Jeremy Irons

Jeremy Irons had already made a name for himself on the London stage when international audiences got their first look at him in the television miniseries Brideshead Revisited. Although Irons made his reputation as a romantic leading man in films such as The French Lieutenant's Woman, he has never shied from unusual or unsympathetic roles. He amazed audiences with his performance in the French language film Swann in Love, and as psychotic identical twins in Dead Ringers. He played a spine-tingling villain in Die Hard: With a Vengeance, a dying artist in Bernardo Bertolucci's Stealing Beauty and the tormented Humbert in the second screen version of Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita. After seeing Irons' portrayal of Claus von Bulow in Reversal of Fortune, von Bülow's real life attorney, Alan Dershowitz, declared that "Jeremy Irons is a better Claus von Bulow than Claus von Bulow." The Motion Picture Academy agreed and gave Irons an Oscar for Best Actor. As familiar as Irons' face may be to adult moviegoers, even more children know his voice as the villainous Scar in The Lion King. Audiences of all ages can be grateful that he has lent his face and voice to an extraordinary variety of roles in some of the most memorable films of the last 30 years. He remains a commanding presence in film, on the New York and London stages and on television productions such as the Showtime miniseries The Borgias. In this podcast, recorded at the 2002 International Achievement Summit in Dublin, Ireland, Jeremy Irons speaks to the Academy's student delegates about the relevance of the arts in the world today. He notes the particular potential of motion pictures to bridge cultural differences.