Ralph Fiennes

Born: December 1962
Where: Suffolk, England

Fiennes has emerged as one of Britain's most versatile actors from the camp commandant in Schindler's List to the love interest opposite Jennifer Lopez in Maid in Manhattan.

He attended Chelsea College of Art and Design in London where he majored in painting before changing a year later to acting.

He attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, where his classmates included Imogen Stubbs, Jane Horrocks, Iain Glen and future wife Alex Kingston.

He began his acting career on stage, and in 1989 joined the Royal Shakespeare Company for two seasons.

His British TV debut came in 1991 with Prime Suspect. Later that year he made his film debut opposite Juliette Binoche in Wuthering Heights.

He won a BAFTA Award and an Oscar nomination for his portrayal of a Nazi concentration camp commandant in Steven Spielberg's Holocaust epic, Schindler's List.

Fiennes had the title role in Anthony Minghella's Oscar-winning epic The English Patient, that earned him a Best Actor Oscar nomination.

The wonderfully surreal Oscar & Lucinda followed although his decision to play John Steed in the big screen version of The Avengers wasn't one of his best ones.

He went on to executive produce and star in Onegin, directed by his sister Martha. Not forgetting his stage roots, he performed as the title characters in the Shakespeare double act of Richard II and Coriolanus.

Fiennes essayed the role of a heartbroken writer mourning The End of the Affair he had with the wife of his civil-servant friend in London during the blitzkrieg.

The actor followed that up with the seamless execution of three principle roles in Sunshine/A Taste of Sunshine, an ambitious epic that chronicled one family's history for nearly a century.

After several stage triumphs, Finnes was poised to raise his profile on-screen again in 2002 and 2003 with roles in a number of high-profile films.

These included Red Dragon in which he plays the vicious tattooed serial killer Francis Dolarhyde pursued with the help of Dr. Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins).

This was followed by Maid in Manhattan a fairy-tale romance in the Pretty Woman vein with leading lady Jennifer Lopez; and director David Cronenberg's Spider, playing an institutionalized schizophrenic who attempts to return to mainstream London.

He also played a vicious art dealer in Neil Jordan's Cote D'Azur crime caper The Good Thief with Nick Nolte.