Sebastian Stan

Born in Soviet Romania in 1982, Sebastian Stan would later find global fame in the quintessentially American Marvel franchise, in which he portrays Bucky Barnes, otherwise known as the Winter Soldier.

After moving to the USA with his family in the early 90s, Stan was enrolled at the prestigious Mason Gross School of the Arts at New York’s Rutger’s University. As part of his studies, he took a year abroad in the UK, where he studied theatre in London’s West End.

On his return to the USA in the mid-00s, Stan soon began racking up screen credits, including a lead role in the campy teen thriller The Covenant, a small role in Darren Aronofsky’s Black Swan and a recurring TV part as The Mad Hatter in Once Upon a Time.

In 2011, Stan played Bucky Barnes for the first time in Captain America: The First Avenger. He would go on to be one of the lynchpin characters of the MCU, recurring in nine subsequent movies to date.

In between his Marvel commitments, Stan branched out into other roles, working with Ridley Scott in 2015’s The Martian, and Steven Soderbergh in the 2017 heist comedy Logan Lucky. In 2017 he won critical praise for his performance in I, Tonya, for which his co-stars Margot Robbie and Alison Janney both received Oscar nominations.

He also received strong reviews for his performance as rock star Tommy Lee in the 2022 mini-series Pam & Tommy. In 2024, with his MCU commitments winding down, he starred in two acclaimed films, the darkly comedic A Different Man and the Donald Trump biopic The Apprentice. For the latter, he received his first Academy Award nomination for Actor in a Leading Role.