Stephen Marcus(I)

Stephen became an actor in 1984 after three years of training at Arts Educational Schools in London. He left college and immediately his film career began with his first film role as Moose in the cult film "My Beautiful Laundrette".

After a few years working in theater, commercials, and supporting roles on TV, he joined the cast of fledgling comedy "Birds of a Feather" as Dave, the lover of Sharon (Pauline Quirke).

One lazy, sunny afternoon in in the garden of actress, novelist, and fashion icon Sarah Stockbridge, Stephen met up with Peter Richardson, who asked him if he was available to do a day's work on "The Glam Metal Detectives" for the Comic Strip". One day became three months and he played literally hundreds of characters, and in 2012, he was asked back by Peter to be in the 30-year anniversary Comic Strip show "5 go to Rehab".

TV commercials introduced him to director Peter Chelsom, who cast him right away as Gordon in "Hear my Song" opposite Ned Beatty. Then there were a couple of years getting great roles on British TV in the likes of "The Hot Dog Wars", "Dangerfield", "Kavanagh QC", and "Our Friends in the North" opposite Malcolm McDowell and Daniel Craig.

His movie career was moving alongside this at quite a pace, with roles opposite Timothy Dalton in "The Beautician and the Beast", Robert Englund in "The Killer Tongue", and Richard Harris in "Savage Hearts".

In 1996, his agent set up a meeting on a small low-budget movie with an unknown director named Guy Ritchie; Guy offered him the role of Nick the Greek in his movie "Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels". Three years later, the film was released and became the biggest British movie in the last 25 years and launched the careers of Vinnie Jones, Guy Ritchie, Jason Statham, and Mathew Vaughn.

"Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels" led to Hollywood knocking on the door. Alan Parker had him do a small role in "Angela's Ashes", and Philip Kaufman asked him to play Bouchon in "Quills" alongside Kate Winslett, Michael Caine, Joaquin Phoenix and Geoffrey Rush. Richard Eyre called on him twice, for "Iris" opposite Judy Dench and in "Stage Beauty" with Claire Danes. This was followed by the role of Ted Ray in "The Greatest Game Ever Played", directed by Bill Paxton. Paxton had seen his work and, after speaking to his agent, called Stephen from his car phone (very Hollywood) and offered him the part. Stephen has had the pleasure of doing two films with the Wachowski Brothers and Jeff McTeague - "Speed Racer" and "Ninja Assassin".

Alongside a very successful movie career, he did several TV series for the USA, Canada, and the UK. In "Starhunter 2300", he played Rudolpho De Luna; he played the co-lead in the BBC series "Cavegirl". He played Banjo and Broadman in the adaptations of Terry Prachett's "Hogfather" and "The Colour of Magic" for Sky TV, plus the two 20th-anniversary episodes of "Casualty" and regular roles on "Kingdom" (with Stephen Fry) and "Lark Rise to Candleford".

2013 and 2014 saw Stephen on the West End stage in the musical "The Bodyguard" (based on the film with Whitney Huston and using her music) playing Tony Schibelli. It also saw the release of "It's a Lot", "The Smoke", "AB Negative" and "Fast and Furious 6".

Since then, he's done several films in different genres: horror - "The Rizen" 1&2, gangster - "The London Firm", "AB Negative" and "Welcome To Curiosity", and comedy - "Sanctuary" and "Fanged Up" (comedy/horror).His latest cinematic release is "Walk Like a Panther", a comedy about old wrestlers making a comeback.

Stephen is also an author and has written a book about the making of the British crime caper "Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels".

He lives in LA with the most beautiful woman in the world, his wife Sarah. They have two small dogs, Fry and Ronnie. Both have passed now but are very much still in my heart.