Adam Beach

Born: November 11 1972
Where: Ashern, Manitoba, Canada

The actor attracted critical acclaim for his portrayal of Native American infantryman Ira Hayes in Clint Eastwood's war epic Flags of Our Fathers.

Born into the Canadian Salteaux Indian tribe, he grew up with his two brothers on the Dog Creek Indian Reserve.

At the age of eight he was orphaned when his mother was killed by a drunk-driver while pregnant outside their house and his depressed father drowned himself.

As a teenager, he moved to Winnipeg, Manitoba, where he became involved in theatre and the Black Sabbath cover band Lethic.

After landing a part in the film Lost in the Barrens with Graham Greene, he decided to pursue acting as a career and moved to Ottawa.

He made his TV debut in 1990 in the adventure yarn Lost in the Barrens and made his first outing on the big screen three years later in the Canadian drama Cadillac Girls.

Subsequent feature appearances included the drama A Boy Called Hate with Scott Caan and Dance Me Outside, which earned him a Best Actor award from the American Indian Film Festival.

Cast as an American Indian, he appeared in the likes of Son of Hiawatha and Chris Eyre's Smoke Signals, which won the Audience Award at the Sundance Film Festival.

Small, independent projects such as Mystery, Alaska and The Art of Woo followed before John Woo cast him in 2002 as a Navajo Marine opposite Nicolas Cage in the WWII action drama Windtalkers.

Beach starred in the romantic drama Now & Forever and sci-fi comedy The Big Empty before Eastwood cast him in Flags of Our Fathers as Hayes, one of the soldiers who raised the American flag over the island of Iwo Jima.