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CALLUM TURNER IS ON TARGET

Before Callum Turner embraced acting, he wanted to be a footballer. In a sense, he still does. On screen, the 33-year-old British actor’s team spirit, humble charisma and physicality have proved vital assets, as they surely will again in two major incoming projects.

Turner will soon be seen slicing through the water in The Boys in the Boat, George Clooney’s Depression-era film about a university rowing crew. Shortly after, he’ll be found joining forces with exec producer Steven Spielberg for Apple TV+’s Masters of the Air, the high-flying sibling show to Band of Brothers and The Pacific.

He certainly put in the training to get here. Raised on a Chelsea council estate by his mum, a nightclub promoter, Turner has steadily amassed a body of work that showcases his sporting attributes and eye for director-driven material. After time spent modelling, he banked TV kudos in shows such as Glue. He was a likeable presence as director John Boorman’s alter ego in Hope and Glory follow-up Queen & Country, then a charismatic but cornered punk band frontman in Jeremy Saulnier’s blistering Green Room.

From here, he held his own as the cocky but unlikeable Anatole Kuragin amid a starry cast in TV’s War & Peace. Other period gigs have included Emma., where he played the caddish Frank Churchill, drawn to the role by director Autumn de Wilde’s fresh viewpoint. TV served him well again with his ambiguous ex-soldier in The Capture. Victor Frankenstein and Assassin’s Creed offered tentative blockbuster in-roads, before he brought his ensemble game to Theseus Scamander in the Fantastic Beasts sequels.

With his role as would-be writer Thomas in The Only Living Boy in New York, he also ticked off a bucket-list entry by acting with Jeff Bridges. In Masters…, he’ll join Barry Keoghan and Austin Butler, forming a holy trinity of young talent that shows how surely Turner is gathering pace. In any line-up, Turner thinks in terms of ‘team morale’, of ‘responsibility’ to his collaborators, drawing out the sporting angle. ‘Acting’s funny,’ he’s said. ‘When I started to get it, it felt the same as football – the desire, the performance, the result.’ Footie’s loss, acting’s gain.

THE BOYS IN THE BOAT OPENS IN CINEMAS ON 12 JANUARY 2024. MASTERS OF THE AIR IS ON APPLE TV+ FROM 26 JANUARY 2024.