Rory Kinnear is an English actor who has worked with the Royal Shakespeare Company and the
Royal National Theatre.
He is best known for playing Bill Tanner in James Bond films Quantum of Solace and Skyfall,
and in various video games of the franchise.
He also won a Laurence Olivier Award for portraying Fopling Fluter in a 2008 version of The Man
of Mode, and a British Independent Film Award for his performance in the 2012 film Broken.
In 2014, he won the Olivier Award for Best Actor for his portrayal of Shakespeare's villain
Iago in the National Theatre production of Othello.
Early life Kinnear was born in London, England.
The son of actors Roy Kinnear and Carmel Cryan, Kinnear has two sisters, Kirsty and Karina.
Through his father, a well-known British comedy actor, he is the grandson of the international
rugby union and rugby league player Roy Muir Kinnear, and he is the godson of Michael Williams.
Educated at Tower House School and St Paul's School, London, he read English at Balliol
College, Oxford and then studied acting at London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art.
Career Kinnear's performances in Phyllida Lloyd's
production of Mary Stuart and Trevor Nunn's Hamlet, in which he played Laertes, met with
acclaim.
He also achieved recognition as the outrageous Sir Fopling Flutter in The Man of Mode at
the National Theatre, winning a Laurence Olivier Award and Ian Charleson Award.
Other notable theatre work includes the lead in Thomas Middleton's The Revenger's Tragedy,
the role of Pyotr in Gorky's Philistines and the role of Mitia in a stage adaptation of
the Nikita Mikhalkov film Burnt by the Sun, all for the National Theatre.
Further to his theatre work he received particularly positive reviews for his sympathetic portrayal
of Denis Thatcher in The Long Walk to Finchley, a BBC dramatisation of the early years of
Margaret Thatcher's political career, which also starred Andrea Riseborough and Samuel
West.
He portrayed Bill Tanner in the James Bond films Quantum of Solace and Skyfall.
In 2010, he played Angelo in Measure For Measure at the Almeida Theatre.
Later in 2010 he played the title role in Hamlet at the National Theatre.
The two portrayals won him the best actor award in the Evening Standard drama awards
for 2010.
In 2010, he played Flugkapitän Jürgen Rahl in the BBC Radio drama Slipstream as a disaffected
German pilot who joins a mission to steal an alien spacecraft harboured by the Nazis.
He also starred alongside Lucy Punch and Toby Stephens in the BBC Two series Vexed.
Broadcast on 19 October 2010, he was the co-lead in the BBC4 TV drama, The First Men in the
Moon written by and co-starring Mark Gatiss.
In 2011, he provided narration during the BBC Proms production of 'Henry V – suite'
arranged by Muir Mathieson during their Film Music Prom.
He appeared in the lead role of Prime Minister Michael Callow in 'The National Anthem', the
first instalment of Charlie Brooker's miniseries Black Mirror.
In July 2012, Kinnear appeared as Bolingbroke in Richard II, a BBC Two adaptation of the
play of the same name, with Ben Whishaw as King Richard and Patrick Stewart as John of
Gaunt.
Kinnear appeared in The Last of the Haussmans at the Royal National Theatre during the summer
of 2012.
The production was broadcast to cinemas around the world on 11 October 2012 through the National
Theatre Live programme.
He starred as Iago opposite Adrian Lester in the title role of Othello in 2013 at the
National Theatre throughout the summer of 2013.
Both actors won the Best Actor award in the Evening Standard Theatre Awards for their
roles; the award is traditionally given to only one actor, but the judges were unable
to choose between the pair.
He starred in the BBC Two series Count Arthur Strong as Michael and also appeared in the
Channel 4 drama Southcliffe.
From September 2013 the Bush Theatre in London staged Rory's debut play The Herd, directed
by Howard Davies.
In December 2013 he appeared as the main character Lord Lucan in the two-part TV Series which
was spread over two nights for ITV He is currently appearing as Frankenstein's
monster in the Showtime television series Penny Dreadful, which premiered May 11, 2014.
Selected credits
References
External links Rory Kinnear at the Internet Movie Database
Interview with The Observer Wish 143 - short film starring Rory Kinnear
The First Men in the Moon