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Christian McKay

English stage & screen actor (born 1973)

Summary

English stage & screen actor (born 1973)

Field	Value
name	Christian McKay
image	Christian McKay as Grant Pierce ("Creditors").jpg
caption	Christian McKay in 2013
birth_name	Christian Stuart McKay
birth_date
birth_place	Bury, Lancashire, England, UK
nationality	British
spouse	Emily Allen (m. 2006)
children	2
occupation	Actor
years_active	2001–present

Christian Stuart McKay (born 30 December 1973) is an English stage and screen actor. He is best known for his portrayal of Orson Welles in the 2008 film Me and Orson Welles, for which he was nominated for over two dozen awards including the BAFTA Award for Best Supporting Actor. He also appeared in Florence Foster Jenkins, The Theory of Everything, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and Rush.

Early life

McKay was born in Bury, Lancashire. He has a sister, Karen. His mother, Lynn, worked as a hairdresser, and his father, Stuart, was a railway worker. He studied piano as a youth, and performed the Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No. 3 at age 21. McKay subsequently halted his concert career and enrolled at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art to study acting.

Career

McKay's television appearances include portraying conductor Pierre Monteux in the BBC TV production Riot at the Rite (2005). His first film appearance was in Abraham's Point (2008).

After seeing a performance of Rosebud at the 2007 "Brits Off Broadway" festival, Richard Linklater cast McKay as Welles in his film Me and Orson Welles, retaining McKay over the subsequent producer objections to his casting. In this, his second film and first lead role, McKay received critical praise for his performance as Orson Welles.

McKay has recently been seen in the biographical drama Rush, alongside Chris Hemsworth and Daniel Brühl, the BAFTA-nominated music film Northern Soul, and the Oscar-winning biographical drama The Theory of Everything, alongside Eddie Redmayne and Felicity Jones. All of these were met with critical acclaim, with The Theory of Everything receiving a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Picture.

Theatre

McKay has portrayed Orson Welles in the one-man play Rosebud: The Lives of Orson Welles at a number of venues, including the Edinburgh Festival and King's Head (London). He subsequently reprised the role in the US at the 2007 "Brits Off Broadway" festival.

In 2013, McKay played Gerard in Strangers on a Train at London's Gielgud Theatre.

Personal life

McKay was married to Emily Allen. They divorced in 2021. He has two children, Maximilian Sidney McKay, born 2011 and Aniela Rita Lynn McKay, born 2015.

Selected filmography

Film

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2008	Abraham's Point	Robert
2009	Me and Orson Welles	Orson Welles	Austin Film Critics Association Award for Breakthrough Artist
San Francisco Film Critics Circle Award for Best Supporting Actor
Utah Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting Actor
Nominated — BAFTA Award for Best Supporting Actor
Nominated — British Independent Film Award for Most Promising Newcomer
Nominated — Broadcast Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting Actor
Nominated — Chicago Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting Actor
Nominated — Chicago Film Critics Association Award for Most Promising Performer
Nominated — Dallas–Fort Worth Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting Actor
Nominated — Denver Film Critics Society Award for Best Supporting Actor
Nominated — Detroit Film Critics Society Award for Best Supporting Actor
Nominated — Evening Standard British Film Award for Best Actor
Nominated — Houston Film Critics Society Award for Best Supporting Actor
Nominated — Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Male
Nominated — International Cinephile Society Award for Best Supporting Actor
Nominated — London Film Critics Circle Award for British Actor of the Year
Nominated — National Society of Film Critics Award for Best Supporting Actor (3rd place)
Nominated — New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Supporting Actor (2nd place)
Nominated — San Diego Film Critics Society Award for Best Actor
Nominated — Toronto Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting Actor
Nominated — Washington D.C. Area Film Critics Association Award for Best Breakthrough Performance
2010	You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger	Poker Friend
Mr. Nice	Hamilton McMillan
2011	I Melt With You	Tim
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy	Mackelvore
2013	Rush	Alexander Hesketh
The Devil's Violinist	John Watson
2014	Closer to the Moon	Iorgu
Northern Soul	Dad
The Theory of Everything	Roger Penrose
2015	Creditors	Grant Pierce	Nominated — Blow-Up International Arthouse Film Festival for Best Actor
2016	The Young Messiah	Cleopas
ChickLit	David Rose
Florence Foster Jenkins	Earl Wilson
2017	The Leisure Seeker	Will Spencer
Crooked House	Roger Leonides
Provenance	John
2018	The Talent Agent	Jeff Rogers	Short film
2019	The Second Hearing		Short film
2022	Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris	Giles Newcombe

Television

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2004	Doctors	Neville Gordon	Episode: "Pardon"
2005	Riot at the Rite	Pierre Monteux	TV film
2008	Agatha Christie's Poirot	Jefferson Cope	Episode: "Appointment with Death"
2009	A Short Stay in Switzerland	Carsten	TV film
Margaret	John Whittingdale
2010	The Road to Coronation Street	Harry Elton
2011–2013	Borgia	Cardinal Sforza
2012	Getting On	Dr. Nigel Hoskins	Episode #3.3
2015	Jekyll and Hyde	Maxwell Utterson
2016	Churchill's Secret	Christopher Soames	TV film
Frontier	Father James Coffin
2019	Grantchester	Anthony Hobbs	4 episodes
2019–2020	Warrior	Mayor Samuel Blake
2023	FDR	President Franklin D. Roosevelt
2024	Strike	Inigo Upcott	Episode 2
2024	Churchill at War	Winston Churchill

References

"FamilySearch.org".
"Archived copy".
John Millar. (2009-12-06). "Christian McKay's Obsession with Orson Welles". Daily Express.
Sam Allis. (2009-12-06). "Getting Orson Welles just right". The Boston Globe.
(2009-12-09). "Linklater's film depicts young Orson Welles". CBC News.
Kenneth Archer and Millicent Hodson. (February 2006). "Reading the Riot Act". ballet.co magazine.
Cath Clarke. (2009-10-15). "First sight: Christian McKay". The Guardian.
Philip French. (2009-12-06). "Me and Orson Welles". The Observer.
Anthony Quinn. (2009-12-04). "Me and Orson Welles (12A)". The Independent.
(2009-12-03). "Me and Orson Welles, review". The Telegraph.
A.O. Scott. (2009-11-25). "When a Bombastic Young Man Bestrode the Boards of the Mercury Theater". The New York Times.
Lyn Gardner. (2004-08-17). "Rosebud (Assembly Rooms, Edinburgh)". The Guardian.
Maddy Costa. (2006-01-09). "Rosebud (King's Head, London)". The Guardian.
Gina Bellafante. (2007-06-06). "Finding Room for an Actor Fit for the Stage". The New York Times.
"Strangers on a Train". [[Delfont Mackintosh]].
(20 September 2013). "Fatal Attraction and Strangers on a Train head to West End stage". [[BBC News]].
(2010-01-20). "International Cinephile Society Likes "Basterds," "Serious Man"". indieWire.
(November 2015). "Blow-Up film festival annual nominations and awards listing".

Wikipedia Source

This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page.

1973-births living-people english-male-stage-actors english-male-film-actors english-male-television-actors male-actors-from-bury,-greater-manchester alumni-of-the-royal-academy-of-dramatic-art

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