Charles Matthew “Charlie” Hunnam (born 10 April 1980) is an English actor and screenwriter. He is known for his roles as Nathan Maloney in the Channel 4 drama Queer as Folk (1999), Lloyd Haythe in the Fox comedy series Undeclared (2001), Pete Dunham in the film Green Street (2005), Jackson “Jax” Teller in the FX series Sons of Anarchy, and Raleigh Becket in the film Pacific Rim (2013).
Hunnam was born in Newcastle upon Tyne, to father William “Billy” Hunnam (1952-2013), a gangster and scrap metal merchant, and mother Jane Hunnam, a business owner. His maternal grandmother was the premiere portrait artist in Newcastle. Hunnam was the second child born after brother William “Billy”; he later had two younger half-brothers, Oliver and Christian, on his mother’s side. His parents split up when he was two years old and he moved to the village of Melmerby, Cumbria when he was 12, as his mother remarried. He went to Heaton Manor School in Newcastle, and after moving he went to Queen Elizabeth Grammar School in Penrith, Cumbria. Hunnam got expelled from secondary school and did his exams from home. He attended Cumbria College of Art and Design, where he graduated with a degree in the theory and history of film with a side in performing arts.
At the age of 17, Hunnam was discovered in a shoe shop on Christmas Eve while drunkenly clowning around buying shoes for his brother. A production manager for the Newcastle-based children’s show Byker Grove approached him and Hunnam was later cast in his first role as Jason in three episodes of the show. Aged 18, his first major role came when he was cast by Russell T. Davies as fifteen-year-old schoolboy Nathan Maloney in Davies’ Channel 4 drama Queer as Folk. He followed this up with his role as Daz in the film Whatever Happened to Harold Smith? (1999) and then moved to Los Angeles..
His career expanded to include a recurring role as Gregor Ryder in the WB Television Network series Young Americans. He then appeared in the short-lived Fox series Undeclared as an English drama student called Lloyd Haythe. Despite critical acclaim, the series was cancelled after one season. Hunnam then appeared on the large screen in Abandon (2002), Nicholas Nickleby (2002), and Cold Mountain (2003). Hunnam has stated that he does not wish to simply take any role that he is offered: “I have 60 years to make the money, but the choices I make in the next five years are really going to define my career.” This decision resulted in his return to the UK to take the lead role of Pete Dunham in the film Green Street (2005), however his attempts at delivering a Cockney accent resulted in his inclusion in many critics’ “worst accents in movie history” lists.
Hunnam says his role Patric, a member of “The Fishes”, in Children of Men (2006), was the final part in his “trilogy of mad men”. “I played the psycho in Cold Mountain, my character in Green Street is fairly psychotic and now I’ve got this role.” Since 2008, Hunnam has starred as Jackson “Jax” Teller in Sons of Anarchy, a show about a prominent motorcycle club in a small fictional California town. Hunnam was cast after Kurt Sutter, the creator of the show, saw him in Green Street. His portrayal as Jax Teller has led Hunnam to receive a Critics’ Choice Television Award nomination, three EWwy Award nominations for Best Lead Actor in a Drama series, and a PAAFTJ Award nomination for Best Cast in a Drama Series
Immediately prior to getting cast on Sons of Anarchy, he sold his screenplay Vlad to Summit Entertainment with Brad Pitt’s Plan B Studios co-producing. The film is being directed by music video director and photographer Anthony Mandler, and will focus on the real-life story of Vlad the Impaler. Hunnam learned the story from locals in Romania, while shooting Cold Mountain. He stated that he had not acted in 18 months and was so broke that if he had not managed to sell the script he would have had to sell his house and move back to Britain to live with his mother.Hunnam is also developing a screenplay based on a 2011 Rolling Stone article that he optioned about Edgar Valdez Villareal, an American drug lord who ran one of the biggest cartels in Mexico. Another project he has in development is a film about gypsy culture in Britain, which he hopes to direct. He stated that it’s “a part of English society that’s really seldom been explored, but is one of the most colourful and interesting parts of British society.”
In 2011, Hunnam played the role of Gavin Nichols in the philosophical drama/thriller The Ledge by Matthew Chapman. In 2012, he starred as the title character in the indie comedy 3,2,1… Frankie Go Boom alongside, among others, his Sons of Anarchy co-star Ron Perlman. Hunnam said that he considered the day that he filmed scenes with Perlman for that film the best and funniest day of filming he’s ever had in his whole career. He also appeared as Jay, an ex-boxer, in Stefan Ruzowitzky’s crime drama Deadfall (2012)
Hunnam starred as Raleigh Becket in Guillermo del Toro’s sci-fi film Pacific Rim, that opened in July 2013 and grossed $411 million worldwide. On June 2, 2014, Hunnam was awarded a Huading Award for Best Global Emerging Actor, for his role as Raleigh, due to the film doing very well in the Asian markets. Earlier in the same year, it was announced that Hunnam would reunite with del Toro in the horror film Crimson Peak. He will appear alongside Mia Wasikowska, Tom Hiddleston and Jessica Chastain. The film was set to start shooting in February 2014 with an 16 October 2015 release date. It was announced on 2 September 2013 that Hunnam would play the lead role of Christian Grey in the film adaptation of E. L. James’ novel Fifty Shades of Grey. However, on 12 October 2013, Universal Pictures announced that Hunnam had withdrawn from the film due to conflicts with the schedule of his series Sons of Anarchy.
Hunnam met actress Katharine Towne in 1999 when they both auditioned for roles on Dawson’s Creek. After dating for four weeks, they married in Las Vegas. The couple divorced in 2002. He has been in a relationship with jewelry designer Morgana McNelis since 2007.
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