67 Facts About Jeremy Irons

Jeremy Irons is known for his roles on stage and screen having won numerous accolades including an Academy Award, two Golden Globe Awards, three Primetime Emmy Awards, and a Tony Award.

Jeremy Irons is one of the few actors who has achieved the Triple Crown of Acting, having won Oscar, Emmy, and Tony awards for film, television and theatre.

Jeremy Irons appeared in many West End theatre productions, including the Shakespeare plays The Winter's Tale, Macbeth, Much Ado About Nothing, The Taming of the Shrew, and Richard II.

Jeremy Irons voiced Scar in Disney's The Lion King and played Alfred Pennyworth in the DC Extended Universe franchise.

Jeremy Irons starred as Pope Alexander VI in the Showtime historical series The Borgias.

Jeremy Irons was born on 19 September 1948 in Cowes on the Isle of Wight, to Paul Dugan Jeremy Irons, an accountant, and Barbara Anne Brereton Brymer.

Jeremy Irons was educated at the independent Sherborne School in Dorset from 1962 to 1966.

Jeremy Irons was the drummer and harmonica player in a four-man school band called the Four Pillars of Wisdom.

Jeremy Irons trained as an actor at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School and later became president of its fundraising appeal.

Jeremy Irons performed a number of plays, and busked on the streets of Bristol, before appearing on the London stage as John the Baptist and Judas opposite David Essex in Godspell, which opened at the Roundhouse on 17 November 1971 before transferring to Wyndham's Theatre playing a total of 1,128 performances.

In 1985, Jeremy Irons directed a music video for Carly Simon and her heavily promoted single, "Tired of Being Blonde", and in 1994, he had a cameo role in the video for Elastica's hit single "Connection".

Jeremy Irons has contributed to other musical performances, recording William Walton's Facade with Dame Peggy Ashcroft, Stravinsky's The Soldier's Tale conducted by the composer, and in 1987 the songs from Lerner and Loewe's My Fair Lady with Dame Kiri Te Kanawa, released on the Decca label.

Jeremy Irons acted alongside Matthew Broderick, Nathan Lane, James Earl Jones, Rowan Atkinson and Whoopi Goldberg.

Jeremy Irons has since provided voiceovers for three Disney World attractions.

Jeremy Irons narrated the Spaceship Earth ride, housed in the large geodesic globe at Epcot in Florida from October 1994 to July 2007.

Jeremy Irons was the English narrator for the Studio Tram Tour: Behind the Magic at the Walt Disney Studios Park at Disneyland Paris.

Jeremy Irons voiced H G Wells in the English-language version of the former Disney attraction The Timekeeper.

Jeremy Irons is one of the readers in the 4x CD boxed set of The Fairy Tales of Oscar Wilde, produced by Marc Sinden and sold in aid of the Royal Theatrical Fund.

Jeremy Irons serves as the English-language version of the audio guide for Westminster Abbey in London.

Jeremy Irons voiced English soldier and WWI poet Siegfried Sassoon in The Great War and the Shaping of the 20th Century, receiving the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Voice-Over Performance.

Jeremy Irons featured in Bernardo Bertolucci's Stealing Beauty, the 1997 remake of Lolita, and the 1998 film version of The Man in the Iron Mask, playing the musketeer Aramis share credit with Leonardo DiCaprio, John Malkovich, Gerard Depardieu and Gabriel Byrne.

In 2003, Jeremy Irons played Fredrik Egerman in a New York revival of Stephen Sondheim's A Little Night Music, and two years later appeared as King Arthur in Lerner and Loewe's Camelot at the Hollywood Bowl.

Jeremy Irons played the Uber-Morlock in the film The Time Machine.

In 2004, Jeremy Irons played the title character in The Merchant of Venice.

Jeremy Irons has co-starred with John Malkovich in two films, The Man in the Iron Mask and Eragon, though they didn't have any scenes together in the latter.

In 2004 Jeremy Irons played Severus Snape in the BBC's Comic Relief's Harry Potter parody, "Harry Potter and the Secret Chamberpot of Azerbaijan".

In 2005, Jeremy Irons portrayed Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester in the Channel 4-HBO mini-series, Elizabeth I, in which he starred opposite Helen Mirren.

In 2006, Jeremy Irons appeared with Laura Dern in David Lynch's Inland Empire.

Jeremy Irons made his National Theatre debut playing former British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan in Never So Good, a new play by Howard Brenton which opened at the Lyttelton on 19 March 2008.

In 2009, Jeremy Irons appeared on Broadway opposite Joan Allen in the play Impressionism.

In 2008, Jeremy Irons co-starred with Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen in the western drama Appaloosa, directed by Harris.

In 2009, Jeremy Irons appeared on the Touchstone album Wintercoast, recording a narrative introduction to the album.

Jeremy Irons appeared in the documentary for Irish television channel TG4, Faoi Lan Cheoil, in which he is seen taking fiddle lessons from Caoimhin O Raghallaigh.

In 2011, Jeremy Irons appeared alongside Kevin Spacey in the thriller Margin Call.

Jeremy Irons reprised the role on an episode titled "Totem" that ran on 30 March 2011.

Jeremy Irons narrated the French-produced docuseries about volcanoes, Life on Fire.

Jeremy Irons has had extensive voice work in a range of different fields throughout his career.

Jeremy Irons read the audiobook recording of Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisited, Paulo Coelho's The Alchemist, Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita, and James and the Giant Peach by the children's author Roald Dahl.

Jeremy Irons finally completed recording the entire canon of T S Eliot which was broadcast over New Year's Day 2017.

In 2020, Jeremy Irons was one of 40 British voices to read three to four verses of Samuel Taylor Coleridge's 150-verse 18th century poem The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.

In 2021, Jeremy Irons played Rodolfo Gucci in Ridley Scott's biographical crime drama film House of Gucci.

In 2024, Jeremy Irons was cast in the Apple TV+ drama series The Morning Show where he will portray Alex Levy's father for season 4.

At the 1991 Tony Awards, Jeremy Irons was one of the few celebrities to wear the red ribbon to support the fight against AIDS.

Jeremy Irons was the first celebrity to wear it onscreen.

Jeremy Irons was one of several celebrities who endorsed the parliamentary candidacy of the Green Party's Caroline Lucas at the 2015 general election.

Jeremy Irons is an outspoken critic of the death penalty and has supported the campaign by the human rights organisation Amnesty International UK to abolish capital punishment worldwide.

In 2011, Jeremy Irons was criticised in the British Medical Journal for his fundraising activities in support of the College of Medicine, an alternative medicine lobby group in the UK linked to King Charles.

Jeremy Irons later clarified his comments, saying he was providing an example of a situation that could cause a "legal quagmire" under the laws that allow same-sex marriage, and that he had been "misinterpreted".

Jeremy Irons added that "some gay relationships are more long term, responsible and even healthier in their role of raising children, than their hetero equivalents".

Jeremy Irons said in a BBC interview that he wished he had "buttoned my lip" before asking if its legalisation would see fathers marry sons.

Jeremy Irons agreed with an abortion opponent and was quoted as saying that "the church is right to say it's a sin".

In 2020, Jeremy Irons said, "I support wholeheartedly the right of women to have an abortion should they so decide".

Jeremy Irons married Julie Hallam in 1969, but they divorced later that year.

Jeremy Irons married Irish actress Sinead Cusack on 28 March 1978.

Jeremy Irons owns Kilcoe Castle near Ballydehob, County Cork, Ireland, and had the castle painted a traditional ochre colour which was misreported as being 'pink'.

Jeremy Irons has another Irish residence in The Liberties of Dublin, as well as a home in his birth town of Cowes, a detached house and barn in Watlington, Oxfordshire and a mews house in Notting Hill, London.

In 2013, Jeremy Irons said he was a smoker and an avid fan of cigars, naming Romeo y Julieta as his favourite brand.

Jeremy Irons supports a number of other charities, including The Prison Phoenix Trust in England, and the London-based Evidence for Development, which seeks to improve the lives of the world's most needy people by preventing famines and delivering food aid, for both of which he is an active patron.

In 2000, Jeremy Irons received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement presented by Awards Council member Olivia de Havilland during the International Achievement Summit in London.

Jeremy Irons was named Goodwill Ambassador of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations in 2011.

Jeremy Irons provided the narration of the 2013 documentary Sahaya Going Beyond about the work of the charity Sahaya International.

In November 2015, Jeremy Irons supported the No Cold Homes campaign by the UK charity Turn2us.

Jeremy Irons was one of nearly thirty celebrities, who included Helen Mirren, Hugh Laurie and Ed Sheeran, to donate items of winter clothing to the campaign, with the proceeds used to help people in the UK struggling to keep their homes warm in winter.

Jeremy Irons is a patron of the Chiltern Shakespeare Company, which produces Shakespearean plays annually in Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire, and a London-based drama school, The Associated Studios.

Jeremy Irons was bestowed an Honorary Life Membership by the University College Dublin Law Society in September 2008, in honour of his contribution to television, film, audio, music, and theatre.

Also in 2008, Jeremy Irons was awarded an honorary Doctorate by Southampton Solent University.

On 20 July 2016, Jeremy Irons was announced as the first Chancellor of Bath Spa University.