Stephen Rea (born 31 October 1946) is an Irish film and stage actor. Rea has appeared in high profile films such as V for Vendetta, Michael Collins, Interview with the Vampire and Breakfast on Pluto. Rea was nominated for an Academy Award for his lead performance as Fergus in the 1992 film The Crying Game. Rea was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland, the son of a bus driver. One of four children in a working class Presbyterian family, he attended Belfast High School and the Queen's University of Belfast, taking a degree in English. Politically, Rea is a Protestant nationalist. Rea trained at the Abbey Theatre School in Dublin. In the late 1970s, he acted in the Focus Company in Dublin with Gabriel Byrne and Colm Meaney. During the broadcasting ban on Sinn Féin imposed by Margaret Thatcher's government, in order to cut the 'oxygen of publicity', it was interpreted that Sinn Féin members could not be heard making statements expressing the views of Sinn Féin, so Rea was one of many actors contacted to provide an actor's voice to get around that problem.