Viggo Mortensen

Viggo Mortensen was born in New York in 1958 and graduated in Spanish Studies from St. Lawrence University. After travelling around Europe, he returned to the United States to pursue a career in acting. His film debut came in Witness (1985), directed by Peter Weir. Mortensen is best known for his role as Aragorn in The Lord of the Rings trilogy in the early 2000s. In the years that followed, he starred in two films directed by David Cronenberg: A History of Violence(2005) and Eastern Promises (2007), receiving an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor for the latter. After balancing theatre and film for several years, he was again nominated for Best Actor for his role in Captain Fantastic (2016), and earned a third nomination in 2019 for Green Book (2018). In 2020, Mortensen wrote, produced, and directed his first feature film, Falling. In 2022, he reunited with Cronenberg for Crimes of the Future, which was selected for the Official Competition at the Cannes Film Festival. One of today’s most acclaimed actors, Mortensen is also a published author, with several books of poetry, paintings, and photography released through his publishing house, Percival Press. He is also a composer, having released several albums and composed the soundtracks for Falling (2020) and The Dead Don’t Hurt (2023), his second film as writer, producer, and director.