Daniel Day-Lewis

His older sister, Tamasin Day-Lewis (born 1953), is a television chef and food critic.

Sir Daniel Michael Blake Day-Lewis (born 29 April 1957) is an English retired actor.

Often described as one of the greatest actors in the history of cinema, he received numerous accolades throughout his career, which spanned over four decades, including three Academy Awards, four BAFTA Awards, three Screen Actors Guild Awards and two Golden Globe Awards.

Daniel Michael Blake Day-Lewis was born on 29 April 1957 in Kensington, London, the second child of poet Cecil Day-Lewis (1904–1972) and his second wife, actress Jill Balcon (1925–2009).

His father, who was born in the Irish town of Ballintubbert, County Laois, was of Protestant Anglo-Irish descent, lived in England from age two, and was appointed Poet Laureate in 1968.

In 1968, Day-Lewis's parents, finding his behaviour to be too wild, sent him as a boarder to the independent Sevenoaks School in Kent.

At the school, he was introduced to his three most prominent interests: woodworking, acting, and fishing.

However, his disdain for the school grew, and after two years at Sevenoaks, he was transferred to another independent school, Bedales in Petersfield, Hampshire.

His sister was already a student there, and it had a more relaxed and creative ethos.

He made his film debut at age 14 in Sunday Bloody Sunday, in which he played a vandal in an uncredited role.

He described the experience as "heaven" for getting paid £2 to vandalise expensive cars parked outside his local church.

For a few weeks in 1972, the Day-Lewis family lived at Lemmons, the north London home of Kingsley Amis and Elizabeth Jane Howard.

Day-Lewis's father had pancreatic cancer, and Howard invited the family to Lemmons as a place they could use to rest and recuperate.

His father died there in May that year.

By the time he left Bedales in 1975, Day-Lewis's unruly attitude had diminished and he needed to make a career choice.

Although he had excelled on stage at the National Youth Theatre in London, he applied for a five-year apprenticeship as a cabinet-maker.

He was turned down due to a lack of experience.

He was accepted at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, which he attended for three years along with Miranda Richardson, eventually performing at the Bristol Old Vic itself.

Day-Lewis shifted between theatre and film for most of the early 1980s, joining the Royal Shakespeare Company and playing Romeo Montague in Romeo and Juliet and Flute in A Midsummer Night's Dream.

After supporting film roles in Gandhi (1982) and The Bounty (1984), he earned acclaim for his breakthrough performances in My Beautiful Laundrette (1985), A Room with a View (1985), and The Unbearable Lightness of Being (1988).

Playing the title role in Hamlet at the National Theatre in London in 1989, he left the stage midway through a performance after breaking down during a scene where the ghost of Hamlet's father appears before him—this was his last appearance on the stage.

He earned Academy Awards for his roles in My Left Foot (1989), There Will Be Blood (2007), and Lincoln (2012).

Other notable films include The Last of the Mohicans (1992), The Age of Innocence (1993), The Crucible (1996), and The Boxer (1997).

His other Oscar-nominated roles were in In the Name of the Father (1993), Gangs of New York (2002), and Phantom Thread (2017).

At one point he played understudy to Pete Postlethwaite, with whom he would later co-star in the film In the Name of the Father (1994).

He retired from acting from 1997 to 2000, taking up a new profession as an apprentice shoe-maker in Italy.

In 2014, Day-Lewis received a knighthood for services to drama.

Born and raised in London, Day-Lewis excelled on stage at the National Youth Theatre before being accepted at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, which he attended for three years.

Despite his traditional training at the Bristol Old Vic, he is considered a method actor, known for his constant devotion to and research of his roles.

Protective of his private life, he rarely grants interviews and makes very few public appearances.

Although he returned to acting, he announced his retirement again in 2017.

Day-Lewis's mother was Jewish; her Jewish ancestors were immigrants to England in the late 19th century, from Latvia and Poland.

Day-Lewis's maternal grandfather, Sir Michael Balcon, became the head of Ealing Studios, helping develop the new British film industry.

The BAFTA for Outstanding Contribution to British Cinema is presented every year in honour of Balcon's memory.

Two years after Day-Lewis's birth, he moved with his family to Croom's Hill in Greenwich via Port Clarence, County Durham.

He and his older sister did not see much of their older two half-brothers, who had been teenagers when Day-Lewis's father divorced their mother.

Living in Greenwich (he attended Invicta and Sherington Primary Schools), Day-Lewis had to deal with tough South London children.

At this school, he was bullied for being both Jewish and "posh".

He mastered the local accent and mannerisms, and credits that as being his first convincing performance.

Later in life, he has been known to speak of himself as a disorderly character in his younger years, often in trouble for shoplifting and other petty crimes.