Jared Leto
Birthdate: Dec 26, 1971
Birthplace: Bossier City, Louisiana, USA
The evolution of Jared Leto’s (birthname: Jared Joseph Leto) acting career—one he didn’t intend when he jumped into the film business—is from being a mere actor to a chameleonic screen presence. His first phase, which runs from 1995 and his feature debut in How to Make an American Quilt to Lonely Hearts in 2006, involved Leto establishing himself as an interesting supporting actor with the visible potential for leading status.
That came in 2007 when Leto played John Lennon’s assassin, Mark David Chapman, in Chapter 27, and continued with Leto top-lining Jaco Van Dormael’s ambitious fantasy, Mr. Nobody. Quite often, actors who win an Oscar experience a career dip; it even happened to such greats as George C. Scott after Patton (1970). Not for Jared Leto. His flamboyant performance as an ailing gay man in Dallas Buyers Club (2013), for which he won a flurry of awards, including the supporting actor Oscar, catapulted his worldwide status and visibility.
He joined The Suicide Squad (2016) as The Joker, the first time that character appeared in a movie not featuring Batman, then followed with a string of starring and supporting characters living on the dark side—Nick in the Yakuza-themed The Outsider (2018), killer Albert Sparma in The Little Things (2021), his reprise of The Joker in Zack Snyder’s Justice League (2021) and his controversial turn as Paolo Gucci in The House of Gucci (2021), which garnered both serious awards talk as well as a Razzie for worst performance of the year.
Jared Leto has steered a second career as band leader of a busily touring unit known as 30 Seconds to Mars (including directing and performing in over a dozen of the group’s music videos). He has a third career as an entrepreneur specializing in minority and majority investments in high-tech startups and diversifying in such brands as Blue Bottle Coffee, exemplifying how the current generation of movie stars has learned to expand their business away from the movies themselves.
Before he had movie ambitions, Jared Leto desired to be a visual artist. This led him to study at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, but his efforts to transfer to NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts failed when he was turned down. His education ended after he transferred to New York’s School of Visual Arts, from which he soon dropped out.
At this point, he set his sights on a movie career in Los Angeles, determining that doing some acting would train him to be a director. Leto’s first two years in Hollywood were in the TV business, most notably in My So-Called Life opposite Claire Danes (1994-1995). He stayed away from TV for the next 26 years until 2022, when he appeared as Adam Neumann in the streaming series, WeCrashed.
Leto solidified his position as a leading man with Morbius (2022), a dark-tinged entry in the Marvel Comics Universe co-starring Matt Smith, Adria Arjona, Jared Harris, Al Madrigal, and Tyrese Gibson under Daniel Espinosa’s direction, and which grossed $167.5 million for Columbia Pictures/Marvel Entertainment and Sony Pictures Releasing. Leto performed a voice role (as Hatbox Ghost) in Disney’s ride attraction adaptation, Haunted Mansion (2023), starring LaKeith Stanfield, Tiffany Haddish, Owen Wilson, Danny DeVito, Rosario Dawson, Dan Levy, and Jamie Lee Curtis under Justin Simien’s direction, but delivering a poor box office ($117.5 million), and as the star of Darren Aronofsky’s thriller, Adrift (2023). It marks Leto’s reunion with Aronofsky, who directed him in Requiem for a Dream in 2000.
Jared Leto starred in and was a producer on another Disney project, the third entry in the Tron saga, Tron: Ares (2025), co-starring Greta Lee, Evan Peters, Jodie Turner-Smith, Hasan Minhaj, Gillian Anderson, and Jeff Bridges under Joachim Rønning’s direction, and which was produced and released by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures.
Leto took the bad-guy role of Keldor/Skeletor in the MGM/Mattel Studios’ superhero movie, Masters of the Universe (2026), with Nicholas Galitzine, Camila Mendes, Alison Brie, Idris Elba, Morena Baccarin, James Purefoy and Kristen Wiig under Travis Knight’s direction, released wide by Amazon MGM Studios (North America)/Sony Pictures Releasing International (International).
Leto was a producer and star of director/writer Kemp Powers’s Cold War-era comedy-drama, Lunik Heist (date to be announced), co-starring John Mulaney and Lupita Nyong’o, and which was produced and released by Searchlight Pictures.
Personal life
Jared Leto was born in the small Louisiana town of Bossier City to parents Connie (Metrejon) Leto and Tony Bryant. When Leto was 12, his family lived briefly in Haiti where his mother Connie worked for a medical charity organization. He attended Philadelphia’s University of the Arts. He was engaged to Cameron Diaz from 2000 to 2002. Jared Leto has provided financial and physical aid to survivors of the disastrous 2010 earthquake in Haiti. Leto’s height is 5’ 11’’. His net worth is $90 million. He has never married and has no children.
Known For
Awards
Academy Awards, Best Supporting Actor (2014); Film Independent Spirit Awards, Best Supporting Actor (2014); Golden Globes Awards, Best Supporting Actor (2014); Los Angeles Film Critics Association, Best Supporting Actor (2013); nominee, National Society of Film Critics, Best Supporting Actor (2013); New York Film Critics Association, Best Supporting Actor (2013); three-time nominee and winner, Best Supporting Actor, Screen Actors Guild Awards (2014); People’s Choice Award, Toronto Film Festival, Best Documentary (2012);
Critics Choice Award
Critics Choice Awards
Independent Spirit Award
Film Independent Spirit Awards
Jared Leto Movies
actor
Previous (28)
- 2025 |
Tron: Ares
asAres
A highly sophisticated Program, Ares, is sent from the digital world into the real world on a dangerous mission.
- 2023 |
Haunted Mansion
asCrump
A single mom named Gabbie hires a tour guide, a psychic, a priest and a historian to help exorcise her newly bought mansion after discovering it is inhabited by ghosts.
- 2022 |
- 2021 |
House of Gucci
asPaolo Gucci
When Patrizia Reggiani, an outsider from humble beginnings, marries into the Gucci family, her unbridled ambition begins to unravel their legacy and triggers a reckless spiral of betrayal, decadence, revenge, and ultimately...murder.
- 2021 |
The Little Things
asAlbert Sparma
Kern County Deputy Sheriff Joe Deacon is sent to Los Angeles for what should have been a quick evidence-gathering assignment. Instead, he becomes embroiled in the search for a serial killer who is terrorizing the city.
- 2019 | A Day in the Life of America
- 2018 | The Outsideras Nick Lowell
- 2017 |
Blade Runner 2049
asNiander Wallace
Young Blade Runner K's discovery of a long-buried secret leads him to track down former Blade Runner Rick Deckard, who's been missing for thirty years.
- 2016 | Zedd: True Colors
- 2016 |
Suicide Squad
asThe Joker
A secret government agency recruits some of the most dangerous incarcerated super-villains to form a defensive task force. Their first mission: save the world from the apocalypse.
- 2015 | Jeremy Scott: The People's Designer
- 2013 | Dallas Buyers Clubas Rayon
- 2012 | Artifact
- 2009 | Mr. Nobodyas Nemo Adult
- 2007 | Chapter 27as Mark David Chapman
- 2006 | Lonely Heartsas Ray Fernandez
- 2005 | Lord of Waras Vitaly Orlov
- 2002 | Highwayas Jack
- 2002 | Panic Roomas Junior
- 2000 | Sunset Stripas Glen Walker
- 2000 |
Requiem for a Dream
asHarry Goldfarb
The drug-induced utopias of four Coney Island people are shattered when their addictions run deep.
- 2000 | American Psychoas Paul Allen
- 1999 | Black & Whiteas Casey
- 1999 | Girl, Interruptedas Tobias Jacobs
- 1998 | Basilas Basil
- 1998 |
Urban Legend
asPaul
A college student suspects a series of bizarre deaths are connected to certain urban legends.
- 1996 | The Last of the High Kingsas Frankie Griffin
- 1997 | Prefontaineas Steve Prefontaine
Facts About Jared Leto
O baby: Jared Leto was born at midnight.
Beautiful: Early in his career, in 1995, Leto was selected as one of People Magazine’s 50 Most Beautiful People.
AKA: Leto uses the pseudonym of Bartholomew Cubbins, inspired by Dr. Seuss, as a director of music videos and short films.
What’s in a name? : He adopted the surname of Leto from his adoptive father.
Music Man: Jared Leto leads his own band, 30 Seconds to Mars, with his brother Shannon Leto.
World Record: Leto’s band, 30 Seconds to Mars, is entered in the Guinness Book of World Records for performing the longest concert tour—300 shows across two years.
Extreme measures: Leto lost 28 pounds preparing for his role in Requiem for a Dream and 35 pounds for his Oscar-winning role in Dallas Buyers Club, but gained 62 pounds for the role of Mark David Chapman in Chapter 27 only to lose that weight with a liquid diet.
No joke: Jared Leto is the fourth actor to both win an Oscar and play the role of The Joker, following Jack Nicholson, Heath Ledger, and Joaquin Phoenix.
Near miss: Leto nearly never played the role of Rayon in Dallas Buyers Club, for which he won the Oscar for best-supporting actor. He had wanted to devote time to his band but then changed his mind to pursue the role.
Method man: Leto can use extreme measures to get into a character, such as watching endless hours of real-crime footage on YouTube in preparation for Suicide Squad.
Auto-didact: Jared Leto has done no actual acting training.
Businessman: Leto was an initial investor in home security company Nest before Google bought it, has been invested in over 50 high-tech firms and other companies such as Blue Bottle Coffee and owns four startups, including VIP experiences company, Adventures in Wonderland. These firms are organized under the umbrella company, The Sisyphus Corporation.
High-end tattoos: Leto’s many tattoos, all of them thematically connected to his band 30 Seconds to Mars, have been done by legendary tattoo artist Mark Mahoney.
Sexy: PETA named Jared Leto the sexiest vegetarian in 2014.
Minister: Leto is an ordained minister in the Universal Life church.
Model actor: He has served as the face of luxury brands Gucci and Carrera.
Home base: Leto’s 50,000 square-foot, 1.7-acre Los Angeles home is a former Air Force base homestead property on Lookout Mountain.
A new look: Leto started growing his hair long in 2016 to prepare for The Outsider, and hasn’t since cut his hair to its previously shorter length.
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