Colin Friels
Born: September 25 1952
Where: Kilwinning, North Ayrshire, Scotland
Friels' breakthrough performance was as the cheeky misfit in Malcolm, which won him the Australian Film Institute's best actor award.
The son of a mill worker and a carpenter, he moved with his family to Australia and settled in the Melbourne suburb of Broadmeadows.
He worked as a bricklayer's labourer before studying at the prestigious National Institute of Dramatic Arts, alongside actors such as Mel Gibson and his own future wife Judy Davis.
Extensive stage work , including Shakespeare, was followed by his big screen debut in 1981 in Prisoners with Tatum O'Neill and David Hemmings.
Subsequent appearance included Monkey Grip, the nuclear thriller Ground Zero, Malcolm and Kangaroo, opposite his future wife Judy Davis, and the acclaimed Dingo.
American film credits include the Michael Apted drama Class Action and the comic book caper Darkman with Liam Neeson.
He starred in Bruce Beresford's A Good Man in Africa and also appeared in sci-fi cult hit Dark City with Rufus Sewell (he had earlier recovered from pancreatic cancer after nearly dying).
In 2002, following a domestic disturbance, he was ordered by an Australian court not to harass his wife Judy Davis, whom he married in 1984.
More recently, he starred opposite Billy Connolly (and Davis) in The Man Who Sued God and the drama Black and White with Robert Carlyle and Charles Dance.
In 2004, he starred in the drama Tom White as an architect who goes off the rails after a nervous breakdown.
Recent work includes the psychological thriller The Book of Revelation with Greta Scacchi and Tom Long.
