Talent and modelling agency Talent Management loves the story of Jeremy Irvine’s discovery almost as much as the film that made it possible…

When the Cambridge based, unknown actor gained an audition for box office smash War Horse he simply didn’t dare to believe that he may actually be offered the role and become an actor in a Steven Spielberg film. At the time of the audition Irvine had no previous film or TV experience and his part in a play had been less than inspiring. In a Scotsman.com interview he confessed in good humour: “I was a tree. I had no lines and my main job was to wave my branches. I think I was only there because I was cheap.”

The 21-year-old auditioned for War Horse alongside hundreds of other actors in a process that went on for weeks, before he found the unexpected success that led to his fast-track rise to fame. His experience just goes to show that dreams really can come true for talented people. “At no point did I think I’d get this part in War Horse. My agent would phone me up after each audition and the two of us would just say, ‘Well, this is great audition experience.’ That’s all it ever was. We never said, ‘God, what if we got this part?’ I wasn’t even getting called back for commercials, so that just wasn’t on the cards.” Little did Irvine know that Spielberg was looking for just the qualities he had to offer.

The brilliant, multi-award winning film director is quoted in the Daily Mail as saying: “We looked at hundreds of boys for Albert but nobody had the heart, or the spirit, or the communication skills that Jeremy had. I am very accustomed to working with people with no experience; look at the kids in ET and look at Christian Bale who had never made a movie before Empire of The Sun and who now has the sort of career that I think Jeremy could have.

“My job is to get real people to be themselves in front of the camera. The problem with a newcomer can be that they freeze when they see the camera or imitate the actors they admire and stop being themselves. My job is to return them to what I first saw in them. I didn’t want Jeremy to be a character actor; I wanted him to be the wonderful person that he is today. He did a wonderful job of playing himself.”

Irvine has told of his continued state of disbelief in a number of interviews since he gained the part as Albert Murpurgo: “Trying to explain where I am now, you have to start with where I was; playing a tree with no lines in a theatre show. I had been out of work for nearly two years and I was thinking playing a tree was as good as it got. To be in a movie with lines. For it to be a Spielberg film. To be one of the main characters; it’s all beyond my imagination really and I was completely freaked out! When we first started filming some of the actors had to calm me down, put their arms around me and remind me that it’s only a job. There is still a part of me that feels it’s just a dream.”

Talent Management is very happy for this young actor and wish him all of the continued success that he deserves!