High Wycombe-born actor Aaron Taylor Johnson has been making headlines as – potentially – the next 007, but how did he go from Bucks to Hollywood?
Taylor-Johnson, 33, has long been a favourite to pick up the James Bond mantle from Daniel Craig but this week the speculation has reached fever pitch, with The Sun reporting on Monday that a contract signing was imminent.
Alas, sources close to the actor have downplayed the claims – but without an official statement either way, it is all technically still to play for.
Assuming Taylor-Johnson could still be the next to take on Ian Fleming’s famous character, we’ve had a look back at his journey from the High Wycombe stage to Hollywood.
Aaron Johnson began his acting career at just six-years-old in a local production of Macbeth and went on to attend the Jackie Palmer Stage School in Wycombe – an institution that also counts James Corden and Eddie Redmayne among its alumni.
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He paid tribute to the school’s namesake and founder after she died in 2016, saying he “wouldn’t be where he is today” without her.
It didn’t take long for the 33-year-old to transition from the stage to the screen, with a packed filmography consisting mostly of guest spots in the early years.
His star truly began to ascend in the late 2000s, when he appeared first as love interest Robbie in Angus, Thongs and Perfect Snogging (2008), then in the John Lennon biopic Nowhere Boy (2009), directed by his now-wife Sam Taylor-Johnson, who he married in 2012 and is 24 years his senior.
Since then, Taylor-Johnson’s career has gone from strength to strength, stepping between genres with ease and starring in Kick-Ass (2010), Anna Karenina (2012) and Nocturnal Animals (2016), just to name a few.
Most recently, he’s been on the promotional trail for his new film The Fall Guy alongside Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt and his upcoming projects include Marvel’s Kraven the Hunter and Robert Egger’s Nosferatu.
In a recent interview with Rolling Stone UK, Taylor-Johnson appeared to bat away Bond rumours, telling the magazine: “I can only really talk about the things I’m going to show and tell. I’m here to promote those.
He added: “I don’t feel like I need to have a future drawn out for me. I feel like whatever’s drawn out for me, I can f****ing do better.”
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