Academy Award-nominated actor Jude Law, best known in recent years for his portrayal of Dr. John Watson in the "Sherlock Holmes" series, got his start on the British stage. He earned a spot with the National Youth Music Theatre at the age of 13 and starred in its production of "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat" three years later. While he soon moved on to television and film work, stage acting has always been Law's first love, and he has returned to live acting many times.
Law's first feature-film role was in 1994's "Shopping," a dystopian sci-fi tale of criminal youth. His first major American role followed three years later, playing opposite Ethan Hawke in the science fiction thriller "Gattaca." The same year, he married actress Sadie Frost and began the Natural Nylon production company with two of his long-time friends, Ewan McGregor and Jonny Lee Miller. The role that catapulted Law to stardom, however, was his turn in 1999's critically acclaimed "The Talented Mr. Ripley," a role that earned him an Academy Award nomination as well as the BAFTA award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role. The following year saw him star alongside Miller and Rhys Ifans in "Love, Honour and Obey," a British gangster comedy-drama.
2001 saw Law starring in the World War II film "Enemy at the Gates," which told a fictionalized version of the exploits of Soviet marksman Vasily Zaytsev and his protracted duel against a Wehrmacht sniper named Erwin Konig, played by Ed Harris. He also took a role as Gigolo Joe in Stephen Spielberg's science fiction epic "A.I.," a film originally developed by Stanley Kubrick from the Brian Aldiss short story "Super-Toys Last All Summer Long" decades earlier.
In 2002, Law earned more acclaim for his role as the odious hitman Harlen Maguire in "Road to Perdition," an adaptation of the graphic novel by Max Allan Collins. A year later, he starred in "Cold Mountain" opposite Nicole Kidman and Renee Zellweger. The performance earned Law an admirable collection of acting award nominations, but his performance was overshadowed by 2004's less critically acclaimed but more iconic turn as the title character in "Alfie," a remake of a Michael Caine comedy from 1966.
Also in 2004, Law's production company Natural Nylon launched an ambitious but ultimately doomed project entitled "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow." The film was a science fiction adventure story set in an alternate 1930s universe and featured heavy use of computer-generated effects and graphics. With the exception of one reshoot, director Kerry Conran filmed the entire movie against chroma key backgrounds, allowing him to create fantastic settings for the actors' scenes. In addition, the film used digitally altered footage from Sir Laurence Olivier's early works to cast him as the movie's supervillain, Dr. Totenkopf. The film received positive reviews for its stylistic depiction of this science fiction-inspired alternate universe, but "Sky Captain" failed miserably at the box office, taking in a little more than half of its production budget.
In 2007, Law returned to his live acting roots with "Realtime Movie Trailer," an experimental production directed by Jason Martin. The short film appeared in the form of a movie trailer and ran in theaters throughout London, advertising a live show on November 30. Audience members who attended the live production saw the scenes from the "trailer" expanded into a full movie-length production, albeit one performed live for one time only. That same year, he received the Order of Arts and Letters in France, granted the "Chevalier" or "Knight" rank in the order.
Another notable role of Law's was in 2009's "The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus," a film directed by Terry Gilliam. The film originally starred Heath Ledger, but the actor's untimely death left the production in limbo. Eventually, Gilliam rewrote the science fiction film's storyline to allow other actors to play different aspects of Ledger's character, and he recruited Law as well as Johnny Depp and Colin Ferrell to fill out the role of their fallen friend.
In 2008, Warner Brothers selected Guy Ritchie to direct a new adaptation of the classic Sherlock Holmes stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, involving a version of the detective considerably more youthful and modern than his traditional on-screen depiction. Ritchie cast Robert Downey, Jr. in the role of the famous detective and selected Jude Law to play his partner, Doctor John Watson. Law's performance was considerably different from many traditional interpretations of the Watson character, who had become almost a buffoonish figure in contrast to the brilliantly deductive Holmes. Law's Watson was a man of action and keenly clever, and his portrayal was cited as one of the reasons for the film's success. Law reprised the role in the 2011 sequel, "
Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows."
