Idris Elba
Idris Elba
Idrissa Akuna "Idris" Elba, OBE is an English actor and musician. He is known for playing drug baron Russell "Stringer" Bell on the HBO series The Wire, Detective John Luther on the BBC One series Luther, and Nelson Mandela in the biographical film Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom. He has been nominated four times for a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor in a Miniseries or Television Film, winning one, and was nominated five times for a Primetime Emmy Award...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionTV Actor
Date of Birth6 September 1972
CityLondon, England
I love working. I'm a workaholic and I'm really privileged for some of the jobs I get offered and so I just want to keep going.
There's a fast-track if you can do the networking. For some personalities it works, but for mine it doesn't.
The one album I can't live without is called 'Cumbolo' by a band called Culture. Every song on their album is deep, but there's one in particular called 'This Train.' I have a tattoo of the lyrics on my left arm.
What kind of role do you play after someone like Stringer, you know what I mean? You play another gangster. What's the point of that? I've played the gangster. I try to keep it really varied; it just makes for more of a fun and interesting career.
When you come from an under-privileged background, oftentimes, you feel a little overwhelmed by your education or your lack of.
What really excites me in a project is when it goes in a way you haven't been before.
As much as it's nice to step into that massive world of Hollywood and be a big, famous actor, I prefer the career of actors that have really chosen smartly and done really amazing performances. Maybe they're not as known, but their careers are a bit more interesting.
I love bikes. I used to own one, but I fell off it when I was younger and that was the end of my bike riding days until now.
I dont have a place that I call home at the moment because theres no point. I mean, Im a traveling circus for a while. Its weird. Like, if I wanted to go home, theres nowhere to go. I just go to a hotel. But Ive kind of gotten used to it.
Sean Connery wasn't the Scottish James Bond and Daniel Craig wasn't the blue-eyed James Bond. So if I played him, I don't want to be called the black James Bond.
In some countries, no one knows who Idris Elba is.
I'm a little sheepish about it. Whenever I meet fans and they're like, 'Oh, you're so sexy,' I just don't get that. There's no way one man can be universally sexy.
In 'Pacific Rim' I had to have a haircut I wouldn't usually rock. However, the moustache I had in the film - that might have to come out again. It was a good moustache. Good times.
I still sing on bits and pieces. Singing's something that I love to do, but it's not something that I pursue as a career.