George MacKay (actor)

George Andrew J. MacKay (/məˈkaɪ/; born 13 March 1992) is an English actor. He began his career as a child actor in Peter Pan (2003). He had starring roles in the British war drama Private Peaceful (2012), the romantic film How I Live Now (2013), For Those in Peril (2013), for which he won a BAFTA Scotland Award, and Marrowbone (2017). He gained wider recognition for his leading role in the war film 1917 (2019) and won a British Independent Film Award for his performance in Femme (2023) .
MacKay was born in Hammersmith, London to Kim Baker, a British costume designer from London, and Paul MacKay, an Australian working in lighting and stage management. He grew up in Barnes with his younger sister. He is of Irish descent on his mother's side, his maternal grandmother being from Cork.
MacKay attended The Harrodian School, a private school in London. When he was 17, he unsuccessfully auditioned for entrance to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art.
In 2002, MacKay was spotted at school by an acting scout who asked him to audition for a role in P. J. Hogan's 2003 film adaptation of Peter Pan. He attended a workshop and won the role of one of the Lost Boys, Curly, in what was his first professional acting job.
In 2005, at the age of 13, he won the role of Riccio in The Thief Lord, the film adaptation of Cornelia Funke's best-selling children's novel. He was also cast in the lead role in Johnny and the Bomb, a BBC three-part television drama adapted from Terry Pratchett's novel of the same name. MacKay also had some work in television, including roles in Rose and Maloney, Footprints in the Snow and The Brief. In the 2008 film Defiance, MacKay played Aron, the youngest of the four Bielski brothers. In 2009 he portrayed Harry in The Boys Are Back starring Clive Owen. MacKay co-starred in the Marc Evans-directed musical film Hunky Dory opposite Minnie Driver, Aneurin Barnard and Kimberley Nixon, which is set in 1970s Swansea.
In 2012, he played the main character, Private Tommo Peaceful, in Private Peaceful, and appeared as a paralyzed soldier in the inspirational film The Best of Men. In 2013, MacKay portrayed Eddie in How I Live Now opposite Saoirse Ronan and directed by Kevin Macdonald, and starred as Davy in the musical film Sunshine on Leith, featuring songs by The Proclaimers, directed by Dexter Fletcher. In 2014, MacKay played the role of Joe, a 20-year-old struggling to come out in a homophobic Britain in 1984 in the film Pride (based on a true story) also starring Bill Nighy.
In 2015, Mackay took the lead role as Richard Miller in Eugene O'Neill's coming-of-age play, Ah, Wilderness! directed by Natalie Abrahami at Young Vic. In July 2015, MacKay filled the title role of Lewis Aldridge in the BBC's two-part television adaptation of Sadie Jones’ debut novel The Outcast. In February 2016, he portrayed the part of Bill Turcotte in the Hulu production of Stephen King's sci-fi/thriller 11.22.63.
From 29 March to 14 May 2016, MacKay performed the part of Mick in Harold Pinter's play The Caretaker directed by Matthew Warchus at The Old Vic Theatre in London opposite Timothy Spall and Daniel Mays. In the 2016 film Captain Fantastic, MacKay portrayed Bodevan, eldest son of Ben Cash (Viggo Mortensen). In 2017, he played Jack, the main character in Marrowbone, a psychological horror film directed and written by Sergio G. Sánchez, and also starring Anya Taylor-Joy, Charlie Heaton and Mia Goth. MacKay portrayed Prince Hamlet in Ophelia, a 2018 film retelling the story of Shakespeare's play from the perspective of the young female character Ophelia. The film premiered at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival, and included Daisy Ridley, Naomi Watts, Clive Owen, and Tom Felton in the cast. In the 2018 film Where Hands Touch, MacKay portrayed Lutz, a member of the Hitler Youth in Nazi Germany who falls in love with a biracial girl, portrayed by Amandla Stenberg.
In a 2019 release, MacKay interpreted the role of outlaw Ned Kelly in True History of the Kelly Gang, directed by Justin Kurzel. Adapted from the novel of the same name by Peter Carey, the film premiered at the 2019 Toronto International Film Festival. That same year, MacKay played the lead role of lance corporal William Schofield, a young British World War I soldier in 1917, directed by Sam Mendes. 1917 was nominated for Best Picture in the 92nd Academy Awards, along with nominations in nine other categories, winning three technical awards. MacKay stars in Nathalie Biancheri's film Wolf alongside Lily-Rose Depp, for which principal photography began in Ireland in August 2020. The film premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in September 2021 as the entry for Ireland, and was theatrically released in December 2021. His acting in Wolf was called by IndieWire as "the best performance of his still-rising career".
In October 2021, MacKay was cast in the apocalyptic musical film The End along with Tilda Swinton and Stephen Graham, directed by Joshua Oppenheimer, and in 2022, he starred in Christian Schwochow's film Munich – The Edge of War for Netflix. In 2023, Mackay starred in LGBT revenge thriller Femme alongside Nathan Stewart-Jarrett, for which he won Best Joint Lead Performance in the British Independent Film Awards. Also in 2023 MacKay starred in the science fiction film The Beast.
MacKay cites actors Eddie Marsan and Viggo Mortensen as influences for his work. He credits Marsan as an influence in pursuing acting full-time. MacKay describes acting as being "done ultimately in a very safe environment" and "rooted in some kind of experience." MacKay has been called a method actor by several publications. Flaunt writer Elizabeth Aubrey stated that MacKay's roles are "chosen by a desire to push the boundaries of storytelling, to ask challenging questions about identity, and leave audiences with more questions than answers via stories that start important cultural conversations." The Last Magazine writer Jonathan Shia called MacKay's body of work "notable for both its length and its breadth." The Independent writer Alexandra Pollard wrote that MacKay's roles are tactically "chosen to broaden his perspective on the world" and that he is "clearly intensely thoughtful, in both conversation and in his career."
In January 2023, MacKay was one of almost 100 film and TV industry figures in the UK to sign a letter calling on the government to take "immediate action" against Iran's executions.
In November of that year, MacKay married his long-term girlfriend Doone Forsyth, a makeup artist and hair stylist whom he met on the set of 1917, and the couple have two children.
He is a supporter of Chelsea F.C..