Stephen Rea Biography
Born: October 31, 1946
Date of Birth: October 31, 1946
The fact that Rea was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland, made him the perfect choice to play the role of a tormented Irish Republican Army gunman in Neil Jordan's first movie, The Crying Game. That film was a huge hit and turned the Rea—an actor previously known mostly for his theater work—into a star. He received an Academy Award nomination and a BAFTA Award nominations for his part in the film, and won a National Society of Film Critics Best Actor Award. In 2002 he received a Daytime Emmy nomination as Outstanding Performer in a Children's Special for Snow in August (2001) and was nominated in 2004 for an IFTA Award as Best Actor in The Halo Effect. He re-teamed with his The Crying Game director, Neil Jordan, for Breakfast on Pluto (2005).
One of a quartet of children born into a working-class Protestant family, Rae is divorced from former IRA member Dolours Price, with whom he has two sons and a daughter. He also has an interesting take on the American movie capital: "It's weird, Hollywood, isn't it?," he says. "All these people walking around in shorts with no brains."
In 2010, he won an Irish Film and Television Awards for his work in the television series Father & Son.
Rea lives in Dublin.