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Karl-Heinz Urban (born June 7, 1972 in Wellington, New Zealand) is an actor. He may be best known for playing Éomer in the second and third installment of Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings trilogy, Kirill in The Bourne Supremacy, the lead role in the movie adaptation of video game Doom, Ghost from Pathfinder, and Vaako from The Chronicles of Riddick. Considering his previous experience essaying the recurring role of Julius Caesar on the popular small screen fantasy adventure series Xena: Warrior Princess, it seems only natural that New Zealand born actor Karl Urban would advance to slay orcs in Peter Jackson's epic Lord of the Rings trilogy. Appearing as a somewhat more rugged version of screen heartthrob Leonardo DiCaprio, it's obvious from his work in such films as The Price of Milk that the handsome young actor has the looks and the skills to make it on his own. Karl Urban is the son of a leather goods manufacturer. He attended St Mark's Church School where he showed an early love for public performance. His first acting role was when he was eight he had a line on a television show. However, he did not act again until after high school. He then went on to Wellington College. Upon leaving High School Karl was offered a role in the hit New Zealand TV-series Shortland Street playing homosexual paramedic Jamie Forrest. After appearing on the show for the 1993-1994 season he attended Victoria University in Wellington for one year, then left to pursue his acting career. Over the next few years, he landed several theater roles in the Wellington area. Eventually, he moved to Auckland where he was offered many guest roles in local shows. One of his first roles was that of a heroin addict in the drama Shark In the Park. Some of his earlier work included roles on New Zealand soap Shortland Street, which apparently interrupted his planned attendance of Victoria University of Wellington, and a guest role on the second season of police drama Shark in the Park. As well as appearing in films and television shows, Urban also had various roles in theatre productions and television advertisements in his native New Zealand and abroad. In February/March 1998, he was in a play called The Herbal Bed at the Maidment Theatre in Auckland (as the character Jett Lane). In August 1998, he played Mark Antony in Auckland Theatre Company's production of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar in Auckland. In 1999, he appeared in the Auckland Theatre Company's production of Foreskin's Lament. A Wellington native and son of a leather goods manufacturer, Urban's first acting experience came with an appearance in a New Zealand television show at the age of eight. Though he would subsequently eschew an acting career until after graduating from high school, Urban was drawn back in front of the cameras when he was offered the opportunity to appear on an evening soap opera entitled Shortland Street while preparing to attend Victoria University. The acting bug was a bit harder to shake the second time around, and after a mere year at Victoria, Urban abandoned higher education for a career on the stages of Wellington. A relocation to Auckland found Urban gaining exposure on New Zealand television, and after a turn as a heroin addict in Shark in the Park, he made an impression in the 1998 Scott Reynolds thriller Heaven. An unaired pilot for a show called Amazon High was eventually incorporated into an episode of Xena, and Urban would next take to the screen for the gory horror outing The Irrefutable Truth About Demons. Urban was seen on the internationally syndicated American TV series Hercules: The Legendary Journeys and on its spin-off Xena: Warrior Princess, in which he played both Cupid and Julius Caesar from 1996 to 2001. These shows were filmed in New Zealand. He won the New Zealand Film and TV Awards for his role in the 2000 film The Price of Milk. Urban's Hollywood break did not come until his role in the 2002 horror film Ghost Ship. Since then, Karl has worked on many blockbusters including The The Lord of the Rings trilogy (in which he played Éomer of Rohan), The Bourne Supremacy and The Chronicles of Riddick with Vin Diesel and Judi Dench. turning point of sorts came when Urban was cast as the lead in the romantic fantasy The Price of Milk, and his performance as a milk farmer whose relationship is on the rocks found him gaining increasing recognition on the international art house circuit. Though mainstream American audiences would begin to get acquainted with Urban courtesy of his role in the seafaring horror outing Ghost Ship, his role in the Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers later that same year ensured that audiences would be seeing plenty more of him in the future. Following his escapades in Middle Earth, Urban would take to the stars opposite Vin Diesel in The Chronicles of Riddick (2004). Action roles continued to come at a clip when, after dodging bullets in the fast-moving sequel The Bourne Supremacy, Urban jettisoned to Mars to do battle with a particularly nasty breed of evil in the video game-to-screen adaptation Doom. From the far future to the distant past, Urban next laid down his plasma rifle to take up sword against his own people when he assumed the role of a Viking boy raised by Native Americans in director Marcus Nispel's 2006 fantasy adventure Pathfinder. The Hollywood Reporter speculated that Urban was one of several actors being considered for the part of British secret service agent 007 in Casino Royale, directed by fellow New Zealander Martin Campbell. Website filmforce.com had mixed feelings over whether he would make the best Bond. "While darkly handsome, he's a bit elfish-looking for Bond. He's the right age, is recognisable, but not yet a big name and had proven himself adept at genre fare. But does Urban have the gravitas and flair needed for Bond?" The actor selected for the part was Daniel Craig. Urban played John "Reaper" Grimm, one of the lead characters in Universal Pictures' Doom which was released on October 21, 2005. Following his role in Doom, he played the lead in the Viking film Pathfinder, which received a United States release on 13 April 2007. In October of 2007, it was announced that Urban would play Leonard McCoy in the eleventh Star Trek film. |
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