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present in his life. One of his earliest memories was spending every weekend and
school holiday with his maternal grandparents, who relocated from Trinidad and

Tobago in the 1970s among the early waves of Caribbean immigrants to the UK.

Kentish Town was a mostly working-class area when Ben-Adir was growing up, but

nearby neighborhoods were wealthier. “In my high school, I was in classrooms with
people who went off to Oxford and Cambridge. And I was also next to people who

went to prison before the age of 15 and who are not with us,” he explains. “So there
were definitely periods of my life where it was fucking really dangerous and rough

growing up around here. I came out on the lucky side.”

Kingsley Ben-Adir in New York, November 11, 2019.Paul Bruinooge / Getty Images

Ben-Adir became interested in acting as a young teen, when certain shows and

movies began grabbing his attention and triggering emotional responses. “I
remember watching Good Will Hunting and getting a lump in my throat, but I was at

the age where that wasn’t cool and I was glad no one was around.”

He was placed in a special drama class around the same time, created for students

who had difficulties concentrating or behavioral issues. He didn’t go to university,
instead remaining in Kentish Town, working with special needs kids and at a bar for

a couple of years. He kept hearing about institutions where you could study acting
and decided to enroll in the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London in his