Joel Edgerton was born on June 23, 1974 in Blacktown, New South Wales, Australia, to Marianne and Michael Edgerton, who is a solicitor and property developer. His brother is filmmaker Nash Edgerton. He went to Hills Grammar School in the Western Suburbs of Sydney, and after leaving, he attended Nepean Drama School in 1994. Joel has done many projects on stage and off, but most people will recognize him from his work on the Australian television series Vidas secretas (2001), in which he played William McGill. This gave him his first big break through in the television industry. For this role, he was nominated in 2001 for an AFI Award. As well as "The Secret Life of Us", he has also appeared in other television projects such as The Three Stooges (2000), Dossa and Joe(2002), Secret Men's Business (1999), Nunca digas jamás (1998) and Saturn's Return(2001). Joel has done a lot of work on the theatrical stage having played King Henry in "Henry V", Prince Hal in "Henry III", and others including "Road", "Third World Blues" and "Dead White Males". As well as acting, he has also starred, co-written and produced the short movie Bloodlock (1998).
His first international break came from when he played Uncle Owen Lars in Star Wars: Episodio II - El ataque de los clones (2002). Since then, he has also starred in Ned Kelly (Comienza la leyenda) (2003), El rey Arturo (2004), Star Wars: Episodio III - La venganza de los Sith (2005) and Pisando fuerte (2005). - IMDb Mini Biography By: Sarah Bendall
Trade Mark
Razor-sharp cheekbones
Trivia
The Edgerton brothers have collaborated on several film projects.
Joel's brother, Nash Edgerton, was also in Star Wars: Episodio II - El ataque de los clones(2002). Nash was the stunt double for Ewan McGregor (Obi-Wan Kenobi).
Joel appears in the music video for Ben Lee's (Claire Danes's then-boyfriend) 2002 single "Something Borrowed, Something Blue". The music video was directed by Joel's brother Nash Edgerton.
Attended Hills Grammar School in Sydney's north-west.
When he graduated from high school he attended University of Western Sydney-Nepean Kingswood Campus and studied Drama there
Is the second Star Wars actor to have played Sir Gawain in a King Arthur movie. Liam Neeson played the role in Excalibur (1981).
Auditioned for the role of "Ty-Zor" in McG's now-aborted version of "Superman."
Starred in Ned Kelly (Comienza la leyenda) (2003) with Orlando Bloom. Bloom in turn starred with Keira Knightley in Piratas del Caribe. La maldición de la Perla Negra (2003). Kiera also starred in El rey Arturo (2004) with Edgerton.
Studied acting at Theatre Nepean in Sydney, Australia.
Founding member of 'Blue-Tongue Films'.
His short film Monkeys (2011) was selected for Australian short film event Final Cut in 2012, where it was awarded the Audience Favourite Prize alongside short films from award-winning filmmakers David Ludlow [Drifting (2010)] and Kelly Hucker [Kwik Fix(2010)].
He became close friends with Phil Brown, who played Uncle Owen in La guerra de las galaxias (1977).
Personal Quotes
[on Ases calientes (2006)] I'm not a huge advocate of violence for violence's sake, but what makes this film okay in that regard for me is that it's a heightened reality. It's kind of like Ocean's Eleven on acid - it's hyper-real, cartoon violence.
[on how important it is to him that he's involved in other facets of filmmaking besides acting] Well, it's great. I mean, it's great to have that opportunity. It's just been like, without meaning it to sound too arrogant, I have a lot of stuff in me that I know I can do and I've wanted to have the opportunity to do and now thanks to people like Gavin O'Connor and David Michod, I'm starting to kind of spread my wings a little bit more and get new opportunities. And I'm fucking ready for them and I'm dying to do more stuff, but at the same time I want to keep writing projects. I want to write characters that I want to play. I want to direct. I want to do a lot of stuff. I just don't want to do crap movies, man, because I just love that I can get up and talk about them and talk to journalists about stuff that I'm really proud of. I mean, fuck, man - there is so much money out there to be made out there in the industry, and unfortunately the most money gets given for the subpar quality projects, so I don't need money to survive. I don't need shit tons of money, I just want to be satisfied all the time, and I want to be proud. I don't want to sit here and talk to you and know that in your mind you're going, "I fucking hated this movie and this guy is a sellout and I hate him." So we've got high expectations of ourselves at Blue Tongue and I've just got a high expectation myself. And I know I've got a brother, Nash, who if I took a step too far out of line or did it a couple of times in a row in terms of choosing the wrong project, he would slap me down (laughs). And I'm like you - I just love good movies. And not every movie you're going to end up in is always going to turn out right, but at least walk into it with the right intention. I have an issue with the commercial aspect of moviemaking: I don't see why a movie can't make a lot of money and also be good. We see at least two or three of them every year. Like last year I think was a really good year for movies, and they made some money and they also satisfied people on a number of levels. But there is some shit movies out there now. - it fucking pisses me off - and I hate it when a shit movie comes out that's obviously made just to make money, and it does make that money and it lets everybody know that it's okay to make shit movies because you can get rich off of it. I hate those people (laughs). There has got to be a business, yes, obviously it's a film business. But at least try along the way.
The sum total of all my stop-starts have made me less concerned about the future. I'm just aware now that I'll always land on my feet somehow.
I have always stuck to my guns about what I want from the work and what interests me. I've never been seduced down the evil path. The path of taking the money.
My brother and I are best friends.
'The Great Gatsby' ticked so many boxes for me.
There's a real sense of fighting and destruction in our DNA that we don't get in touch with.
I'm on the list that I thought I'd never be on. I'm not sitting here thinking, 'God, I might get this part' or 'is it too late for me to play Hamlet?' It's really about: who do I get to work with? There's so many people on that list.
It's tricky. I've never been standing at the top of the tree with tons of money thrown at me. I've never really had a profile. So in a way I have this 'nothing to lose' attitude.
Sometimes, the smaller roles in movies can be the most interesting. If you only take the stance that you'll only play central characters in movies, you'll find yourself not being able to indulge in that morally grey terrain that makes support characters so rich and interesting.
The first video I ever watched was on a Beta system because everyone thought Beta was the way but then it ended up being video so we backed the wrong horse.
The tricky thing becomes: Do you know yourself well enough to then portray that on screen? And for me, I find that really hard. I'd rather hide behind accents and funny walks.
I'm single, footloose and fancy free, I have no responsibilities, no anchors. Work, friendship and self-improvement, that's me.
One of the things I've always enjoyed is moving around and staying fit. Physicality is such a big part of being an actor, but it's also about stillness and silence.
I'm not going to allow myself to second-guess projects. I'm just going to do the ones that I fully love and believe in - that's a real privilege.
Every job leaves its residue, a bit of extra knowledge, a new skill-set.
Whereas 'Avatar' and other movies get shocks out of their three-dimensionality, 'Gatsby' is going to be about inviting the audience into this larger-than-life drama, letting them almost be inside the room rather than looking at it through the window. I think it will really work.
I remember my brother Nash had just directed me in 'The Square,' and I was sitting in Australia going: 'No one's called me about working for ages. I don't know if I'm ever going to get another job.'
The biggest difference for me is momentum. On a smaller film you get to shoot sometimes four or five scenes a day and you've got to do the tight schedule. I think I really feel the luxuries of a big budget film.
To act with a tennis ball and imagine it's a tentacle, or if you're in some kind of wilderness film and you go, 'Okay, we can't have a grizzly bear here, but imagine when you step over the rock there there's a grizzly bear.' I don't know. They're tough moments.
That's one of the great privileges, being an actor, is that someone pays you and sends you off to learn about something that otherwise you'd never know about.
There's the pressure of being a No. 1 on the call sheet, being a lead actor. There's almost this feeling like being captain of the team. You want to put a bit of energy into actually setting a good example.
I'm a pacifist.
I can't sing or dance.
Whenever you deal with science fiction you are setting up a world of rules. I think you work hard to establish the rules. And you also have to work even harder to maintain those rules, and within that find excitement and unpredictability and all that stuff.
I'm hardly digging trenches for a living. I'm getting to tap into my boyhood fantasies of being a larger-than-life character.
It feels good to be fit and strong.
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