Hugh Grant

British actor
print Print
Please select which sections you would like to print:
verifiedCite
While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions.
Select Citation Style
Feedback
Corrections? Updates? Omissions? Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login).
Thank you for your feedback

Our editors will review what you’ve submitted and determine whether to revise the article.

Also known as: Hugh John Mungo Grant
Quick Facts
In full:
Hugh John Mungo Grant
Born:
September 9, 1960, Hammersmith, London, England (age 64)
Also Known As:
Hugh John Mungo Grant
Married To:
Anna Eberstein (2018–present)
Movies/Tv Shows (Acted In):
"The Gentlemen" (2019)
"A Very English Scandal" (2018)
"Paddington 2" (2017)
"W1A" (2017)
"Florence Foster Jenkins" (2016)
"The Man from U.N.C.L.E." (2015)
"The Rewrite" (2014)
"Cloud Atlas" (2012)
"The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists!" (2012)
"I'm Still Here" (2010)
"Did You Hear About the Morgans?" (2009)
"Music and Lyrics" (2007)
"American Dreamz" (2006)
"Travaux, on sait quand ça commence..." (2005)
"Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason" (2004)
"Love Actually" (2003)
"Two Weeks Notice" (2002)
"About a Boy" (2002)
"Bridget Jones's Diary" (2001)
"Small Time Crooks" (2000)
"Mickey Blue Eyes" (1999)
"Notting Hill" (1999)
"Extreme Measures" (1996)
"Restoration" (1995)
"Sense and Sensibility" (1995)
"Nine Months" (1995)
"The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill But Came Down a Mountain" (1995)
"An Awfully Big Adventure" (1995)
"Sirens" (1994)
"Four Weddings and a Funeral" (1994)
"Performance" (1991–1993)
"The Remains of the Day" (1993)
"Night Train to Venice" (1993)
"Shakespeare: The Animated Tales" (1992)
"Bitter Moon" (1992)
"Impromptu" (1991)
"The Big Man" (1990)
"Till We Meet Again" (1989)
"La nuit Bengali" (1988)
"Remando al viento" (1988)
"The Lair of the White Worm" (1988)
"The Dawning" (1988)
"White Mischief" (1987)
"Maurice" (1987)
"Shades of Darkness" (1986)
"Ladies in Charge" (1986)
"A Very Peculiar Practice" (1986)
"The Last Place on Earth" (1985)
"Jenny's War" (1985)
"The Detective" (1985)
"Privileged" (1982)

Hugh Grant (born September 9, 1960, Hammersmith, London, England) is a British actor best known for his leading roles as the endearing and funny love interest in romantic comedies, including Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994), Notting Hill (1999), Bridget Jones’s Diary (2001), and Love Actually (2003). Later in his career, Grant also found success playing darker characters.

Education and early work

It was not until Grant’s senior year at the University of Oxford, where he was studying English literature, that he became involved in acting. He appeared in a student film, Privileged (1982), and joined the Oxford University Dramatic Society. Following graduation (1982), Grant wrote and occasionally performed in radio commercials and attempted to write a novel before turning once again to acting. His stage debut came at the Nottingham (England) Playhouse in 1985. Moving to London, he formed the Jockeys of Norfolk comedy troupe, for which he wrote, directed, and performed in revues.

Four Weddings and a Funeral and Notting Hill

Grant began his professional film career with the James Ivory–Ismail Merchant film Maurice (1987), for which he won a best actor award at the Venice Film Festival. It was his charming performance as a British bachelor in Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994), however, that brought him to the attention of the general public; he won a Golden Globe Award for best actor and was named best actor by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts.

USA 2006 - 78th Annual Academy Awards. Closeup of giant Oscar statue at the entrance of the Kodak Theatre in Los Angeles, California. Hompepage blog 2009, arts and entertainment, film movie hollywood
Britannica Quiz
Pop Culture Quiz

Grant quickly followed up with Nine Months and a film adaptation of Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility, both of which were released in 1995. He took on a more serious role in Extreme Measures (1996), portraying an emergency room doctor, but he returned to romantic comedy with Notting Hill (1999), in which he starred as a bookstore owner who falls in love with a movie star (played by Julia Roberts).

Bridget Jones’s Diary and Love Actually

Stepping out of his trademark role as the boyishly appealing leading man who ultimately gets the girl, Grant portrayed the womanizing boss and scheming sometime lover of the title character (Renée Zellweger) in Bridget Jones’s Diary (2001). His later films included About a Boy (2002), an adaptation of Nick Hornby’s novel; Love Actually (2003); and Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason (2004). In 2007 Grant starred opposite Drew Barrymore as an aging pop star in Music and Lyrics. He next appeared in Did You Hear About the Morgans? (2009), a comedy about a married couple who enter a witness-protection program.

In 2012 Grant provided the voice of a pirate captain in The Pirates! Band of Misfits, a stop-motion animation film, and he disappeared into multiple roles in the epic Cloud Atlas, which wove together six stories that spanned centuries. Grant later portrayed St. Clair Bayfield, the manager of the deluded title character, a talentless opera singer played by Meryl Streep, in Florence Foster Jenkins (2016).

Later roles

Grant subsequently began to play darker characters, from narcissists to murders, and these roles garnered him some of the best reviews of his career. In 2017 he was cast as the villain in the family movie Paddington 2, and in the TV miniseries A Very English Scandal (2018), he portrayed Jeremy Thorpe, a British politician accused of trying to kill his former gay lover. Grant then played an unscrupulous private investigator in Guy Ritchie’s comedy-action movie The Gentlemen (2019).

Get Unlimited Access
Try Britannica Premium for free and discover more.

In the miniseries The Undoing (2020), Grant was cast as a charming doctor whose secrets are exposed when he becomes a suspect in a murder. He then appeared with Timothée Chalamet in Wonka (2023), a family comedy inspired by Roald Dahl’s books about candy maker Willie Wonka. While the movie earned mixed reviews, Grant’s performance as a thieving Oompa-Lumpa was widely praised. He received even more acclaim for Heretic (2024), a horror film in which his character has sinister plans for two young missionaries.

Barbara Whitney The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica