Pierce Brendan Brosnan was born on May 16, 1953, in Drogheda, County Louth, on the east coast of Ireland. He is the only child of May Brosnan and carpenter Thomas Brosnan. When he was an infant, his father abandoned the family, and his mother left for London to work as a nurse when Pierce was 4.
At age 11, he reunited with his mother and her new husband, moving to Scotland and later to London. He studied acting at the Drama Centre, graduating in 1975 and beginning his professional career on stage.
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Pierce Brosnan’s Early Career
He made his acting debut in the play Wait Until Dark and performed in the British premiere of Tennessee Williams’ The Red Devil Battery Sign. Brosnan also began making brief appearances in films and television shows, and in 1981, he landed his first role in the United States with the miniseries The Manions of America.
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Pierce Brosnan in ‘Nancy Astor’
Brosnan earned his first Golden Globe nomination for his portrayal of socialite Robert Gould Shaw II in the miniseries Nancy Astor, which depicted the life of the first woman to sit in the British Parliament. Although the series aired in Britain in 1982, it was not recognized at the Globes until 1985, when Brosnan received a nod for Best Supporting Actor.
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Pierce Brosnan’s Marriage to Cassandra Harris
Shortly after graduating from the Drama Centre, he met Australian actress Cassandra Harris. They married in 1980 and welcomed son Sean in September 1983. He also adopted Harris’ children from a prior marriage, Charlotte and Chris, after their father died.
In 1987, Harris was diagnosed with ovarian cancer, and after a four-year battle, she died on December 28, 1991.
“She has made me the man I am, the actor I am, the father I am. She’s forever embedded in every fiber of my being. She’s there with me every day. I was so blessed to have met someone like that,” Brosnan told PEOPLE in 1992, four months after his wife’s death.
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Pierce Brosnan in ‘Remington Steele’
He starred alongside Robin Williams and Sally Field in the hit 1983 comedy-drama Mrs. Doubtfire as Stu Dunmeyer, the boyfriend of Field’s Miranda Hillard. In 2025, Brosnan rewatched scenes of his old films with Vanity Fair, and he reflected on working with the late Williams, who died in 2014.
“He really was quite colorful, because the children weren’t there, and it was just Robin and myself, and he knew he had me in the crosshairs with his humor. I loved the man,” he recalled.
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Pierce Brosnan as James Bond
His most iconic role by far was his stint as the famed British Secret Service agent James Bond, whom he portrayed for four films between 1995 and 2002: GoldenEye, Tomorrow Never Dies, The World Is Not Enough and Die Another Day.
“You kind of have your own private work that you deal with as an actor in trying to portray this man,” he said of the character to GQ. “It’s pretty overwhelming, and then providing your own truthfulness. Can you make a truthful moment out of this scene?”
As for whether he would reprise the character, he told GQ, “How could I not be interested? But it’s a delicate situation now. I think it’s best to let sleeping dogs lie, really. … I think that it’s best left to another man, really. Fresh blood.”
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Pierce Brosnan’s Marriage to Keely Shaye Smith
In 1994, he met his second wife, journalist Keely Shaye Smith, by chance in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. She was scheduled to interview Ted Danson, and while the Cheers actor had been pulled away, she ran into Brosnan and introduced herself.
They married in 2001 and share two sons, Dylan and Paris, who have followed in their dad’s footsteps into the film industry.
“Watching someone grow up with you and grow old with you is a very spiritual journey,” Brosnan said of Keely to Fox News in 2023. “She allows me to go out into the wild blue yonder and do what I do as a man, as an actor — [she] always has.”
He continued, “Keely is a journalist, a reporter. She’s an artist in her own right. And as a woman, she has made a family for our sons.”
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Pierce Brosnan in ‘Mamma Mia!’
Brosnan portrayed Sam Carmichael in the classic 2008 musical Mamma Mia!, opposite Meryl Streep, Amanda Seyfried, Colin Firth and Stellan Skarsgård.
Apart from the “terror of singing,” Brosnan told IndieLondon in a joint interview with Firth and Skarsgård, “It was great fun. I had the time of my life from day one all the way to the end. … It was just wonderful to be in such company. It felt going to work every day and there was work to be done but Phyllida [Lloyd] really created this wonderful platform for us all to make fools of ourselves and support each other.”
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Pierce Brosnan as a Father
The actor is the father of five: Charlotte, who died of ovarian cancer in 2013, and Christopher, born in 1972, who were children of his first wife, the late actress Cassandra Harris; Sean, whom Brosnan and Harris welcomed in 1983; and his two sons, Dylan and Paris, with wife Keely Shaye Smith.
In 2015, Brosnan told The Herald he recognizes how fleeting life can be. “That’s why I enjoy my wonderful, beautiful family, my children and my grandchildren,” he said.
