Dangerous to Know

Born in Chichester in 1988, Edward Speleers had a couple of close calls with fame before landing the lead in 2006's 'Eragon'. He very nearly found himself playing Peter in 'The Lion the Witch and The Wardrobe' before losing out to William Moseley. Ed was also lined up to appear as a young Hannibal Lecter in the then titled 'Behind the Mask' but again found himself ousted, this time by Frenchman Gaspard Ulliel.

When his time did come around, it was for the highly anticipated 'Eragon'. The phenomenal success of Christopher Paolini's rip-offs of everything from 'Lord of the Rings' to the Narnia books, managing to take in a bit of 'Star Wars' in between was down largely to it's youthful fan base of tween readers. Tween readers who were desperate for their new favourite fantasy to become the next big movie series.

A couple of rounds of auditions later and he'd quit his A-Levels and a role as Hamlet in a school production. “Next thing I knew, I was signing up for a movie. LA phoned my Dad, who told me, ‘You’ve got the part’ . . . I started yelling and screaming.”

After the release of the film and it's poor box office receipts it became apparent that the series ended with the beginning. The books, however, continue to grow beyond the originally planned trilogy with the third out soon and another in the pipeline.

After a year in the wilderness, Ed signed up Storm Models agency and did a couple of shoots with talented young photographer Kai Z Feng, Including one for an article in British gay mag Attitude.

Last seen playing both himself and hunk-about-Cornwall Jimmy Penwarden in show within a show, the surprisingly good, 'Moving Wallpaper/Echo Beach', Ed has gone quiet again. Here's to hoping we'll see more of him in the near future on screen and in print.