Gary Leonard Oldman (born 21 March 1958) is an English actor, filmmaker and musician. A former member of the Royal Shakespeare Company, he made his stage debut in 1979 and established himself as a theatre actor over the next decade, coming to prominence via his multiple roles in works by Edward Bond. Oldman gained fame as a film actor in the mid 1980s, and has since received significant acclaim from critics and peers. Colin Firth once remarked: "He is as far as I'm concerned a very strong candidate for the world's best living actor."
Oldman's early starring film roles included skinhead Coxy in Meantime (1983), Sid Vicious in Sid and Nancy (1986) and gay playwright Joe Orton in Prick Up Your Ears (1987). He continued to garner critical acclaim for his portrayals of a violent football hooligan in The Firm (1989), an Irish American gangster in State of Grace (1990), Presidential assassin Lee Harvey Oswald in JFK (1991) and the title character of Dracula (1992), becoming a popular casting choice in villain roles; he played the antagonist of films such as True Romance (1993), Léon (1994), The Fifth Element (1997) and The Contender (2000). Since the turn of the millennium Oldman has been
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