Short Biography

Crowe was born in Wellington, New Zealand, the son of Jocelyn Yvonne (née Wemyss) and John Alexander Crowe,[2] both of whom were movie set caterers; his father also managed a hotel.[3] Crowe`s maternal grandfather, Stan Wemyss, was a cinematographer who, according to Crowe, produced the first film by New Zealander Geoff Murphy,[4] and was also named an MBE for filming footage of World War II. Crowe`s maternal great-great-great grandmother was Mâori,[citation needed] and as a result Crowe is registered on the Mâori electoral roll in New Zealand; Crowe also has Norwegian, Irish and British ancestry.[2][5][6] Two of Russell Crowe`s cousins, Martin and Jeff Crowe are former New Zealand national cricket captains.


Russell Crowe as the man inside the costume of "Shirty the Slightly Aggressive Bear" in The Late Show. His character was inspired by Hando, a role Crowe played in 1992 film Romper Stomper.When Crowe was four years old, his family moved to Australia, where his parents pursued a career in film set catering. The producer of the Australian TV series Spyforce was his mother`s godfather, and Crowe at age five or six was hired for a line of dialogue in one episode, opposite series star Jack Thompson, who years later played Crowe`s father in The Sum of Us and who coincidentally had been educated at the same school which Crowe was to attend for two years: Sydney Boys High School.

From his youth to the present, Crowe has had a special love of horses. "They`re just like people," he told CraveOnline, "there are some horses that you have a deeper connection with immediately, and you can work on that over time.[7] He has also noted that he sometimes finds it difficult to part with his equine co-stars when a film wraps.

When he was 14, however, Crowe`s family moved back to New Zealand, where he attended Auckland Grammar School with his cousins Martin Crowe and Jeff Crowe. He did not complete secondary school, leaving early to help his family financially. In the mid-1980s Russell, under guidance from his good friend Tom Sharplin, performed as a rock `n` roll revivalist, under the stage name Russ Le Roq, and had a New Zealand single with "I Wanna Be Marlon Brando."

Crowe returned to Australia at age 21, intending to apply to the National Institute of Dramatic Art. "I was working in a theater show, and talked to a guy who was then the head of technical support at NIDA," Crowe recalled. "I asked him what he thought about me spending three years at NIDA. He told me it`d be a waste of time. He said, `You already do the things you go there to learn, and you`ve been doing it for most of your life, so there`s nothing to teach you but bad habits.`"[8] In 1987 Crowe spent a six-month stint as a busker when he couldn`t find other work.[9]

After appearing in the TV series Neighbours and Living with the Law, Crowe was cast in his first film, The Crossing (1990), a small-town love triangle directed by George Ogilvie. Before production started, a film-student protegé of Ogilvie`s, Steve Wallace, hired Crowe for the film Blood Oath (1990) (aka Prisoners of the Sun) which was released a month earlier, although actually filmed later. In 1992, Crowe starred in the first episode of the second series of Police Rescue. Also in 1992 Crowe starred in Romper Stomper, an Australian film which follows the exploits and downfall of a racist skinhead group in blue-collar suburban Melbourne, directed by Geoffrey Wright.


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Miscellaneous Information

Friends and Family

Rick Perry [Friend]

Jodie Foster [Friend]

Don Spencer (Father-in-Law)

Martin Crowe (Cousin)

Jeff Crowe (Cousin)

Keith Urban [Friend]

Nicole Kidman [Friend]

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