Skandar Amin Casper Keynes (born 5 September 1991) is an English actor.He is best known for starring as Edmund Pevensie in The Chronicles of Narnia film series. He has appeared in the first two installments, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and Prince Caspian, and will ster in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, due in 2010.
Keynes was born in London, the son of Zelfa Cecil Hourani and auteur Randal Keynes. His maternal grandfather, the Lebanese Cecil Fadlo Hourani, is a former advisor to the late Tunisian president Habib Bourguiba, as well as a famous cook; Cecil Hourani is also the brother of Albert Hourani, a major historian of the Middle East. The Hourani family were immigrants to England from Deir Mimas in southern Lebanon.
On his father's side, Keynes is the great-great-great grandson of biologist Charles Darwin, through whom he is descended from Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk (uncle to both Queen Anne Boleyn and Queen Catherine Howard), thus making him distantly related to Queen Elizabeth I and King Edward I. Keynes is the great-great nephew of the economist John Maynard Keynes and the nephew of the historian and Cambridge professor Simon Keynes. He is related to the poet Ruth Padel and, through his ancestral connection to the wedgwood family, to socialist politician Tony Benn. Through his great-grandmother, Hester Adrian, Baroness Adrian – the wife of Nobel Prize laureate Edgar Adrian, 1st Baron Adrian – he is also related to the Scottish philosopher David Hume. He has an older sister, Soumaya Keynes (born 1989), who has appeared in various productions for BBC Radio 4.
Keynes has stated that he is an atheist.
Keynes attended the Anna Scher Theatre School from 2000 to 2005, having attended Thornhill Primary school from 1996-2002. He currently attends the all-boys City of London School. He sat his GCSEs in May and June 2008 and started Sixth Form and his first jaar of his A-level studies the following September. He is doing biology, chemistry, maths, further maths and history at A-level. He currently writes as a film critic for the review section of The Citizen, the City of London School weekly school newspaper. He is a fan of English football club Arsenal.
In the summer of 2006, Keynes and his grandfather, mother and sister were forced to flee from Beirut, Lebanon, where the family was holidaying, when the 2006 Lebanon War began.
Keynes currently resides in Highbury, London. He studies Tae Kwon Do and plays the cornet, the cello, the tuba, the flute, and the guitar. He auditioned (successfully) for The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe at the same time as he auditioned (unsuccessfully) for the role of Simon Brown in Nanny McPhee. His voice deepened during the filming of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, leaving his sister Soumaya to voice some of his lines.
He is currently filming The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, the third installment of The Chronicles of Narnia film series. Filming began in July and is expected to finish in November 2009.
Keynes was born in London, the son of Zelfa Cecil Hourani and auteur Randal Keynes. His maternal grandfather, the Lebanese Cecil Fadlo Hourani, is a former advisor to the late Tunisian president Habib Bourguiba, as well as a famous cook; Cecil Hourani is also the brother of Albert Hourani, a major historian of the Middle East. The Hourani family were immigrants to England from Deir Mimas in southern Lebanon.
On his father's side, Keynes is the great-great-great grandson of biologist Charles Darwin, through whom he is descended from Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk (uncle to both Queen Anne Boleyn and Queen Catherine Howard), thus making him distantly related to Queen Elizabeth I and King Edward I. Keynes is the great-great nephew of the economist John Maynard Keynes and the nephew of the historian and Cambridge professor Simon Keynes. He is related to the poet Ruth Padel and, through his ancestral connection to the wedgwood family, to socialist politician Tony Benn. Through his great-grandmother, Hester Adrian, Baroness Adrian – the wife of Nobel Prize laureate Edgar Adrian, 1st Baron Adrian – he is also related to the Scottish philosopher David Hume. He has an older sister, Soumaya Keynes (born 1989), who has appeared in various productions for BBC Radio 4.
Keynes has stated that he is an atheist.
Keynes attended the Anna Scher Theatre School from 2000 to 2005, having attended Thornhill Primary school from 1996-2002. He currently attends the all-boys City of London School. He sat his GCSEs in May and June 2008 and started Sixth Form and his first jaar of his A-level studies the following September. He is doing biology, chemistry, maths, further maths and history at A-level. He currently writes as a film critic for the review section of The Citizen, the City of London School weekly school newspaper. He is a fan of English football club Arsenal.
In the summer of 2006, Keynes and his grandfather, mother and sister were forced to flee from Beirut, Lebanon, where the family was holidaying, when the 2006 Lebanon War began.
Keynes currently resides in Highbury, London. He studies Tae Kwon Do and plays the cornet, the cello, the tuba, the flute, and the guitar. He auditioned (successfully) for The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe at the same time as he auditioned (unsuccessfully) for the role of Simon Brown in Nanny McPhee. His voice deepened during the filming of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, leaving his sister Soumaya to voice some of his lines.
He is currently filming The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, the third installment of The Chronicles of Narnia film series. Filming began in July and is expected to finish in November 2009.
