Kodi Smit-McPhee

Kodi Smit-McPhee is an Australian actor who first gained prominence as a child performer in films such as The Road and Let Me In. Over the course of his career, he has appeared in major studio blockbusters, independent features, and animated projects, eventually earning widespread critical recognition for his performance in the 2021 Western drama The Power of the Dog.

Smit-McPhee was born on 13 June 1996 in Adelaide, South Australia. He was raised in a family involved in the entertainment industry; his mother is Sonja Smit, and his father, Andy McPhee, is an actor and former professional wrestler. His older sister, Sianoa Smit-McPhee, works as an actress and singer. At age sixteen, he was diagnosed with ankylosing spondylitis, a degenerative form of arthritis affecting the spine. The condition later led to a severe cataract that impaired the vision in his left eye while filming The Power of the Dog.

Smit-McPhee made his feature film debut in Romulus, My Father, earning the 2007 Australian Film Institute Award for Best Young Actor and a nomination for Best Actor. He achieved further international recognition for his starring role in the post-apocalyptic drama The Road (2009), receiving nominations for a Critics' Choice Award and an Australian Film Institute Award. He received an additional Critics' Choice nomination for his work in the 2010 film Let Me In. In 2012, he voiced Norman Babcock in the animated film ParaNorman, which was nominated for an Academy Award and a BAFTA Award, and appeared in Dead Europe, which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival.

In subsequent years, Smit-McPhee starred in projects such as The Wilderness of James, A Birder's Guide to Everything, and an adaptation of Romeo and Juliet as Benvolio. He expanded his filmography with roles in the science-fiction drama Young Ones, which screened at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, and the 2015 film Slow West. On television, he portrayed seventeen-year-old soldier Thomas "Tolly" Johnson in the 2015 historical drama miniseries Gallipoli.

In 2016, Smit-McPhee joined the X-Men franchise as Nightcrawler in X-Men: Apocalypse, taking over a role previously played by Alan Cumming. He later reprised the character in the 2019 feature Dark Phoenix. During this period, he also starred as Keda, an Ice Age youth who tames a wolf, in the 2018 survival drama Alpha.

Smit-McPhee earned significant acclaim for his role as a troubled teenager in Jane Campion's 2021 film The Power of the Dog, which debuted at the 78th Venice International Film Festival. His performance earned him a Golden Globe Award and a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. He has since appeared in the thriller miniseries Disclaimer, the biographical drama Maria, and provided the voice for Gilbert Pudel in the 2024 animated feature Memoir of a Snail.