Adam Douglas Driver (born November 19, 1983) is an American actor, recognized for his collaborations with auteur filmmakers. Driver made his film debut in J. Edgar (2011) and played supporting roles in Lincoln (2012), Frances Ha (2012), Inside Llewyn Davis (2013) and While We're Young (2014) before gaining wider recognition for his portrayal of Kylo Ren in the Star Wars sequel trilogy (2015–2019).

He won the Volpi Cup for Best Actor for a leading role in Hungry Hearts (2014) and received consecutive Academy Award nominations for Best Supporting Actor for playing a Jewish police officer infiltrating the KKK in BlacKkKlansman (2018) and Best Actor for his role as a theater director going through a divorce in Marriage Story (2019).[1] Driver garnered further acclaim for portraying the titular character in Paterson (2016), Father Francisco Garupe in Silence (2016), Jacques le Gris in The Last Duel (2021), and Enzo Ferrari in Ferrari (2023).[2] He has also acted in films such as Logan Lucky (2017), The Report (2019), Annette (2021), House of Gucci (2021), and Megalopolis (2024).

His breakout performance was as an emotionally unstable actor in the HBO television series Girls (2012–2017), for which he received three consecutive Primetime Emmy nominations. On stage, Driver made his Broadway debut in Mrs. Warren's Profession (2010) and subsequently acted in Man and Boy (2011) and Burn This (2019), the later of which earned him a nomination for the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play.

Driver is a veteran of the U.S. Marine Corps.[3][4] He also was the founder of Arts in the Armed Forces, a non-profit that provided free arts programming to American active-duty service members, veterans, military support staff, and their families worldwide.[5]

Early life Driver was born in Fontana, California, on November 19, 1983.[6][7] He is the son of Nancy Wright (née Needham), a paralegal, and Joe Douglas Driver.[8][9] His father's family is from Arkansas, and his mother's family is from Indiana. His family moved to San Diego, where Driver spent time with them until he was seven years old.[10][11] After his parents were divorced, Driver and his mother moved to Mishawaka, Indiana, where he was primarily raised by his stepfather, Rodney G. Wright, a Baptist minister.[12][13] Driver graduated from Mishawaka High School in 2001, while spending time with his older sister and mother at their hometown.[14][15] Driver was raised Baptist, and sang in the choir at church.[16]

Driver has described his teenage self as a "misfit"; he told M Magazine that he climbed radio towers, set objects on fire, and co-founded a fight club with friends, inspired by the 1999 film Fight Club.[17] Throughout high school, he was active in choir and theater, participating in school productions of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, Into the Woods, and Guys and Dolls.[18] He applied to Juilliard School for drama knowing that they would not look at his grades from high school, but was not accepted.[19] After high school, he worked as a door-to-door salesman selling Kirby vacuum cleaners and as a telemarketer for a basement waterproofing company and Ben Franklin Construction.[20]

When Driver was eighteen, he attempted to start his acting career in Los Angeles, leaving Indiana by car and breaking down in Amarillo, Texas. He spent his money repairing his car only to make it to Santa Monica, where he lived in a hostel for two days and was scammed by a real estate agent he paid to find him an apartment. He realized he did not have enough money to live, returning to Indiana after only a week away from home.[21]

Shortly after the September 11 attacks, Driver enlisted in the United States Marine Corps.[6] He was assigned to Weapons Company, 1st Battalion, 1st Marines as an 81mm mortar man.[22] He served for two years and eight months, before fracturing his sternum while mountain biking.[23] He was medically discharged with the rank of Lance Corporal.

Subsequently, Driver attended the University of Indianapolis for a year before auditioning again for Juilliard, this time succeeding. He got the news he was accepted while at work at the Target Distribution Center in Indianapolis. Driver has said that his classmates saw him as an intimidating and volatile figure, and he struggled to fit into a lifestyle so different from the Marines.[17] He was a member of the Drama Division's Group 38 from 2005 to 2009, where he met his future wife, Joanne Tucker. He graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in 2009.[24]

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Driver