Jason Statham life and biography

Jason Statham is an English actor. He is known for portraying characters in various action-thriller films who are typically tough, hardboiled, gritty, or violent.

According to a BBC News report, his film career from 2002 to 2017 generated an estimated $1.5 billion (£1.1 billion) in ticket sales, making him one of the film industry's most bankable stars.


British director Guy Ritchie frequently attributes the success of his unorthodox crime films -- 1998's Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels, 2000's Snatch -- to the fact that his offbeat miscreants are more than believable, they are real. Preferring to cast for authenticity rather than resumé, Ritchie handpicks many of his actors from the true-life cult figures and rascals of London's underbelly. Actor Jason Statham is among the best of them.

A one-time Olympic diver, fashion model, and black-market salesman, Statham came to acting by way of commercials and "street theater" -- a euphemism for hustling tourists on London's Oxford Street. Raised in Syndenham, London, he was the second son of a lounge singer and a dressmaker turned dancer. Although Statham had the familial background to go immediately into entertainment, he excelled first on the high dive. He was a member of the 1988 British Olympic Team in Seoul, Korea, and remained on the National Diving Squad for ten years. In the late '90s, a talent agent specializing in athletes landed Statham a gig in an ad campaign for the European clothing retailer French Connection. This led to an appearance in a Levi's Jeans commercial and a fledgling modeling career. Meanwhile, Statham had also earned local fame as a street corner con man, selling stolen jewelry and counterfeit perfume out of a briefcase. Thus, when French Connection's owner became one of the biggest investors in Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels, he naturally introduced the diver/model/hustler to knave-hunting Ritchie.

Intrigued by Statham's past and impressed by his modeling work, Ritchie invited him to audition for a part in the film. The director challenged Statham to impersonate an illegal street vendor and convince him to purchase a piece of imitation gold jewelry. Statham was evidently so persuasive that Ritchie bought four sets. When the director attempted to return his worthless acquisition -- pretending that the gold had turned to stainless steel -- Statham was so graciously inflexible that Ritchie hired him.

This unorthodox audition resulted in Statham's big screen debut as Bacon, one of Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels' four primary characters engaged in a risky get-rich-quick scheme to repay a massive gambling debt. Bacon supplies a streetwise discipline and restraint that the other characters lack and a sense of humility crucial to Ritchie's film. In the director's follow-up crime comedy, Snatch, Ritchie rehired Statham to play Turkish, a smalltime hood vainly trying to break into the world of underground boxing. As this amateur but respectable hoodlum, Statham is attractive, urbane, immaculate, and smart enough to be bewildered by even his own laughable criminal ineptitude. The role began as a small supporting part in Snatch's star-filled ensemble cast but expanded throughout shooting. By the time of the film's theatrical release, Statham received top billing as its narrator and chief anti-hero.

The Guy Ritchie oeuvre that supplied his breakthrough performances is not Statham's only acting arena. In 2000, he made his American film debut as a British drug dealer in Robert Adetuyi's Turn It Up starring Pras Michel. By 2001, he had finished shooting John Carpenter's sci-fi thriller Ghosts of Mars and joined Delroy Lindo in the cast of the Jet Li vehicle The One. A chance to reteam with former Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrel co-star Vinnie Jones proved too fun an opportuity to resist, and Stratham would round out a particularly busy 2001 with his role in the prison-bound sports remake Mean Machine.

Just as audiences were finally standing up to take notice of the amiable tough-guy, Stratham stepped into his own as the action lead of the explosive 2002 adrenaline ride The Transporter. A sizable hit that would earn Statham increasingly prominant roles in such high profile pics as The Italian Job, and Cellular, The Transporter established Stratham as a bankable international action star and was eventually followed by a 2005 sequel that miraculously managed the improbable feat of upping the ante of the previous installment's over-the-top cartoon violence. A starring role in Ritchie's 2005 crime thriller Revolver found Stratham re-teaming with the director who launched his career with decidedly mixed results, and the following year it was off to race the clock and rescue the girl as a reformed assassin looking to make good in the hyper-intense action entry Crank.

Statham's filmography:

1998 Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels
2000 Snatch
2000 Turn It Up
2001 Ghosts of Mars
2001 The One
2001 Mean Machine
2002 The Transporter
2003 The Italian Job
2004 Collateral
2004 Cellular
2005 Transporter 2
2005 Revolver
2005 London
2006 Chaos
2006 The Pink Panther
2006 Crank
2007 War
2008 The Bank Job
2008 In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale
2008 Death Race
2008 Transporter 3
2009 Crank: High Voltage
2010 13
2010 The Expendables
2011 Blitz
2011 The Mechanic
2011 Gnomeo and Juliet; Blitz; Killer Elite
2012 Truth in 24 II; Safe; The Expendables 2
2013 Parker; Fast & Furious 6; Hummingbird; Homefront
2014 The Expendables 3
2015 Wild Card; Furious 7; Spy
2016 Mechanic: Resurrection
2017 The Fate of the Furious
2018 The Meg
2019 Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw
2021 Wrath of Man; F9
2022 Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerredagger (Post production)
2022 The Expendables 4dagger (Post production)
2023 Fast Xdagger (Filming)
2023 Meg 2: The Trenchdagger (Filming)

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