Nicholas Caradoc Hoult born December 7 1989 is an English actor His body of work includes supporting work in bigbudget mainstream productions and starring roles in independent projects in both the American and the British film industries He has been nominated for awards such as a British Academy Film Award a Golden Globe Award and a Screen Actors Guild Award Born and raised in Wokingham Berkshire Hoult was drawn to acting from a young age and appeared in local theatre productions as a child He made his screen debut at age seven in the 1996 film Intimate Relations and appeared in several television programmes between 1998 and 2001 Hoults breakthrough role came when he played Marcus Brewer in the 2002 comedydrama film About a Boy for which he was nominated for the Critics Choice Movie Award for Best Young Performer He achieved wider recognition and praise for his performance as Tony Stonem in the E4 teen comedydrama series Skins 20072008 His transition to adult roles began with the 2009 drama film A Single Man for which he earned a BAFTA Rising Star Award nomination and the fantasy film Clash of the Titans 2010 He was cast as the mutant Hank McCoy in Matthew Vaughns 2011 superhero film XMen First Class a role he reprised in later instalments of the series In 2013 Hoult played the lead title role in the fantasy adaptation Jack the Giant Slayer and starred as a zombie in romantic comedy Warm Bodies Following a supporting role in Mad Max Fury Road 2015 Hoult starred in a number of independent films before portraying various reallife figures such as Robert Harley Earl of Oxford in the historical black comedy The Favourite 2018 writer J R R Tolkien in Tolkien 2019 and Peter III in the Hulu comedydrama series The Great 2020present In 2021 he starred in the survival thriller Those Who Wish Me Dead