James Nesbitt
James Nesbitt
William James Nesbitt, OBEis an actor and presenter from Northern Ireland. Born in Ballymena, County Antrim, Nesbitt grew up in the nearby village of Broughshane, before moving to Coleraine, County Londonderry. He wanted to become a teacher like his father, so he began a degree in French at the University of Ulster. He dropped out after a year when he decided to become an actor, and transferred to the Central School of Speech and Drama in London. After graduating in...
NationalityIrish
ProfessionTV Actor
Date of Birth15 January 1965
CountryIreland
That thing of briefly losing sight of a child happened to me when the kids were younger, and you can't see them in the supermarket or wherever. It's a terrible, terrible moment... the most unimaginable horror.
As fabulous as technology is, it can also make us very anxious.
When I did the film 'Hear My Voice' a few years ago, I disappeared fully up my own backside for a while. Because I thought my career was taking off, I became a bit of an egomaniac and a pain in the neck. I thought I was God's gift to mankind and the greatest Irishman since George Best.
When I turned 40, subconsciously, life was a blank sheet. Before, it was disjointed, and I was very displaced and quite mad, but it was a brilliant time. Everyone thinks I must have been unhappy.
I was one of the many kids in Northern Ireland who grew up in the countryside and had an idyllic childhood well away from the Troubles.
I love nothing more than going to eat by myself with a newspaper.
I have three older sisters who, when we were children, used to hold me down on a bad day and put make-up all over me, so I've had an aversion to it all my life and hate sitting down in the make-up chair.
I'm not an actor who is often asked to be in period things.
I lived a dual life, and when my dual life exploded, I began to feel much happier.
I get an awful lot of people coming up and saying they went to school with me. There must have been 80,000 pupils at that school!
I don't think I'll be doing a lot more commercials.
I loved my time growing up in Northern Ireland doing youth drama, that is where it all began for me.
I'm Ulster Presbyterian. We understand the need to work hard from an early age.
I do commercials, but I also go to Sudan as an ambassador for UNICEF.