Guy Pearce
Born: 5th October 1967
Where: Cambridge, England
The former Neighbours actor won international acclaim when he dragged up for the cult Australian hit Priscilla, Queen of the Desert.
Since that breakthrough, Pearce has shown himself to be a versatile performer, starring as an amnesiac in Memento, a cop in LA Confidential and the Count of Monte Cristo's nemesis.
Born in rural England, he emigrated to Australia to live in Geelong, Victoria, with his family when he was three years old.
Five years later, his father, a New Zealand pilot, died in a plane crash leaving his English school teacher mother to care for him and his older sister Tracey.
Pearce joined local theatrical groups at the age of eleven, where he appeared in amateur theater productions of The King and I, Alice in Wonderland, and The Wizard of Oz.
A teenage bodybuilder inscure about his skinny frame, he won the Mr Junior Victoria competition when he was 15.
Just two days after his final high school exam in 1985, Pearce started his four year stint as hunky student turned turned teacher Mike Young on the Aussie soap Neighbours.
After further TV success in Home and Away and Snowy River: The McGregor Saga, he switched to the big screen.
He had already played supporting roles in the contemporary rock drama Heaven Tonight and the thriller Hunting.
However, Priscilla propelled him into the limelight and he went on to star as Errol Flynn in the biopic Flynn before starring in LA Confidential.
Lead roles followed in Antonia Bird's cannibal drama Ravenous, gung-ho action drama Rules of Engagement and Christopher Nolan's cult hit Memento.
Next up was the dastardly role of Fernand Mondego in Kevin Reynolds' remake of the Count of Monte Cristo and Alexander Hartgeden in The Time Machine, directed by HG Wells great-grandson Simon Wells.
Returning to Australia, he made the crime thriller The Hard Word with Rachel Griffiths playing his unfaithful wife.
Upcoming projects include Jean-Jacques Annaud's Two Brothers, which tells the tale of two hunters.
