence for his debut role in Billy Elliot (2000), for which he won the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role, becoming one of the youngest winners of the award. He is also known for his leading roles as Tintin in The Adventures of Tintin (2011) and as Ben Grimm / Thing in Fantastic Four (2015). Other notable performances include in the films King Kong (2005), Jumper (2008), Snowpiercer (2013), and Rocketman (2019). He earned a second BAFTA Award nomination for his leading performance in Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool (2017). In television, Bell starred as Abraham Woodhull in the AMC historical drama series Turn: Washington's Spies (2014–2017). Early life Bell was born on 14 March 1986 in Billingham, Teesside, England, where he grew up with his mother, Eileen Matfin and his elder sister Kathryn. His father, John Bell, a toolmaker, left before Jamie was born. Bell began his involvement with dance after he accompanied his sister to her ballet lessons. Career In 1999, Bell was chosen from a field of over 2,000 boys for the role of Billy Elliot, an 11-year-old boy who dismays his working-class widowed father and elder brother by taking up ballet. Bell's performance received widespread acclaim, and 14-year-old Bell won London Film Critics' Circle Award for British Newcomer of the Year, British Independent Film Award for Best Newcomer, Evening Standard British Film Award for Most Promising Newcomer, and BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role, becoming one of the youngest winners of the awards. He also appeared in Close and True, an ITV legal drama shown in 2000, which starred Robson Green, James Bolam, Kerry Ann Christiansen and Susan Jameson. Bell served as Honorary Jury President of the 2001 Giffoni Film Festival. In 2002, he appeared as the disabled servant Smike in an adaptation of Nicholas Nickleby and a young soldier in Deathwatch. In the following years, he portrayed a teenager on the run in Undertow, a gun-toting pacifist in Dear Wendy, a disaffected Southern California teenager in The Chumscrubber, and the young Jimmy in the 2005 film version of King Kong. Also in 2005, he starred opposite Evan Rachel Wood in the Green Day video "Wake Me Up When September Ends", directed by Samuel Bayer.