Actor Thomas Stanley Holland was born in England on June 1, 1996. Among his achievements are three Saturn Awards and a British Academy Film Award. He was listed among the 2019 Forbes 30 Under 30 Europe. He is regarded as one of the most well-liked performers of his age by some newspapers.
Tom Holland, who was born in England in 1996, began working on the London run of Billy Elliot the Musical in 2008. He quickly achieved fame in the movie business, receiving positive reviews for his role in The Impossible (2012). Holland, who was chosen to play Peter Parker/Spider-Man on the big screen, made his movie debut in Captain America: Civil War (2016). Later, he was given the opportunity to star in his own film, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017).
Thomas Holland Biography: Quick Facts
- Birth Name: Thomas Stanley Holland
- Birth Date: June 1, 1996
- Birth Place: London, England
- Gender: Male
- Career: Actor
- Most Known For: Playing Spider-Man in six Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) superhero movies, starting with Captain America: Civil War (2016), brought Holland international acclaim.
Early Life
Thomas Stanley Holland was born on June 1, 1996, in Kingston upon Thames, a suburb of southwest London. His parents are comedian and novelist Dominic Holland and photographer Nicola (née Frost). There are three younger brothers in his family. His father’s father was from the Isle of Man, while his mother was from Tipperary, Ireland. His parents’ and younger brothers’ homes are not far from where he resides in Kingston upon Thames.
Holland received his education at Wimbledon, South West London’s Donhead, an all-male Catholic preparatory school. He received a dyslexia diagnosis at the age of seven. In order to ensure that he received the required care, his parents enrolled him and his siblings in a private school to prevent making them feel abandoned. Holland briefly attended the Croydon-based BRIT School for Performing Arts and Technology before enrolling at Wimbledon College, a Jesuit comprehensive with voluntary assistance.
Early Career
Holland started going to the Nifty Feet Dance Studio, whose owner, Lynne Page, assisted with choreography for the critically acclaimed film Billy Elliot (2000), for hip-hop dance courses. Following Holland’s class’s performance at the 2006 Richmond Dance Festival, Page was persuaded to send her student to the Billy Elliot musical for an audition.
Holland’s lack of professional experience in dance and drama prevented him from impressing the majority of talent assessors during the audition. Stephen Daldry, the director of Billy Elliot, was impressed by Holland’s on-stage charisma and natural ability to play.
Holland made his stage debut as Michael, Billy’s closest friend, in the West End production in June 2008, after two years of ballet training. He became the lead singer shortly after and dazzled spectators with his acrobatic prowess until his last show in May 2010.
‘The Impossible’
Holland was chosen to do the voice of Sho for the British release of the animated film The Secret World of Arrietty (2010), not long after he hung up his dancing shoes for Billy Elliot. But it was his role in The Impossible (2012) that cemented his reputation as one of the most promising young actors in the business. Based on a real story of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, Holland received several award nominations for his portrayal of a young man who looks after his damaged mother (Naomi Watts) while also trying to find his missing father (Ewan McGregor).
The sequences he and co-star Naomi Watts shot in a 35,000-gallon water tank were physically and mentally exhausting. Holland realized he wanted to pursue acting as a career full-time after working with Watts. In September, The Impossible made its theatrical and critical debut at the Toronto International Film Festival, grossing $180.3 million against a $45 million budget.
Other Minor roles before breakthrough
Holland had appearances in three drama films: How I Live Now (2013), Locke (2013), and Billy Elliot the Musical Live (2014). He also provided a voice in a supporting role for Locke (2013). The historical miniseries Wolf Hall (2015) on BBC Two featured Holland in four episodes as Gregory Cromwell, the son of Mark Rylance’s character, Thomas Cromwell. In 2015, Holland directed the 3-minute short film Tweet, which followed a young guy as he built a birdhouse with his grandfather. Later, Holland stated that he would like to make feature films when he is older, around 40.
In the historical adventure-drama In The Heart of the Sea, directed by Ron Howard, Holland also starred as the young sailor Thomas Nickerson in 2015. Based on the non-fiction book of the same name published in 2000, the movie tells the story of the American whaling ship Essex’s 1820 disaster. He and Chris Hemsworth, among his co-stars, shed a lot of weight in preparation by eating 500–1,000 calories a day. The majority of Holland’s stunts in the movie were his own.
Breakthrough in ‘Spider Man’
Soon later, it was revealed that he would be playing Peter Parker in the newest Spider-Man remake, setting off his rise to international fame. Holland was an avid admirer of Spider-Man as a child, having amassed thirty outfits and bed linens featuring the superhero. Charlie Rowe and Asa Butterfield, two English actors, were among the 1,500 adolescents from across the world that he tried out against.
Directors Kevin Feige and Amy Pascal selected Holland because of his experience in dance and gymnastics, but Holland’s performances in The Impossible, Wolf Hall, and In the Heart of the Sea also pleased them. In contrast to Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield, who were selected for the Spidey role in their mid-to-late 20s, Holland, then 19 years old, was far more like Peter Parker’s disturbed high school student who transformed into a superhero.
In Captain America: Civil War (2016), Peter made his debut as Spider-Man within the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). Despite having a $250 million budget, the movie was a critical and financial triumph, making over $1.1 billion in revenue worldwide to become the highest-grossing movie of 2016.
He garnered positive reviews for his portrayal of the legendary web slinger despite having little on screen time, which helped to prepare audiences for his highly anticipated and well-received role in Spider-Man: Homecoming in 2017. After that, Holland returned to his superhero persona for the ensemble films Avengers: Infinity War (2018) and Avengers: Endgame (2019), and in Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019), he wrote the next chapter in his character’s journey.
‘In the Heart of the Sea’, ‘The Lost City of Z’, and ‘Spies in Disguise’
Holland had other acting commitments to attend to in the meantime. The 2015 epic In the Heart of the Sea was a box office bomb, but it gave the rising actor another platform and an opportunity to prove himself in challenging shooting circumstances. After making significant appearances in the 2016 films Edge of Winter and The Lost City of Z, he starred in the 2017 medieval action movie Pilgrimage.
Holland and Will Smith collaborated on the animated film Spies in Disguise towards the end of 2019. Then, he provided the voice of Jip the dog in the highly anticipated film Dolittle (2020) and then prepared himself for a prominent voice part in Pixar’s Onward.
Recent Roles
Holland featured in Antonio Campos’s 2020 Netflix psychological thriller The Devil All the Time, which is set in the aftermath of World War II, with co-star Sebastian Stan in The Avengers. Holland claimed that on his first day on set, he was terrified and anxious because he originally believed that he lacked the depth necessary to play a young orphaned man who goes on a murder rampage. Though it temporarily affected his mental health, he eventually relished performing the character because of Campos’ encouragement.
In 2021, Holland acted in three motion pictures. His debut film, the criminal thriller Cherry, reunited him with the Russo brothers, who are the filmmakers of the Avengers, and is based on the eponymous novel by American novelist Nico Walker.
He portrayed a college student who, after joining the army, suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and robs banks to support his drug addiction. Holland shaved his head and spoke with combat veterans receiving treatment for PTSD and drug misuse in order to get ready for the part. He also shed thirty pounds (14 kg), which he later gained again after shooting.
Holland provided the voice of Percy Pig for a string of commercials promoting Marks & Spencer’s holiday meal specials in November 2021. In Spider-Man: No Way Home, the follow-up, Holland played Peter Parker once more the following month. In 2021, Holland expressed doubts about playing Spider-Man again, especially when he is 30 in 2026, in an interview with GQ on his future as the superhero following No Way Home.
The next year, Holland made investments in Dogpound gyms and landed a major part in the film adaptation of Naughty Dog’s Uncharted video game series, playing the youthful, charming wealth seeker Nathan Drake. Holland performed bartending shifts at the London pub Chiltern Firehouse in order to prepare for sequences in which his character is the bartender.
Then, in the Apple TV+ miniseries The Crowded Room (2023), Holland executive produced and performed as a character based on Billy Milligan, drawing inspiration from the 1981 non-fiction book The Minds of Billy Milligan.
Personal Life
Holland is reticent to talk about his personal life and characterizes himself as a quiet individual. He is linked to Zendaya, who costarred with him in Spider-Man. Holland has talked of experiencing episodes of chronic sleepwalking and sleep paralysis from nightmares of photographers in his bedroom, feeling that the media’s attention to their relationship invaded his privacy. He became reliant on alcohol in social settings; therefore, he stopped drinking after participating in Dry January 2022.
