Known for Acting
Paul Rhys (born 19 December 1963) is a Welsh actor with an extensive career in theatre, radio, television and film. Rhys was born in Neath to working-class Catholic parents, Kathryn Ivory and Richard Charles Rhys, a labourer. He is of part-Irish descent on his mother's side. From the age of ten, he bred and trained horses, becoming a highly accomplished rider. A committed punk during his youth, Rhys sang in several bands. His first acting job was playing Liverpudlian judo expert Ralph in John Godber's hit play Bouncers, before leaving for London, where he qualified for his Equity card by singing jazz standards at lunchtime for Peter Boizot's Pizza Express and Kettners. Rhys received a Bernard Shaw Scholarship to study at RADA. In the first term he was spotted by Philip Prowse and was invited to perform in Oscar Wilde's A Woman of No Importance at the Glasgow Citizens Theatre, playing the illegitimate son, Gerald. He also appeared as Dean Swift in Julien Temple's film Absolute Beginners. Rhys completed his education at RADA by winning the William Pole prize and the Bancroft Gold Medal. His next film role was in Franklin J. Schaffner's Lionheart. After a brief spell at the Royal Shakespeare Company he played opposite Colin Firth in Richard Eyre's award-winning film Tumbledown. Soon after this, he appeared in Vincent & Theo, directed by American film director Robert Altman, as Vincent van Gogh's younger brother Theo van Gogh. Continuing the theme of famous brothers, Paul then played Sydney Chaplin opposite Robert Downey Jr.'s Charlie Chaplin in Richard Attenborough's Chaplin. He went on to play Massis in Alan Bennett's 102 Boulevard Haussmann. He then appeared opposite Peter O'Toole in Rebecca's Daughters. A series of films then followed including From Hell, Food of Love, Love Lies Bleeding, Becoming Colette and Hellraiser: Deader. He appears as Talleyrand in Ridley Scott's 2023 epic Napoleon, and as Duncan in Emerald Fennell's Saltburn. Running parallel to Rhys's film work has been a diverse and notable television career, working in leading roles with directors such as Mike Hodges, Stephen Frears, Sir Richard Eyre, Philip Martin, Christopher Morahan, Tom Vaughan, Edward Hall, Harry Bradbeer in productions including Tumbledown, A Dance to the Music of Time, The Heroes, Ghosts, Gallowglass, The Healer, Anna Karenina, The Deal, Beethoven, The Ten Commandments, Borgia, Luther and Spooks. In 2008 Rhys appeared in the series Agatha Christie's Poirot. In 2014, he played the lead as traitor Aldrich Ames, in The Assets miniseries, then as King George III in Turn: Washington's Spies and as Sir John Conroy in Victoria. He has made a minor industry out of playing vampires: Being Human (as Ivan); as Vlad, the Prince of Wallachia aka Dracula in seasons 1–3 of the 2015 series Da Vinci's Demons; and as Andrew Hubbard in two seasons of the 2020–2021 hit, A Discovery of Witches. In 2023, he appears as Tommy in the BBC film, Men Up.
Born
December 19, 1963 (age 62)
Birthplace
Neath, Glamorgan, Wales, UK
Filmography
33 films, 39 shows


Madfabulous
2026 · 1h 48m
country: United Kingdom
When the flamboyant Henry Paget arrives in 1890s North Wales to claim his aristocratic inheritance, his theatrical flair and defiant eccentricities send shockwaves through the upper-class elite, much to the amusement of the local townspeople. Alongside his spirited cousin, Lily, and loyal butler, Gelert, Henry tries to carve out his own identity as the Fifth Marquess, navigating suffocating traditions, scheming relatives, and the long shadow cast by his estranged father.


“Wuthering Heights”
2026 · 2h 16m
country: United States
Tragedy strikes when Heathcliff falls in love with Catherine Earnshaw, a woman from a wealthy family in 18th-century England.


Men Up
2024 · 1h 27m
country: United Kingdom
In Morriston Hospital in Swansea in 1994 a group of ordinary middle-aged Welsh men stepped into the unknown by taking part in the world's first medical trials for the drug that became Viagra.


Widow Clicquot
2024 · 1h 31m
country: United States
After her husband's death, Madame Clicquot flouts convention by assuming the reins of their wine business, defying her critics and ultimately revolutionizing the champagne industry, establishing her as one of the world's first great businesswomen.


Napoleon
2023 · 2h 38m
country: United States
An epic that details the checkered rise and fall of French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte and his relentless journey to power through the prism of his addictive, volatile relationship with his wife, Josephine.


Saltburn
2023 · 2h 11m
country: United Kingdom
Struggling to find his place at Oxford University, student Oliver Quick finds himself drawn into the world of the charming and aristocratic Felix Catton, who invites him to Saltburn, his eccentric family's sprawling estate, for a summer never to be forgotten.


Casanova
2015 · 55m
country: United States
Exiled from his beloved Venice, Giacomo Casanova flees to Paris at the dawn of the Enlightenment in hopes of putting his reputation as a playboy behind him. But old habits die hard, and temptation is everywhere as Casanova finds a wealth of new opportunity and trouble.


Eliminate: Archie Cookson
2011 · 1h 27m
country: Unknown
A burnt-out British spy becomes the recipient of tapes implicating senior MI-6 officers in some light treason. Before he even knows what he has, most of his office has already been killed.


When Harvey Met Bob
2010 · 1h 30m
country: United Kingdom
Bob Geldof and Harvey Goldsmith set up one of the world's greatest ever concerts, Live Aid in 1984 to help ease the Ethiopian Famine.
Unknown Things
Unknown Things
2007 · 1h 30m
country: United Kingdom
An antiques dealer in London is obsessed with the wife of one of his clients and seeks out ever-more unusual collectible mechanical objects to be near her for longer.


Hellraiser: Deader
2005 · 1h 29m
country: Romania
When a tough-as-nails reporter is lead to a mysterious cult and the evil Pinhead, any moment could be her last.


Murder in Rome
2005 · 45m
country: United Kingdom
Cicero, the future Consul of Rome, is just starting out as a trial lawyer in crime-ridden Rome where assassinations for political advantage and for estate grabbing had become de rigueur. The matriarch of a prominent family hires him to defend a relative on a charge of patricide. He faces one of the shrewdest criminal trial prosecutors in the Republic who is backed by powerful political forces with motives to see that his client is convicted and executed in one of the most horrible manners possible.


The Deal
2003 · 1h 15m
country: United Kingdom
It is approaching an election in the UK when the leader of the Labour party, John Smith, suffers another in a line of heart attacks and dies. With the leadership campaign about to start the clear choice appears to be Gordon Brown, a stanch Scotsman. However Tony Blair is also beginning to appear more likely as he will appeal to Southern voters who would be turned off by Brown. Blair rings Brown to arrange a meeting to discuss which will go for the job. The film flashbacks to the start of their relationship, sharing an office in Westminster on their first seats.


Otherworld
2003 · 1h 48m
country: Russia
Whilst celebrating Lleu's 18th birthday, Lleu and two friends go for a boat ride, when they discover beneath the water the golden doorway to the Mabinogi (the Otherworld). They swim down and are transported back in time many centuries to the Mabinogi. There they encounter some problems with mediaeval life, and they have to deal with the conflict between fate personal choice and magic


Food of Love
2002 · 1h 45m
country: Germany
Young aspiring pianist attracts attention of famous musicians. Chance encounters bring them together but expectations must be managed by all.


From Hell
2001 · 2h 2m
country: United States
Frederick Abberline is an opium-huffing inspector from Scotland Yard who falls for one of Jack the Ripper's prostitute targets in this Hughes brothers adaption of a graphic novel that posits the Ripper's true identity.
The Innocent
The Innocent
2001 · 3h
country: Unknown
A happily married housewife is devastated when her husband is accused of rape by her best friend - but who is telling the truth?


Love Lies Bleeding
1999 · 1h 30m
country: Australia
Jack the Ripper terrorizes London in 1888. The young talented journalist Catherine Winwood begins her first job. The relationship between Catherine and the surgeon Jonathan Stevens threatens to shatter, as her fiancé may be involved in the gruesome murderer of young prostitutes in the Whitechapel district. But Inspector Frederick Abberline arrests another suspected surgeon ..


The Strange Case of Delfina Potocka
1999 · 1h 49m
country: Unknown
In 1945, the new Polish government asked for the heart of Chopin previously buried in Paris. A woman called Paulina Czernika approached the government claiming to have some love letters from the composer to her great-grandmother, the Countess Delfina Potocka.


King Lear
1998 · 2h 30m
country: United Kingdom
An aging King invites disaster, when he abdicates to his corrupt, toadying daughters, and rejects his loving and honest one.


The Haunting of Helen Walker
1995 · 1h 28m
country: United States
A live-in nanny discovers two children haunted by the spirits and deeds of their former care givers.


Nina Takes a Lover
1995 · 1h 40m
country: United States
When Nina's husband goes out of town for several weeks on a business trip, Nina hooks up with a photographer. Told from a reporter's point of view, his interviews with Nina and the photographer provide comic insights.


The Healer
1994 · 2h 10m
country: United Kingdom
Alberto, a Colombian migrant, has the gift of healing but can't heal his own dark past. Working in London to send money home, he is tortured by dark visions, that will determine his own destiny - Your future is in his hands.


Chaplin
1992 · 2h 25m
country: France
An aged Charlie Chaplin narrates his life to his autobiography's editor, including his rise to wealth and comedic fame from poverty, his turbulent personal life and his run-ins with the FBI.


Rebecca's Daughters
1992 · 1h 35m
country: United Kingdom
Young aristocrat Anthony Raine returns home from India to find the farmers of Pembrokeshire protesting about the rates of a tollgate run by The Whitman Turnpike Trust, headed by the drunken Lord Sarn. So Raine dons a mask and, calling himself Rebecca, instructs his followers to dress as women as they attack the tolls, leading the common people to victory over their masters.


Becoming Colette
1991 · 1h 37m
country: France
French writer recalls her start as the country wife of a Paris publisher who called her erotic work his own.


Vincent & Theo
1990 · 2h 20m
country: France
The tragic story of Vincent van Gogh broadened by focusing as well on his brother Theodore, who helped support Vincent. Based on the letters written between the two.


102 Boulevard Haussmann
1990 · 1h 14m
country: United Kingdom
In 1916 author Marcel Proust is leading a reclusive life in Paris. He hires a quartet of musicians and befriends one of them, a wounded serviceman.


Tumbledown
1988 · 1h 55m
country: United Kingdom
The film centers on the experiences of Robert Lawrence MC, an officer of the Scots Guards during the Falklands War of 1982. While fighting at the Battle of Mount Tumbledown, Lawrence is shot in the head by an Argentine sniper and left paralyzed on his left side. He then must learn to adjust to his new disability.


The Heroes
1988 · 3h 28m
country: Australia
Based on a true story, The Heroes follows one of the most extraordinary and heroic exploits of World War II. After months of rigorous training in the north of Australia, a team of 14 men, most barely out of their teens, set sail from Cairns on board a leaky old fishing boat called 'The Krait'. Their mission, code-named Operation Jaywick, became a tense voyage through thousands of kilometres of Japanese held territory to launch a daring attack on Singapore Harbour. The raid is a success but within sight of safety they encounter a Japanese destroyer, and all prepare to die rather than be taken prisoner.


Lionheart
1987 · 1h 44m
country: United States
A young knight sets out to join King Richards crusaders. Along the way, he encounters The Black Prince who captures children and sells them as slaves to the Muslims. It is Robert Narra's sworn duty to protect the children and lead them to safety.


The Spirit
1987 · 1h 9m
country: United States
A legally dead police detective decides to battle crime as a masked superhero.


Absolute Beginners
1986 · 1h 48m
country: United Kingdom
A musical adaptation of Colin MacInnes' novel about life in late 1950s London. Nineteen-year-old photographer Colin is hopelessly in love with model Crepe Suzette, but her relationships are strictly connected with her progress in the fashion world. So Colin gets involved with a pop promoter and tries to crack the big time. Meanwhile, racial tension is brewing in Colin's Notting Hill housing estate...