Biography

Alexander Richard Pettyfer was born on April 10, 1990 in Stevenage, Hertfordshire, England, United Kingdom to Richard Pettyfer and Lee Robinson. He moved with his mother to Windsor as a child after his parents divorced. He has a half-brother James. As a child, Alex had a passion to be a Formula 1 driver until he found his love of acting, which he was encouraged to pursue by his mother, as both she and Richard were former actors. While he was attending a private school, his mother found him an audition for a television movie called Tom Brown’s Schooldays, where he would win the starring role at the age of 13.

In 2005, Tom Brown’s Schooldays premiered on British television and soon after, he would earn the role of Alex Rider for the 2006 action film Stormbreaker, based on the Alex Rider novels. Alex starred opposite such names as Ewan McGregor, Mickey Rourke, and Alicia Silverstone. He was a nominee for Best Performance in an International Feature Film at the 2007 Young Artist Awards and Best Male Newcomer at the Empire Awards for his performance. He would next play Emma Roberts’ love interest in the 2008 teen comedy Wild Child as Freddie Kingsley, followed closely by the teen thriller Tormented where he played Bradley. During this time, Alex ended up modeling for a couple of campaigns for Burberry between roles.

He became the 2010 winner of the Male Star of Tomorrow Award at the ShoWest Convention before the release of his upcoming films. I Am Number Four was released in February 2011, based on the sci-fi novel by the same name, followed closely by Beastly where he played Kyle Kingston opposite Vanessa Hudgens, following a teenager who is turned into a Beast and has one year to find someone to love him. The film was also based on a novel, a new telling of the story Beauty and the Beast. Unfortunately, because the novels were still fairly new, the films didn’t gain any traction from a fanbase from the books. Later that year, Alex’s next role came as Fortis in the Justin Timberlake sci-fi thriller In Time, where he dipped his toes into being an antagonist on screen.

His next project came in 2012 with Steven Soderbergh’s Magic Mike, starring Channing Tatum and Matthew McConaughey. Though it was filmed as an indie, the film went on to gross over $167 million worldwide, skyrocketing Alex into stardom, though came down quickly as he would later confess that nobody wanted to work with him because he was a “little shit” on set. The next year, he worked on Lee Daniels’ The Butler as Thomas Westfall, which followed Cecil Gaines as he served eight presidents as the butler of the White House. The film earned Alex and his cast mates a 2013 Screen Actors Guild Award nomination for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture. 2014 brought a new telling of the 1981 romantic drama Endless Love, where he portrayed David Elliot opposite Gabriella Wilde. The film grossed nearly $35 million worldwide.

Alex expressed in an interview with Oxford Union that he was no longer enjoying acting anymore and decided to take a bit of a break. That was until he pitched Jennifer Lopez a story of Griselda Blanco, the cocaine queen, where she agreed to co-produce. From that moment, he wanted to contribute to the production of his projects.

In 2016, Alex portrayed Jerry Schilling in Elvis & Nixon, starring Michael Shannon as Elvis Presley. The film follows the untold story behind the meeting between Elvis and President Nixon, resulting in this revealing, yet humorous moment immortalized in the most requested photograph in the National Archives. He began moving back to indie storytelling in 2017 with The Strange Ones, where he portrayed Nick in a crime drama following the mysterious events surrounding two brothers as they travel around America. With his next film, he was fortunate enough to not only produce and star, but Alex was given the chance to direct Back Roads, which released in 2018, following a brother having to take care of his younger sisters after their father was killed. The film was the Best Feature winner at the 2018 Rhode Island International Film Festival. For the Urban Myths series, he portrayed Tony Curtis in an episode revolving around Some Like It’s Hot with Gemma Arterton as Marilyn Monroe. Later in 2018, Alex starred as Stephen Underwood in The Last Witness, where he also served as a co-producer. He would go on to win the Best Actor award at the Los Angeles International Film Festival as well as the Nightlight Impact Awards for his performance.

2019 brought Alex his first multi-episode appearance on the Netflix mini-series The I-Land as Brody. The sci-fi drama follows ten people who wake up on a treacherous island with no memory of who they are and how they got there, they set off on a trek to try to get back home, only to discover the world is not as it seems. He would follow that up by lending his voice in 2020 to the character Troy in an episode of Family Guy. He reunited with Michael Shannon, and Patrick Scharzenegger for the crime drama Echo Boomers, which he also executive produced. 2021 brought Collection, following grieving father grapples with the seedy, manipulative world of high stakes debt collection while struggling to shed the tragedies of his past. The same year, he appeared in Agata Alexander’s sci-fi thriller Warning which starred Thomas Jane, Patrick Schawrzenegger, Kylie Bunburry, and also featured his father, Richard.

In 2022, Alex executive produced and appeared opposite Guy Pierce in The Infernal Machine. The following year, Alex produced the drama Marianne which follows Isabelle Huppert’s tour de force–her first one-character film, and a spectacular showcase for one of the greatest actresses in film history. He also starred in the sci-fi action film Black Noise as Jordan alongside Jackson Rathbone, following members of an elite security team deployed to rescue a VIP on an exclusive island. 2024 was a busy one for Alex, as Sunrise, 5lbs of Pressure, and Chief of Station were all released on streaming platforms. He was also part of a studded core cast for Guy Ritchie’s World War II action comedy The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare. He starred as Geoffrey Appleyard alongside Henry Cavill, Henry Golding, Alan Ritchson, and Hero Fiennes Tiffin. The film grossed over $27 million worldwide, yet quickly finding its second life on streaming platforms through the spring and summer.

Alex’s upcoming projects include Under the Stars, a romantic comedy following a novelist stuck in a passionless relationship. When he travels to Italy, he finds the girl of his dreams. The film also stars Tim Fellingham and Toni Collette and is currently in post-production. He is also executive producing The Godmother, the story of the rise and fall of The Cocaine Queen Griselda Blanco, with Jennifer Lopez. The film is currently in pre-production and will also star Jennifer Lopez.

Alex shares one child, Luca, with ex-wife Toni Garrn.