Ben Mendelsohn

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Ben Mendelsohn (April 3, 1969) is an Australian actor and musician.

Mendelsohn was born in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. His father, Frederick Mendelsohn, is a prominent medical researcher who heads the Howard Florey Institute in Melbourne. Ben and his 2 brothers Tom and David as well as his mother, Carole (deceased), a prominent registered nurse, lived in Europe and the US for long periods of time, and returned to Melbourne in high school. He took drama because he thought it was an easy class, and was the only one of his friends to follow up an audition for Crawford Productions which was being advertised.

After several early television roles, including The Henderson Kids, he attracted notice in his breakout film, The Year My Voice Broke (1987), winning him the Australian Film Institute Award for Best Supporting Actor. His next major role was in Idiot Box, in 1996, playing the angry Kev. In 2000 he was in two contrasting films, the Australian Mullet and the Hollywood Vertical Limit.

Like many in Australian film, Mendelsohn's relative longevity and occasional obscurity has been a blessing and a curse.

As of 2005, he is preparing to play Marc Antony in the Sydney Theatre Company-produced Julius Caesar, and he is in the Terence Malick-directed film The New World. He recently went into the TV series Love My Way, apparently to revive his screen career.

He also plays in a band.