Known for his quick wit, expletive-filled language, and devil-may-care attitude, Farrell has risen fast and as of 2003, is one of the most sought after actors in Hollywood.

Born May 31st 1976 in Castleknock, Dublin, Ireland. His Father, Eamonn Farrell, was a former football player. Colin is the youngest of the four children, he has one brother and two sisters.

Colin Farrell first gained critical attention when he starred in Joel Schumacher's Tigerland, receiving a Best Actor Award from the Boston Society of Film Critics for his portrayal of "Bozz", a roughneck Texan recruit training for a tour of duty in Vietnam.

After Tigerland, Farrell took on the role of Jesse James in American Outlaws.

Farrell then shot a starring role in the thriller Phone Booth, and then co-starred with Bruce Willis in the P.O.W. drama Hart's War.

He then went on to Stephen Spielberg's Minority Report alongside Tom Cruise, the CIA thriller The Recruit opposite Al Pacino, and then portrayed Bullseye, the villain in Daredevil with Ben Affleck, Jennifer Garner, and Michael Clarke Duncan.

After Daredevil, he then went on to work in Intermission.

On the romance front, long before he was linked to numerous high-profile names in the music and cinema industries, Colin shocked close friends by secretly walking down the aisle in July 2001 with 19-year-old English actress Amelia Warner. The pair tied the knot in a romantic Pacific island resort, but four months later their relationship was over.

Then in September 2003 Colin became a father following a romantic dalliance in the US with model Kim Bordenave, who gave birth to a baby boy on Friday September 12th, 2003.

Farrell the Great?

In late 1996, a then 20-year-old Irish actor named Colin Farrell felt he was finally doing pretty well for himself. He had just made his acting debut in Sydney, playing a supporting role in a stage play about Ned Kelly for the then minimum Actor's Equity rate of about $300 a week. He was also making the same in his day job as a trainee drink waiter in a Bondi restaurant.

After 18 months of bumming around Bondi, sometimes sleeping on the beach with a thousand British backpackers, he had enough money for the air fare home to Ireland, where he intended to get serious about his acting career. With a bit of luck, he thought, he might even land a spot in the BBC's ongoing Irish-themed TV series Ballykissangel. Farrell eventually returned to Ireland and did get work in Ballykissangel. But, thanks mainly to his thick, black, Sean Connery-style eyebrows, he was soon on his way to becoming an international movie star.

Farrell's recent success can be traced directly to the intervention of America's Oscar-winning star Kevin Spacey, who happened to catch his performance in a London stage play in mid-2000. By that time Farrell had already made his screen debut with minor supporting roles in two low-budget British movies, but had not attracted much attention.

But the moment Spacey saw Farrell make his entrance on stage, he reportedly remarked, "My God, look at those James Bond eyebrows! He's got eyebrows just like Sean Connery - the camera's going to love this kid." At the time, Spacey was about to start shooting Ordinary Decent Criminal. He used his influence to have Farrell play the major supporting role.

From then on, Hollywood studio reps have been pounding on the young actor's door and he has made three or four movies a year, including starring roles in Tigerland (2000), American Outlaws (2001), S.W.A.T. (2003) and Intermission (2003).

Stone had no hesitation in casting him in the title role in Alexander, which has been mostly filmed in Morocco.

Surprisingly, considering Alexander's exalted place in history, there have been few previous attempts to portray him on the screen. The last was in 1956 when the then 31-year-old Richard Burton took on the role. Burton's Alexander brought mixed reviews and didn't even score him an Academy Award nomination, although he was nominated six times in his distinguished career. It was believed that Charlton Heston had been the first choice to play the role but turned it down, later saying, "Alexander is the easiest kind of picture to make badly". It's difficult to know just what Heston meant because there was certainly no shortage of action and drama in Alexander's short, but extraordinary, life.

Filmography:

Home at the End of the World, A (2003)
Intermission (2003)
S.W.A.T. (2003)
Daredevil (2003)
Recruit, The (2003)
Phone Booth (2002)
Minority Report (2002)
Hart's War (2002)
American Outlaws (2001)
Tigerland (2000)
Ordinary Decent Criminal (2000)
War Zone, The (1999)
Drinking Crude (1997)

In what is probably going to be his greatest success to date, Colin Farrell will star as Alexander the Great in Oliver Stone's film Alexander with Anthony Hopkins, Angelina Jolie, Jared Leto, and Rosario Dawson. Filming starts in September 2003.

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