Daniel Craig Biography
Throughout his early career, Daniel Craig enjoyed the anonymity that comes with not being an A-list actor. That changed, however, when it was announced that he was considered for the role of James Bond in the adaptation of Ian Flemings’ Casino Royale. Craig denied rumors that he was offered a three-picture deal—at the time, Pierce Brosnan was still in the running to continue his reign as the famed British agent. But rumors were enough to blow the lid off Craig’s obscurity and thrust the actor known to loathe publicity into the limelight, especially after he did indeed become the sixth actor to play 007. Even if he weren’t considered for the role, his increasingly high-profile work would have made him a star regardless.
Born in Chester—England’s walled city—Craig grew up in nearby Liverpool, where his mother studied art at university and his stepfather, the painter Max Blond, plied his craft. At 16, he moved to London to train at the National Youth Theatre and later graduated from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. In 1992, Craig made his film debut in the coming-of-age drama, “The Power of One,” wherein he played an Afrikaner soldier who beats and humiliates a white South African boxer (Stephen Dorff) trained by a black man (Morgan Freeman). Craig then appeared in “Genghis Cohn” (A&E, 1993), a satire about a Nazi SS officer (Robert Lindsay) confronted with the ghost of a Jewish comedian (Antony Sher) he killed in a concentration camp. After playing a commoner involved in a forbidden love with King Arthur’s daughter in the children’s fantasy, “A Kid in King Arthur’s Court” (1995), Craig gained fame in native England playing a hapless musician turned homeless person in the BBC’s “Our Friends in the North” (1996), an ambitious nine-part serial about the lives of four friends spanning thirty years.