Liam Neeson

Born: 7th June 1952
Where: Ballymena, Northern Ireland

The ex-boxer proved himself a big hitter in the title role of Oskar Schindler in Steven Spielberg's harrowing holocaust drama.

Other notable roles have included Rob Roy, Michael Collins and controversial American sexologist Alfred Kinsey.

The son of a caretaker and a cook, he was brought up in a working-class neighbourhood in the Irish countryside.

Neeson began taking boxing lessons at the age of nine, and continued with the sport until he reached his late teens when he won the Irish Youth Championship.

However, a broken nose followed by a blackout after a fight led him to quit the ring.

He then attended the University of Belfast to study physics and computer science but dropped out and worked as a forklift driver at the Guinness factory.

Attending drama courses at college, he joined the Belfast Lyric Players' Theater and caught the eye of John Boorman who cast him in Excalibur.

He became more familiar to audiences for his role as the deaf mute in Suspect and landed his first lead role in Darkman in 1990.

Subsequent appearances included David Leland's boxing drama The Big Man and Woody Allen's Husbands & Wives.

However, these were merely warm-ups to his mesmerising role of "good German" Oskar Schindler in Steven Spielberg's Schindler's List.

For this role as the industrialist saviour of hundreds of Jews, Neeson was nominated for both an Academy Award and a Golden Globe.

After dating acrtresses including Helen Mirren, Julia Roberts, Brooke Shields and Barbra Streisand, he married Natasha Richardson in 1994.

(in 1988, he would win a libel case against British newspapers that claimed the marriage was in trouble.)

He went on to play characters close to his roots when he was the Scottish Highlander Rob Roy and the Irish revolutionary leader Michael Collins (for which he won a Golden Globe.)

His next notable role was in Star Wars: Episode 1 - The Phantom Menace as Qui-Gon Jinn which he followed with the chiller The Haunting in 1999.

The same year he was made an OBE in the New Year's Honours but fortune took a downturn when he fractured his pelvis after crashing on his Harley Davidson in America the following year.

Next up he was opposite Harrison Ford as rival Russian submarine commanders in the disappointing K-19: The Widowmaker.

He had an early starring turn in Scorsese's Gangs of New York as Priest Vallon and played a widower with stepson in Richard Curtis' Love Actually.

In 2005, he delivered a critically acclaimed portrayal of American sexologist Alfred Kinsey in Bill Condon's Kinsey, plus he also starred alongside Orlando Bloom in Ridley Scott's Kingdom Of Heaven.

Recent work includes the roles of Batman's mentor Ducard in the Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins and The Chronicles of Narnia.