Rory McCann

Rory McCann is a Scottish actor born on 24 April 1969 in Glasgow. He gained wide recognition for playing Sandor "The Hound" Clegane in the HBO series Game of Thrones. He is also known for portraying Michael "Lurch" Armstrong in the 2007 film Hot Fuzz, Jurgen the Brutal in Jumanji: The Next Level, and voicing Megatron in the animated series Transformers: EarthSpark.

Prior to embarking on his career in acting, McCann attended the Scottish School of Forestry located near Inverness. He subsequently held a variety of physical jobs, working as a landscape gardener, carpenter, painter, and bridge painter on the Forth Road Bridge. He received his initial formal drama training in 1998 from writer and artist Robert Parsifal Finch at The Actor's Workshop in Glasgow. His sister, Sally-Gay McCann, who was born in 1972, works in film and television as a costume professional.

McCann made his screen debut as an extra on the 1988 feature film Willow, from which he was fired for laughing during takes. He later gained broader recognition after appearing in an advertisement for Scott's Porage Oats, wearing a kilt and vest. His major acting breakthrough came in 2002 when he starred as a disabled personal trainer in the television comedy-drama The Book Group, a performance that won him the Scottish BAFTA for best television performance of 2002.

Following his television breakthrough, McCann took on several dramatic roles, playing Detective Inspector Stuart Brown in State of Play, Peter the Great in Peter in Paradise, and a priest in the comedy-drama Shameless. He made his Hollywood feature debut in the 2004 historical epic Alexander, a project requiring desert training in Africa alongside filming in Thailand, Morocco, and London. His subsequent projects included playing Michael "Lurch" Armstrong in Hot Fuzz, Moby in the 2008 film The Crew, and Attila the Hun in the docudrama series Heroes and Villains.

McCann achieved widespread acclaim for portraying Sandor Clegane across seven of the eight seasons of HBO's Game of Thrones. He collaborated with his sister on both Game of Thrones and Alexander. He also appeared in the Jimmy McGovern BBC period drama Banished as an 18th-century blacksmith named Marston in Australia. In 2022, he took on the role of narrator for the ITV1 series DNA Journey, and was later cast to succeed the late Ray Stevenson as Baylan Skoll in the second season of the Star Wars series Ahsoka.

In addition to his acting career, McCann was formerly the lead singer for the musical group Thundersoup, and he plays the piano, guitar, banjo, and mandolin. In 1990, he suffered multiple broken bones in a severe rock climbing accident in Yorkshire. Politically, he has shown support for the Scottish Green Party, featuring in a party election broadcast during the 2007 Scottish Parliament general election.

McCann is known for choosing a solitary and mobile lifestyle, frequently residing on a boat or in dwellings without modern conveniences. In 2006, he traveled to Iceland with actor Gerard Butler to attend the premiere of Beowulf & Grendel. He subsequently remained in Iceland for a year, working as a carpenter and spending part of that time living in a tent after losing his housing.