Sean Bean: Biography
Shaun
Mark Bean was born in Sheffield, Yorkshire, England on April 17, 1959.
His parents are Brian and Rita Bean; he has a younger sister, Lorraine.
He is 5'11" and has green eyes and dark blond hair. Sean left school at
16 with two "O" levels, in Art and English. He had a variety of jobs,
including selling cheese in a supermarket, shovelling snow, and working
as a welder at his father's steel fabrication shop before he discovered
acting while attending an art course at Rotherham College. Sean auditioned
for London's Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in April 1980. One of 30 successful
applicants (out of a field of 11,000) to win a scholarship, Sean began
studying at RADA in Spring 1981. He was awarded a silver medal for his
graduation performance in Waiting for Godot in Spring 1983. Sean is divorced
from his third wife, actress Abigail Cruttenden, who played Jane Sharpe
in the Sharpe television series. Sean and Abigail married on November
22, 1997 at the Hendon Registry Office in London, with a blessing the
following day, November 23, at St. Andrews Church, Totteridge. Their daughter,
Evie Natasha, was born on Friday, November 6, 1998, weighing 9 lbs, 3
oz. Sean also has two daughters, Lorna (born in October 1987) and Molly
(born in September 1991) from his second marriage, to actress Melanie
Hill. Sean and Melanie were married on 27 February 1990 at the Haringey
Civic Centre in North London. They divorced in August 1997. Sean's first
marriage was on 11 April 1981 to hairdresser Debra James, his childhood
sweetheart. Sean had earlier enrolled in the January 1981 (Spring) term
at RADA and travelled back to Sheffield to marry Debra during the break
between the Spring term and the Summer term.
Sean Bean: Career
Before
enrolling in the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, Sean Bean was going to
enter his father's Sheffield steel fabrication business as a welder. He
changed his mind after he garnered praise for acting in a few roles in
local theater while taking an art class at Rotherham College. Bean received
a scholarship to the prestigious academy and graduated a few years later
with the Silver Medal for his performance in Waiting for Godot. Shortly
thereafter, Bean performed in several West End productions. He also appeared
in Romeo and Juliet with the Glasgow Citizens Theatre and with the Royal
Shakespeare Company at Stratford-upon-Avon. In the first he played Tybalt
and in the second he played Romeo. Following more stage experience, Bean
made his feature film debut in 1986 in Derek Jarman's Carvaggio. Two years
later, after returning to the stage, Bean appeared in Mike Figgis' Stormy
Monday and in another Jarman effort, War Requiem. In addition to his filmwork,
Bean also has a thriving television career that began in the mid-'80s.
Notable television work includes Clarissa (1992) and Sharpe (1993). It
is as a "bad guy" in films such as Patriot Games and Golden Eye that Bean
is best-known in the U.S., though in the 1997 remake of Anna Karenina,
he plays the dashing and romantic Count Vronsky. After joining Robert
De Niro and Jean Reno for some international espionage in John Frankenheimer's
Ronin (1998), taking a psychotic turn in Essex Boys (2000) and kidnapping
the daughter of a respected adolescent therapist in Don't Say a Word (2001),
Bean made his way to New Zealand for a role in director Peter Jackson's
eagely anticipated Lord of the Rings trilogy
Sean Bean: Films
Silent Hill
(2006), Clarissa (2005), Sharpes - Revenge Collection Set (2005), Sharpes
- Rifles Collection Set (2005), Sharpes - Sword Collection Set (2005),
North Country (2005), The Dark (2005), Flightplan (2005), The Island (2005),
National Treasure (2004), Troy (2004), Lady Chatterley (2003), The Big
Empty (2003), Equilibrium (2002), The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship
of the Ring (2001), Don't Say A Word (2001), Essex Boys (2000), Airborne
(1999), Bravo Two Zero (1999), Ronin (1998), Anna Karenina (1997), Shopping
(1996), Goldeneye (1995), Black Beauty (1994), Lorna Doone (1993), Patriot
Games (1992), Fool's Gold (1991), The Field (1990), The Fifteen Streets
(1989), How to Get Ahead in Advertising (1989), Stormy Monday (1988),
Caravaggio (1986), When Saturday Comes
