Jonathan Rhys Meyers

Early life

Meyers was born 27 July 1977 in Dublin, Ireland, to Geraldine (née Myers; 1957–2007) and folk musician John O'Keeffe, and brought up in County Cork, possibly in the city of Cork (sources are unclear). His family is Roman Catholic. His three brothers are all professional musicians. He attended North Monastery Christian Brothers School.

Career

After being expelled from North Monastery at 14 for truancy, he spent much of his time working and socialising in pool halls. Casting agents looking for Irish boys to appear in War of the Buttons spotted him at a Cork pool hall, the Victoria Sporting Club, and invited him to audition. Although passed over for War of the Buttons, the casting agents encouraged him to pursue a career in acting. His first film role came in A Man of No Importance (1994). In 1996, he appeared in Michael Collins, as the title character's ambusher. In 1999, he appeared in Ride with the Devil as psychopathic guerrilla fighter Pitt Mackeson.

Meyers has starred in television series including Gormenghast (2000) and in the CBS 4-hour mini-series Elvis (2005) as Elvis Presley alongside Randy Quaid as Colonel Tom Parker, but didn't sing for his role in the miniseries. The latter earned him an Emmy nomination and a Golden Globe win. He starred in the CBC/Showtime co-production The Tudors (2007) as Henry VIII. He was nominated for the Golden Globe for Best Actor in a Television Drama in 2007 for the role.

He played a David Bowie-inspired glam rock star in Velvet Goldmine (1998), a dedicated girls' football coach in Bend It Like Beckham (2002), in Vanity Fair (2004) opposite Reese Witherspoon. He co-starred in 2004 in Oliver Stone's epic Alexander. The following year he starred in Woody Allen's drama Match Point (2005), for which he received a Chopard Trophy at the Cannes Film Festival. In 2006, he appeared in Mission: Impossible III. Subsequent projects include August Rush (2007) and The Children of Huang Shi (2008), Shelter and From Paris with Love (2010)

In 2011, he starred in Belle du Seigneur (an English language film adaptation of Albert Cohen's novel) as Solal des Solal. The film was released in Russia on 29 November 2012 and in France on 19 June 2013 after premiering at the Champs Elysees Film Festival. A self-taught singer and guitarist, he has appeared in a number of musical roles. His first such role was as "Brian Slade" in Velvet Goldmine; two of the songs he sang ("Baby's on Fire" and "Tumbling Down") are on the film's soundtrack. He sang briefly in the TV miniseries version of The Magnificent Ambersons, performed in studio scenes of the miniseries Elvis and played the flute in Gormenghast.

In the 2007 music drama August Rush, he performed on-screen as singer-songwriter Louis Connelly and is credited for four songs on the soundtrack – "Break", "Moondance", "Something Inside" and "This Time". Of the four, "This Time" and "Break" were considered in the Best Original Song category of the 80th Academy Awards. "This Time" was not released as a single but peaked at number 84 in the Canadian Hot 100.

Besides acting, Jonathan has also modelled for several clothing companies. He modelled for Club Monaco in 2001 and was chosen as the face for the Versace men's collection of Autumn/Winter 2006 and Spring 2007, and he was the face of the Hugo Boss men's fragrance range from 2006 until he was replaced with Jared Leto in 2011. He is signed to Independent Models in London. In February 2008, he became a celebrity ambassador for the Cork-based charitable organisation The Hope Foundation. On 5 October 2008, Rhys Meyers received an Honorary Patronage from the Trinity College Philosophical Society in Dublin.

In 2013, Meyers was cast as Dracula, in NBC's television series Dracula alongside Oliver Jackson-Cohen and Jessica De Gouw. It was also announced in May 2013 that Jonathan was to participate in the recording of his brothers' album entitled "Blossom" which was released on 21 April 2014.

On 23 October 2014, he received The Irish Post Legend Award at the London Hilton on Park Lane in recognition of his remarkable achievements in Film & Television over the previous twenty years.

Meyers played the lead in the spy thriller Damascus Cover, based on the novel by Howard Kaplan. It is scheduled to premiere September 23, 2017, at the Boston Film Festival.

Meyers will portray Patrick Pearse, a political activist and one of the leaders of the bloody 1916 Irish Easter Rising, in the centennial commemoration biopic film The Rising, written and produced by Kevin McCann.

Personal life

From 2004 until 2012, Meyers was in a relationship with Reena Hammer, daughter of makeup artist Ruby Hammer.

In 2007, Meyers' representative, Meredith O'Sullivan, confirmed that, "After a non-stop succession of filming, Jonathan Rhys Meyers has entered an alcohol-treatment programme." His representative confirmed Meyers was again receiving treatment in 2010. In November 2011, Meyers was ordered by a French court to pay a restitution of €1,000 and was given a judgment of a suspended sentence for public intoxication 24 months earlier.

On 20 November 2007, his mother, Mary Geraldine "Geri" O'Keeffe, died at Mercy University Hospital, Cork, aged 51, following a short, undisclosed illness.

Rhys Meyers and Mara Lane, who married sometime in 2016, had a son, Wolf Rhys Meyers, in December 2016. Lane said in September 2017 that she had miscarried a second child.