Many happy returns to one of the movies’ toughest ever action heroes, Jason Statham. The big guy turns 49 today and in recognition of his greatness, we bring you eight things you may not have known about him.
1) Statham was working as a French Connection model when he was introduced to Guy Ritchie, who gave him his big break as an actor in Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (1998).
2) Before he was famous, he featured in various music videos including Comin’ On Strong by The Shamen in 1993 and Dream A Little Dream of Me by the Beautiful South in 1995.
3) He took up diving at the relatively late age of 15 and trained at elite level at Crystal Palace, representing England at the Commonwealth Games in 1990. 4) Much like any mythical beast, the Stath’s origins are not clear. Imdb and Wikipedia say he was born in Derbyshire but as far as we’re aware he is from Sydenham and is believed to have later lived in Forest Hill.
5) In Marvel’s Ultimate Spider-Man comics, the villain Vulture was designed to look like Jason Statham. Vulture was this week announced as the villain in the new Spider-Man: Homecoming movie, starring fellow south Londoner Tom Holland. It’s not thought Statham is in line to star. 6) His highest rated movie on Rotten Tomatoes in Paul Feig’s comedy Spy (2015) in which he played an alpha male secret agent obsessed with getting his hands on the machine from the movie Face/Off. His lowest rated movie is In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale (2006).
7) He is famed for doing most of his own stunts. The scariest? It involved a dangling from a chopper. Speaking at The Expendables 3 press conference in London at the time of that film’s release he said: “One that sticks in my memory would be a fist fight outside a helicopter, standing on the skids, on a movie called Crank.
“That was quite adrenaline fuelled. It was quite a scary moment. We were at the top of a tall building. When you leave the ground you can adjust and get used to it.
“Where we took off from the building, it was already 2,000 feet in the air. It was a scary sort of rush. I’m not going to forget that day.”
8) His next movie, Mechanic: Resurrection will see him return to his role as Arthur Bishop in the sequel to 2011’s The Mechanic. It is out next month.
Rihanna snapped up her neighbor’s house for $10 million. This is so sweet!
Rihanna snapped up her neighbor’s house for $10 million. This is so sweet!
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Army commissioned painting of drones monitoring migrant boats in English Channel
Army commissioned painting of drones monitoring migrant boats in English Channel
