AllMovie

An actor of remarkable intensity whether playing comedy, drama, or classical-stage roles, Marton Csokas first became familiar to stateside audiences as Borias on the hit television series Xena: Warrior Princess. And though American audiences may not have been privy to his early stage and screen work, his performance in The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring made him a familiar face. Born in New Zealand in June 1966, Csokas' early schooling didn't exactly encourage creativity, and the future actor didn't discover his passion for the stage and screen until his late teens. While studying literature and art history for a year at Canterbury and Christchurch, Csokas became involved with a writer's club and theater company before graduating from the New Zealand Drama School and co-founding the The Stronghold Theater. Steadily gaining experience and harboring a growing passion for classical-stage drama, the actor landed a role in the television series Shortland Street before making his feature debut in Jack Brown Genius (1994). Numerous small film roles followed, and, after becoming a recognizable star in his native country, Csokas began to familiarize himself with American television audiences with Xena and such small-screen features as The Three Stooges (2000). His experience in the fantasy world of Xena prepared him well for his role as Celeborn in the first Lord of the Rings movie in 2001, and American audiences later saw the versatile actor as a villainous criminal mastermind bent on world domination in XXX (2002). He appeared in director Alex Proyas' decidedly upbeat Garage Days the same year and in Richard Donner's time travel fantasy Timeline in 2003.