You have reached Jim-Sturgess.com, a growing resource for the talented British actor known from his work in the films Across the Universe, The Other Boleyn Girl and 21. Up next is Crossing Over due out August 22 (US). Here we will keep you up to date with all the latest news, media downloads and information. Bookmark us and check back often for the latest on Jim Sturgess!
At this time last year, most people in the States hadn’t even heard of Jim Sturgess. Twelve months later, he seems to be in every other movie. He stole hearts in Across The Universe, stole scenes in The Other Boleyn Girl, and is about to steal some cash in 21l, the sort-of-true story of Jeff Ma and his team of MIT students that broke the banks in Las Vegas with their card-counting system. Sturgess plays Ben Campbell, an exceptionally smart student who happens to be struggling financially and is handed a way to pay for his dream of Harvard Law School and then some. Ben has a head for math and he becomes the leader of a team of students who have an elaborate card-counting system at the blackjack tables in Vegas. The 26-year-old Sturgess is quickly becoming one of the hottest actors on either side of the pond with co-starring roles with Harrison Ford, Sean Penn, Ray Liotta, Rose McGowan, and Ben Kingsley all coming up before the end of the year. And there’s still a chance he might star in a musical stage version of Spider-Man, with songs by Bono and The Edge and direction by Universe helmer Julie Taymor. Sturgess spoke about the musical, his research in Vegas, the rush of gambling, why so many people responded negatively to Across The Universe, and much more when he sat down with The Deadbolt recently while doing press for 21l. We kept the cards off the table.
The Deadbolt: When you’re considering a project, what’s most important to you - the overall story, your character, or the collaborators?
The last thing British actor Jim Sturgess wants is to become a teen poster boy. That may be too late to fret over. He already is in North America after his Jude character in last year’s Across the Universe scored with the under-20 crowd of mostly females.
While his latest portrayal is less fanciful, Sturgess has lots of swooning heartthrob moments in 21, which opens in theatres in a few weeks.
In the movie, Sturgess plays a brainiac MIT student who is led by one of his professors (Kevin Spacey) on card game sojourns to Las Vegas where their
card counting earns the gang millions.
When producer Kevin Spacey and director Robert Luketic went looking for the all-American boy for their film 21, they assumed they would find someone, well, American. But not surprisingly in a film industry that has so many Brits, Canadians, Irish, and Australians playing Yankee Doodle dandies, their best bet was an Englishman with what Luketic calls “a really bad audition tape”.
Across the Universe’s Jim Sturgess was working on The Other Boleyn Girl when his agent told him that Spacey and Luketic were auditioning actors to play an MIT math genius who joins up with a math professor and some other students to count cards and win millions in Las Vegas. The actor they were looking for had to be believable as a nerdy mathematician and, eventually, as an expert card player who loves the life of a successful gambler. (The movie opens in Vancouver on March 28.)
With a breakout role embodying a character inspired by a Beatles song, Hollywood was bound to take notice of Jim Sturgess.
Jim burst on the scene last fall in Julie Taymor’s Across the Universe, playing Jude, a young English man who travels to America in hopes of finding his estranged father. Jim wowed audiences in this powerful musical love story set in the tumultuous 1960s. He belted out classic Beatles songs and won the heart of the character Lucy, played by Evan Rachel Wood.
Jim would travel back to old England for his next role in The Other Boleyn Girl, playing opposite Scarlett Johansson, Natalie Portman and Eric Bana.
Jim Sturgess has become a hot commodity in Hollywood these days. After the big musical hit Across the Universe, he’s joined up with Kevin Spacey and Kate Bosworth in Columbia Pictures’ 21!
Next, he’s rumored to be reuniting with Universe director Julie Taymor for a turn on Broadway in Spider-man the Musical.
At the 21 junket this week in Las Vegas, Sturgess talked about the project a bit to the IESB during an interview that included 21 co-stars Kevin Spacey and Kate Bosworth.
IESB: Jim, rumors are rampant that you will be working with Julie Taymor again in Spider-man the Musical…
21 (2008) 
