Jason Statham extracted from Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia, distributed under the GNU Free Documentation License

Jason Statham
Jason Statham, 2007
Born	Jason Statham 12 September 1972 (1972-09-12) (age 37) London, England
Occupation	Actor
Years active	1998–present

Jason Statham (pronounced /ˈsteɪ θəm/;¹² born 12 September 1972)³ is an English actor and martial artist, known for his roles in the Guy Ritchie crime films Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels; Revolver; and Snatch. Statham appeared in supporting roles in several American films, such as The Italian Job, as well as playing the lead role in The Transporter, Crank, The Bank Job, War (opposite martial arts star Jet Li), and Death Race. He normally performs his own fight scenes and stunts.⁴

Contents 1 Early life 2 Career 3 Personal life 4 Filmography 4.1 Box office performance 5 Video game voice-overs 6 References 7 External links

Early life

Statham was born in Sydenham, London,⁵⁶ the son of a lounge singer and dressmaker-turned-dancer. He later moved to Great Yarmouth, Norfolk and grew up initially following in his parents' footsteps to master the art of street theatre. He also played football for the local grammar school (1978–83), but his real passion was diving - in particular, he finished 12th in the World Championships in 1992.⁷ He was also a member of Britain's National Diving Squad for twelve years.

Statham's life in media began when he was spotted by a talent agent specialising in athletes while training at London's Crystal Palace National Sports Centre. Afterwards, he became a model for the clothing brand Tommy Hilfiger. Statham is an expert of martial art kickboxing.

Career

While working for French Connection, he was introduced to fledgling British director Guy Ritchie⁸ who was developing a film project and needed to fill the role of a street-wise con artist. After learning about Statham's past, Ritchie cast him to play the role of "Bacon" in Ritchie's breakout 1998 hit, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels.⁹ The movie was well received by both critics and audiences, which helped catapult the unknown actor into the public eye. Statham's second collaboration with Ritchie came in the 2000 film Snatch.¹⁰ Cast alongside popular actors Brad Pitt, Dennis Farina and Benicio del Toro, and with the movie earning more than $80 million in box-office revenues, Statham was able to break into Hollywood and appeared in two movies in 2001: Ghosts of Mars and The One.

Statham was offered more film roles and in 2002 was cast as the lead role of driver Frank Martin in the action movie The Transporter, in which his background in martial arts enabled him to do most of his own stunts.¹⁰ A sequel, Transporter 2, followed in 2005¹⁰ and a third Transporter film was released in 2008. He also appeared in supporting roles in The Italian Job (2003) (in which he played Handsome Rob)¹⁰ and Cellular (2004),¹⁰ and had a cameo in Collateral before taking the lead role in Crank (2006).¹⁰ Statham compares his role in Crank to his real life in the September 2006 issue of Maxim. In 2005, Statham was once again cast by Ritchie to star in his new project, Revolver. His most recent releases were the films In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale, Transporter 3 and Crank: High Voltage.

In 2008, American film critic Armond White hailed Statham's ascension as the leading international action film star. On the occasion of Death Race, White championed Statham's "best track record of any contemporary movie star."¹¹ Later in 2008, White praised Statham's Transporter 3 as a great example of kinetic pop art.

Statham is currently^when? developing The Grabbers, written by David Peoples and Janet Peoples (Twelve Monkeys). Statham stated “We’ve got a movie we’re trying to do, written by David Peoples and Janet Peoples, in the vein of an old film, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre. It’s not a remake or anything, but it’s a little bit like that, about relationships and how greed contaminates the relationships these three people have. The working title is The Grabbers."¹²

He will also star in the action film, The Killer Elite. According to Variety the film will be based on real events, which were the subject of Ranulph Fiennes' book The Feathermen. Statham will play a former Navy SEAL who comes out of retirement in order to save an old friend who will be played by Clive Owen.

Personal life

Statham is unmarried, but was in a seven year relationship with model Kelly Brook until 2004.¹³¹⁴

Statham is also a fan of mixed martial arts (MMA) and has attended many mixed martial arts pay per views, usually put on by the Ultimate Fighting Championship (aka UFC)^{clarification needed} and probably other MMA events.^{citation needed}

Filmography

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1998	Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels	Bacon
2000	Snatch	Turkish
	Turn It Up	Mr. B
2001	Ghosts of Mars	Sgt. Jericho Butler
	The One	MVA Agent Evan Funsch	first time partnered with Jet Li
	Mean Machine	Monk
2002	Thai Boxing: A Fighting Chance	Narrator
	The Transporter	Frank Martin
2003	The Italian Job	Handsome Rob
2004	Collateral	Frank Martin (presumed)	Cameo appearance
	Cellular	Ethan Greer
2005	Transporter 2	Frank Martin
	Revolver	Jake Green
	London	Bateman
2006	Chaos	Det. Quentin Conners
	The Pink Panther	Yves Gluant	Uncredited role
	Crank	Chev Chelios
2007	War	FBI Agent John Crawford	second time partnered with Jet Li
2008	The Bank Job	Terry Leather
	In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale	Farmer Daimon
	Death Race	Jensen "Frankenstein" Ames
	Transporter 3	Frank Martin
2009	Crank: High Voltage	Chev Chelios
	Truth In 24	Narrator
2010	13	Jasper	post-production
	The Expendables	Lee Christmas	third time partnered with Jet Li
	Blitz		pre-production
	Pretty, Baby, Machine	Pretty Boy Floyd (rumored)	pre-production
	The Mechanic		filming15

Box office performance

Since 1998, Statham has appeared in over twenty films. Several have been box office hits, such as Snatch and The Bank Job. He has starred in two sets of film series, The Transporter and Crank. The films he has been in have grossed a total of more than $1 billion USD at the box office, with the highest individual film being Transporter 3.

Video game voice-overs

Video game	Year	Character
Red Faction II	2002	Shrike
Call of Duty	2003	Sgt. Waters

References

External links

• Jason Statham at the Internet Movie Database