This Is England actor Stephen Graham awarded OBE for services to drama
Video report by ITV Granada correspondent Elaine Willcox
Merseyside-born actor Stephen Graham has been awarded an OBE for services to drama in the New Year Honours list.
The 49-year-old has won plaudits playing Irish, English and American criminals and police officers in Hollywood films and hit TV dramas across his three-decade career.
He starred in the crime comedy Snatch alongside Brad Pitt, as well as The Irishman, where he played mobster Anthony Provenzano alongside Al Pacino and Robert De Niro.
Graham also played criminals Stephen Shang in Gangs Of New York, Baby Face Nelson in Public Enemies and Al Capone in period crime drama series Boardwalk Empire.
He is perhaps best known for his role of short-fused English nationalist Andrew “Combo” Gascoigne in the 2006 film This Is England.
He later reprised the skinhead character in the Channel 4 series This Is England ’86, This Is England ’88 and This Is England ’90.
Graham has credited his fellow This Is England co-star and wife Hannah Walters for helping him following a suicide attempt during a period of despair in his early 20s.
Walters, who is also executive producer of an upcoming five-part series based on Boiling Point along with Graham, also helps him choose his roles.
Graham told a Bafta session: “I’m dyslexic, so I struggle. My missus actually reads the script and says whether or not I’m doing it. She’s made some good choices.”
He also stunned viewers with DS John Corbett’s shocking death on Line Of Duty in series five more than three years ago.
Corbett was killed off in the hit police drama as he tried to quit the group he was undercover with before getting his throat cut.
In 2022, Graham starred in the hard-hitting ITV drama The Walk In, the musical film Matilda, comedic police series Code 404 and had a role in hit BBC show Peaky Blinders.
He also starred in Help, set in a Liverpool care home, alongside Jodie Comer, with the Channel 4 film winning the International Emmy for TV movie/mini-series in November.
Hard-hitting prison drama Time, co-starring Sean Bean, also won best mini-series at the Bafta TV Awards this year.
Graham has also had roles in Sir Sam Mendes war film 1917, the Pirates Of The Caribbean series, crime drama White House Farm and spy film Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy.
He will star in an upcoming biographical drama about competitive American swimmers, Young Woman And The Sea, and Second World War historical drama Blitz along with Saoirse Ronan.
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