When Fassbender was two years old, the family moved toKillarney, atown inCounty Kerry, Ireland, where Josef and Adele were to operate a restaurant named the West End House. Josef also worked as a chef in the restaurant. The couple chose Killarney because they wanted their children to grow up in the countryside, in contrast to the industrial backdrop of their previous German residence.[3][7]
Fassbender, who was raisedCatholic, served as analtar boy at the church his family attended.[9] He and Catherine spent summer holidays in Germany.[10] He attended Fossa National School in the village andparish ofFossa[11] andSt. Brendan's College in Killarney.[12] Fassbender decided to become an actor at the age of 17 when he was cast in a play. He left home to study at theDrama Centre London at the age of 19. In 1999, Fassbenderdropped out of the Drama Centre and toured with theOxford Stage Company to perform the playThree Sisters.[5][13] Before finding steady work as an actor, he worked as a bartender, postman, manual labourer,market researcher forRoyal Mail andDell employee.[14][15]
Fassbender's first screen role was that of Pat Christenson inTom Hanks andSteven Spielberg's award-winning television miniseriesBand of Brothers (2001).[16] He played the character ofAzazeal in both series ofHex onSky One and starred as the main character in the music video for the song "Blind Pilots" by the British bandThe Cooper Temple Clause. In the video, he plays the part of a man out with friends on a stag night who slowly transforms into a goat due to wearing a cowbell necklace.[16] Fassbender playedJonathan Harker in a ten-part radio serialisation ofDracula produced byBBC Northern Ireland and broadcast in theBook at Bedtime series between 24 November and 5 December 2003. He was also seen in early 2004 in aGuinness television commercial,The Quarrel, playing a man who swims across the ocean from Ireland to apologise personally to his brother in New York;[17] this commercial won a gold medal at the 2005FAB Awards.[18][19]
In 2006, Fassbender playedStelios, a young Spartan warrior, in300, a fantasy action film directed byZack Snyder. The film was a commercial success.[22] In preparation for his role asProvisional Irish Republican Army prisonerBobby Sands inSteve McQueen's historical drama filmHunger (2008), Fassbender adopted a diet that restricted him to 600 calories a day, weighing 125 pounds (57 kg) as Sands.[23] Regarded as his breakthrough,[24][25] his performance earned him theBritish Independent Film Award.[26]Peter Bradshaw film critic ofThe Guardian wrote, "As Sands, Fassbender gives another ferociously convincing performance and his emaciated appearance is, finally, almost unwatchable."[27]
One year after his success at the Cannes Film Festival withHunger, he appeared in two films. The first wasQuentin Tarantino's revisionistWorld War II comedy-dramaInglourious Basterds, in which he played the British officer Lieutenant Archie Hicox. Fassbender acted oppositeBrad Pitt,Diane Kruger,Melanie Laurent, andChristoph Waltz. Eric Kohn ofIndieWire praised the film and its ensemble declaring, "Hell, it's one of the best films of the century. The cast is superb".[28] The other film was the British dramaFish Tank directed byAndrea Arnold. Fassbender plays the boyfriend acting oppositeKierston Wareing as the single mother with two children. Ray Bennett ofThe Hollywood Reporter praised their chemistry and roles writing, "Fassbender and Wareing give honest and open performances as the conflicted adults".[29] Both films were critically acclaimed and Fassbender's work in them also well received.[weasel words]
In 2010, Fassbender appeared as Burke inJonah Hex, a Western film.[30] In an interview atSan Diego Comic-Con, a comic book convention, Fassbender commented of the role: "I kind of developed this character and really pushed it – I'll see how far I pushed it ... I had this idea about the character, he's kind of psychotic, he gets his kicks in perverted ways. I didn't want to make it very obvious or like something you've seen before."[31] Hex received predominantly negative reviews.[32] Responding to criticism ofJonah Hex in 2011, Fassbender commented: "Pretty awful, was it? I haven't seen it myself."[33] He portrayed Quintus Dias inNeil Marshall's bloody Roman war-thriller-drama filmCenturion,[34] and was cast as Richard Wirth in theJoel Schumacher filmBlood Creek alongsideDominic Purcell. The story centres on a West Virginia man who comes to terms with his moral qualms and helps his brother wipe out a family that had been protecting a Nazi occultist and who had kept his brother captive for him to feed off for years.
In 2012, he appeared as an MI6 agent inHaywire, an action-thriller directed bySteven Soderbergh,[30] and inRidley Scott's science fiction filmPrometheus. Reviews praised both the film's visual aesthetic design and the acting, most notably Fassbender's performance as the androidDavid 8. Fassbender played the title role in Ridley Scott'sThe Counselor, a 2013 film based on theCormac McCarthy script.[42][43] In 2013, he starred in12 Years a Slave, his third collaboration with Steve McQueen. Fassbender's portrayal ofEdwin Epps earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor. Fassbender reprised the role ofMagneto inX-Men: Days of Future Past (released 23 May 2014), the sequel toX-Men: First Class.[44] Fassbender stars in the title role inFrank (released late summer 2014),[45] a comedy loosely inspired byFrank Sidebottom, a comic persona created by English comedianChris Sievey.
Fassbender took on the Shakespearean role ofMacbeth in a film directed byJustin Kurzel, where he teamed up with Academy Award winnerMarion Cotillard as Lady Macbeth andDavid Thewlis asKing Duncan.[51] Filming for the production began in January 2014 and the film premiered at the2015 Cannes Film Festival.[52] In 2016, Fassbender once again played Magneto in the filmX-Men: Apocalypse.[53] He next starred inThe Light Between Oceans, based on the novel written by M. L. Stedman, and directed byDerek Cianfrance; the film began filming in New Zealand in late September 2014, and was released on 2 September 2016.[54][55] Also in 2016, Fassbender starred in the thrillerTrespass Against Us, with fellow IrishmanBrendan Gleeson.[56] His final film of the year was the adaptation of video gameAssassin's Creed, which he co-produced through his DMC Film banner.[57] It was released on 21 December 2016.Macbeth helmer Justin Kurzel directed, and co-starMarion Cotillard had a leading role, working with Fassbender again.[58][59]
In May 2017, Fassbender reprised his role as the android David, and played another character, in the sequel toPrometheus,Alien: Covenant.[60] In 2015, Fassbender was cast asHarry Hole (becoming the first actor ever to portray the character) inThe Snowman, an adaptation ofJo Nesbø's novel, directed byTomas Alfredson and co-starringRebecca Ferguson andCharlotte Gainsbourg. Filming began in January 2016 and the film was released in October 2017.[61] Fassbender reprised his role as Magneto in the 2019 filmDark Phoenix, which garnered unfavorable reviews and had a commercially unsuccessful theatrical run.[62][63]
Fassbender has expressed an interest in motorsport since his youth, stating in 2020, "Even before I started acting, I had a big dream to go racing."[75] A fan ofFormula One andScuderia Ferrari, he was a member of the team's Corso Pilota training course in 2016.[76]
He began racing in theFerrari Challenge's Coppa Shell class in May 2017, finishing 15th in his debut atMugello Circuit.[77] He also raced in the Challenge's North American division, finishing sixth atMazda Raceway Laguna Seca.[76] In 2018, he ran the full Ferrari Challenge North America schedule, winning the season opener atDaytona International Speedway and finishing fifth in the standings.[78]
In2021, Fassbender continued to race with Proton Competition in the European Le Mans Series. Fassbender and his co-drivers scored fourth-place finishes at theRed Bull Ring[81] and atSpa-Francorchamps,[82] before achieving his best-ever finish and his first podium at the last race atPortimão, finishing second behind the No. 80Iron Lynx, eventual LMGTE champion.[83] The team finished fourth in the LMGTE teams championship, with 61 points.
In June 2012, Fassbender toldGQ magazine that he was dating American actressNicole Beharie, with whom he had worked on the filmShame (2011).[87] In December 2014, he began dating Swedish actressAlicia Vikander, with whom he had worked on the filmThe Light Between Oceans (2016).[88][89] They married in a private ceremony inIbiza on 14 October 2017,[90][91] and have two sons together.[92][93][94] They moved to Portugal in 2017 and purchased a home in theAlfama district of Lisbon,[90][91] with Fassbender selling the property in theHackney area of London he had lived in since 1996.[95][96][97]
Fassbender is known for preferring to keep his personal life private.[98] He has said that he was analtar boy as a child and is now alapsed Catholic, but still goes to church to light candles.[12][99] He is a supporter of English football teamLiverpool FC.[100][101] He holds aGerman passport,[102] and has admitted that he intended to get anIrish passport "for years and just never got around to it".[102] He speaksGerman,[10] though he stated that he needed to brush up on it before filmingInglourious Basterds (2009) because it was "a bit rusty".[103][104] He has expressed interest in performing in a German-language film or play.[105]
In 2010, Fassbender's ex-girlfriend Sunawin Andrews accused him of two incidents ofdomestic abuse that had occurred the previous year.[106] News reports cited a court petition and a restraining order filed by Andrews, alleging that Fassbender was screaming at her while driving recklessly; after she got out of the car, he allegedly drove forward and dragged her alongside it.[106] This resulted in a hospital visit to treat "a twisted left ankle, blown out left knee cap, and a [burst] ovarian cyst" in addition to "lots of internal bleeding".[106] The second incident came when he allegedly returned to their hotel room from a film festival, inebriated and accompanied by a friend, and the two men tried to get into bed with her; after checking into another room for the night, she alleges that he threw her over a chair and broke her nose when she tried to wake him up after finding him asleep in his own urine.[106] He has not publicly addressed the allegations, which resurfaced during theMeToo movement in 2017.[106]
^Fassbender is aGerman passport holder, who "never got around to" getting anIrish passport.[102] He lived in Ireland until age 19 and has described himself as Irish, saying in 2016, "I definitely still consider myself Irish... And I'm definitely European."[108]
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