From weedy teen in Queer As Folk to hunky King Arthur – we reveal how Charlie Hunnam went from JD Sports to top of the Hollywood A-list
Brit actor plays medieval hero in Guy Ritchie's upcoming film
HE was the puny gay teen who caused outrage in controversial Channel 4 series Queer As Folk.
Now buff Brit actor Charlie Hunnam looks nothing like cocky Nathan Maloney.
Having shot to fame in America, this true Hollywood hunk will next week have his homecoming playing the very British legend King Arthur in Guy Ritchie’s new film.
And just like the medieval hero, Charlie has seemed long destined for greatness.
The 37-year-old earned his first role in Geordie kids TV series Byker Grove after blowing a drunken kiss to a producer while larking around in JD Sports aged 17.
From there he was picked to play 15-year-old Nathan in Russell T Davies’s groundbreaking and hugely controversial TV series about Manchester’s gay village.
His scenes in Queer As Folk included a moment Aiden Gillan’s character Stuart shoves his glistening buttocks right into Nathan’s face, ignited a storm of protest from viewers — and much ribbing back home in Cumbria.
A neighbour in Melmerby this week said: “Everyone used to take the mick out of him because he played a gay lad on the telly.”
But Charlie had the last laugh, using his popularity to move to America at 19 and launch himself into Hollywood.
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He also has his home town to thank for his muscular frame and tough attitude — as well as his late father, Billy Hunnam, a scrap metal merchant with a fierce reputation.
In Cumbria, bullies and local hard nuts prompted Charlie to learn to fight and get into martial arts, as well as assume a menacing bravado.
He : “I wanted people to know, ‘Look, if you’re going to f*** with me, it’s going to go badly for you’. In a lot of ways I started channelling my father.”
Although he moved away from his birthplace of Newcastle at 12 — his mum Jane having split with Billy when Charlie was a toddler — he was fascinated by his “f***ing naughty boy” dad.
Billy, who died at 61 in 2013, worked as a bouncer, in scrap metal and on the shipyards, acquiring a reputation as someone not to be messed with.
And it’s that character Charlie drew on when he got his big US break, the lead role in what would become a hugely successful TV series about a biker gang, Sons of Anarchy.
Charlie said: “My dad was one of the toughest, most savage dudes I’ve ever met. In a way I feel like I’ve been playing him a lot in my career.”
His recent wave of success includes the leads in 2011 thriller The Ledge, alongside Liv Tyler, and Guillermo del Toro’s 2013 sci-fi Pacific Rim and The Lost City of Z, which hit screens in March.
He now happily shuns the Hollywood party scene, living on an idyllic ranch in the countryside outside of Los Angeles with his girlfriend of 11 years Morgana McNelis, a jewellery designer.
But when he first arrived in LA he had an unlikely friendship with Guy Ritchie’s ex-wife, Madonna.
He recalled his embarrassment when invited to the Queen of Pop’s mansion and was so keen to keep the location secret from his cabbie he leapt out at the gate, not realising he had a mile’s walk up the drive to the house.
He took her a gift of a Wonder Woman Pez sweets dispenser (“Well, what wine would you take to Madonna’s?”), and cringed with embarrassment when he said he was in town “for a job,” to which Madonna squealed, “A b**w job?”
Some time later he put her nose out of joint when someone asked if they were a couple and Charlie tactlessly blurted: “Are you kidding me? She’s older than my mum.”
Though on the road to fame and fortune there were times he wondered how he would pay the bills, and times he turned down million-dollar projects because they weren’t the right fit.
Then, in 2013, not long after his father’s death, he dropped out of playing kinky Christian Grey in Fifty Shades of Grey.
He later admitted there was “family stuff” going on and that he had “something of a nervous breakdown” trying to cram filming into his hectic schedule.
A revamped King Arthur might seem a better fit for this beefy hunk than playing S&M-obsessed Christian.
Guy promised a macho scoundrel of a hero and Charlie — who has twice chased burglars from his home, brandishing first a baseball bat then a machete — seems an obvious choice.
But Guy took some convincing. The Mockney director had his heart set on Superman actor Henry Cavill or Prometheus’s Michael Fassbender.
Charlie said: “I can’t remember the exact verbiage of his reasoning, but it really hurt my feelings.
"So I said, ‘F*** that. I’m going to get on a plane and sit down and have a cup of tea with him’.”
Not long afterwards he was announced as King Arthur in the flick, which also features soccer star David Beckham in a cameo role.
Charlie hasn’t always gotten what he wants though.
Aged 13 he was spectacularly humiliated by “the most popular girl at school”, Rachel Gould, who agreed to go to the year disco with him, only to tell him the night before that she was only joking.
He has said: “It was two of the greatest weeks of my life followed by the worst night of my life.”
Charlie suffered more heartache aged 18 after he married American actress Katharine Towne in a 2am ceremony in Las Vegas, just three weeks after meeting her at a Dawson’s Creek audition.
They split following what he described as “three horrible, tumultuous years.”
He hints about having children with Morgana, who benefits from his fitness regime.
Talking about how he keeps toned, Charlie said: “I try to make love as often as I can.”
Aside from Morgana, the other love of his life is his cat George, whom he rescued from his roof 17 years ago.
He recalls: “He was lying half-submerged in a puddle. I picked him up and my heart broke.
"I started crying. I thought, ‘There’s no chance of happiness for me now, I’ve killed this cat’.”
As it turned out, George was alive, and after running two miles to his nearest vet’s and pleading with them to save him, Charlie found himself with a new pet.
He once revealed: “My favourite smell in the world is my cat, George. He smells so f***ing good.”
With everything going so well for the homegrown hunk, it’s clear this Hollywood heavyweight is in no way set to fall on his sword — not even the famous Excalibur.
— King Arthur: Legend of the Sword hits cinemas on May 19.