IDRIS ELBA
Idrissa Akuna Elba OBE (born 6 September 1972) is an English
actor, producer, musician, and DJ. He is best known for playing DCI John Luther
on the BBC One series Luther, drug trafficker Stringer Bell on the HBO series
The Wire, and Nelson Mandela in the biographical film Mandela: Long Walk to
Freedom (2013). He has been nominated four times for a Golden Globe Award for
Best Actor – Miniseries or Television Film, winning one, and was nominated five
times for a Primetime Emmy Award.
Elba appeared in Ridley Scott's American Gangster (2007),
Takers (2010), Thor (2011), and its sequels Thor: The Dark World (2013) and
Thor: Ragnarok (2017), as well as Avengers: Infinity War (2018). He was also in
Prometheus (2012), Pacific Rim (2013), Beasts of No Nation (2015), for which he
received BAFTA and Golden Globe nominations for Best Supporting Actor, and
Molly's Game (2017). In 2016, he voiced Chief Bogo in Zootopia, Shere Khan in
The Jungle Book, Fluke in Finding Dory and played the role of Krall in Star
Trek Beyond. He will make his directorial debut with an adaptation of the 1992
novel Yardie by Victor Headley.
In addition to his acting work, Elba is a DJ under the
moniker DJ Big Driis (or Big Driis the Londoner) and a hip hop and soul
musician. In 2016, he was named in the Time 100 list of the Most Influential
People in the World.
Idrissa Akuna Elba was born an only child on 6 September 1972
in Hackney, London. His paternal grandfather, Moses, was a sailor and a
policeman. His father, Winston, was a Sierra Leonean man who worked at Ford
Dagenham, and his mother, Eve, was a Ghanaian woman. Elba's parents were
married in Sierra Leone and later moved to London. Elba was brought up in
Hackney and East Ham, and shortened his first name to "Idris" at school
in Canning Town, where he first became involved in acting. He credits The Stage
with giving him his first big break; having seen an advertisement for a play in
a newspaper, Elba auditioned and met his first agent while performing in the
role. In 1986, he began helping an uncle with his wedding DJ business; within a
year, he had started his own DJ company with some of his friends.
Elba left school in 1988, and won a place in the National
Youth Music Theatre thanks to a £1,500 Prince's Trust grant. His first acting
role was in Crimewatch murder reconstructions and in 1994 appeared in a BBC
children's drama called The Boot Street Band. To support himself between roles
in Crimewatch reconstructions, he worked in jobs such as tyre-fitting, cold
call advertising sales, and working night shifts at Ford Dagenham. He was
working in nightclubs, under the DJ nickname "Big Driis", aged
nineteen, but began auditioning for television roles in his early twenties.
In 1995, Elba landed his first significant role on a series
called Bramwell, a medical drama set in 1890s England. He played a central
character in an episode of Season 1, an African petty thief named Charlie
Carter, who lost his (white) wife to childbirth and had to figure out how to
support his newborn daughter. His first named role arrived earlier in 1995,
when he was cast as a gigolo on the "Sex" episode of Absolutely
Fabulous. Many supporting roles on British television followed, including
series such as The Bill and The Ruth Rendell Mysteries. He joined the cast of the
soap opera Family Affairs and went on to appear on the television serial
Ultraviolet and later on Dangerfield. He decided to move to New York City soon
after. He returned to England occasionally for a television role, such as a
part in one of the Inspector Lynley Mysteries. In 2001, Elba played Achilles in
a stage production of Troilus and Cressida in New York City.
After a supporting turn on a 2001 episode of Law & Order,
Elba landed a starring role on the 2002 HBO drama series The Wire. From 2002 to
2004, Elba portrayed Russell "Stringer" Bell in the series, perhaps
his best-known role in the United States. In 2005, he portrayed Captain
Augustin Muganza in Sometimes in April, an HBO film about the Rwandan Genocide.
Elba appeared on the 2007 BET special Black Men: The Truth. He appeared as
Charlie Gotso on The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency, filmed in Botswana. The
series premiered on 23 March 2008, Easter Sunday, on BBC One, receiving a high
6.3 million viewers and 27% of the audience share.
In January 2009, it was reported per Variety that Elba would
portray Charles Miner, a new rival to Dunder Mifflin regional manager Michael
Scott (Steve Carell) for NBC's The Office. Elba appeared in a six-episode story
arc later in the 2009 season as well as the season finale In September 2009, he
signed a deal to star as the lead role on the six-part BBC television series
Luther, which aired in May 2010. He appeared on Showtime's The Big C in 2010.
At the 69th Golden Globe Awards telecast on 15 January 2012, Elba won the Award
for Best Actor in a Series, Mini-Series, or Motion Picture Made for Television
for his role on the BBC crime thriller series Luther.
In 2007, Elba signed on as the lead role of the film Daddy's
Little Girls, playing Monty, a blue-collar mechanic who falls in love with an
attorney helping him gain custody of his kids, and finds the relationship and
his custody hopes threatened by the return of his former wife. He appeared in
28 Weeks Later (2007) and This Christmas (2007), which brought in nearly $50
million at the box office in 2007. In 2008, he starred in the horror film Prom
Night and the criminal comedy RocknRolla. In 2009, he starred in the horror
film The Unborn and in Obsessed, a thriller that had him cast opposite Beyoncé.
The latter was a box office success, taking $29 million in its opening weekend.
Elba's next film was Legacy (2010), in which he portrayed a
black ops soldier who returns to Brooklyn after a failed mission in Eastern
Europe, where he has undertaken a journey looking for retribution. He starred
in Dark Castle's adaptation of DC/Vertigo's The Losers, under the direction of
Sylvain White, in the role of Roque, the second-in-command of a black-ops team
out for revenge against a government that did them wrong. Filming took place in
Puerto Rico and the movie was released in April 2010. Elba appeared in the
thriller Takers (2010). He played Heimdall in Kenneth Branagh's film Thor
(2011) (based on the Marvel Comics superhero of the same name).
In August 2010, Elba signed up to portray the title
character in a reboot of James Patterson's Alex Cross film franchise. However,
in February 2011, he was replaced by Tyler Perry. In Ghost Rider: Spirit of
Vengeance (2011), the sequel to Ghost Rider (2007), Elba played an alcoholic
warrior monk tasked with finding the title character. In February 2012, Elba
confirmed that he would portray Nelson Mandela in the film Mandela: Long Walk
to Freedom, which is based on his autobiography. As part of his preparation for
the role, Elba spent a night locked in a cell alone on Robben Island, where Mandela
had been imprisoned. His performance earned him a nomination for the Golden
Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama.
In June 2012, Elba portrayed Captain Janek in Ridley Scott's
Prometheus. He joined the cast of the film Pacific Rim (2013) in the role of
Stacker Pentecost. In January 2014, he confirmed that he would be starring in a
film adaptation of Luther. In 2014, he starred in No Good Deed as a vengeful
psychopathic serial killer.
In 2015, Elba appeared as Heimdall in the superhero
blockbuster Avengers: Age of Ultron, directed by Joss Whedon. Elba also starred
alongside Abraham Attah in the film Beasts of No Nation which premiered in
select theaters and on Netflix. He earned a Golden Globe Award nomination for
Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in any Motion Picture as well
as a BAFTA Award nomination for Supporting Actor in the Film category. In 2016,
he had several voice roles: the cape buffalo chief of police, Chief Bogo, in
Disney's Zootopia, alongside Ginnifer Goodwin and Jason Bateman; villainous
tiger Shere Khan in The Jungle Book (2016), a live-action remake of the
animated 1967 film of the same name; and Pixar's Finding Dory, alongside Ellen
DeGeneres and Albert Brooks, both reprising their roles from Finding Nemo
(2003). Also that year, he played the main antagonist, Krall, in the sequel
Star Trek Beyond. In 2017, he played Roland Deschain in the Stephen King film
adaptation The Dark Tower] and starred in Aaron Sorkin's directorial debut
Molly's Game, alongside Jessica Chastain.
Elba has appeared in music videos for Fat Joe (2002), Angie
Stone (2004) and rapper Giggs (2010). In 2006, he recorded the four-song EP Big
Man for Hevlar Records. He co-produced and performed on the intro to Jay-Z's
album American Gangster (2007). He DJed at the 2007 NBA All Star parties at The
Venetian and Ice House Lounge in Las Vegas.
In July 2009, Elba was the DJ for BET's current series
Rising Icons. Elba announced the release of his first single "Please Be
True." In the August 2009 issue of Essence magazine, he announced the name
of his six-song EP as Kings Among Kings. He released his EP High Class Problems
Vol. 1 in the United Kingdom in February 2010, for which he has won many prizes
including a Billboard Music Awards nomination.
In 2011, he performed on the intro to Pharoahe Monch's album
W.A.R.. The following year, he co-directed and performed in the Mumford &
Sons music video for "Lover of the Light".
In 2014, he produced K. Michelle's "The Rebellious Soul
Musical" which debuted on VH1 on 19 August 2014. In May, Elba featured on
Mr Hudson's single "Step Into the Shadows". Mr Hudson also produced
his album Idris Elba Presents mi Mandela, which was released in November 2014.
He also featured on the remix of Ghanaian music group, VVIP's single
"selfie" together with Nigerian rapper Phyno released on 12 September
2014 and video released on YouTube on 11 April 2015.
Elba performed a rap for the second album by Noel Fielding
and Sergio Pizzorno's band, the Loose Tapestries. Elba also rapped in a remix
of Skepta's "Shutdown" which was uploaded on 1 June 2015 to
SoundCloud. On 17 August, a song was released on which Elba appeared on
Nigerian singer D'banj's single "Confidential", featuring Sierra
Leonean rapper Shadow Boxer with the video uploaded to YouTube on 20 August. In
November 2015, Elba opened for Madonna during her Rebel Heart Tour in Berlin,
Germany. Elba is also featured on the Macklemore & Ryan Lewis album This
Unruly Mess I've Made (2016).
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