What Is Bryan Brown’s Net Worth?
Bryan Brown is an Australian actor and producer who has a net worth of $10 million. Bryan Brown earned a Primetime Emmy nomination and a Golden Globe nomination for his performance in the 1983 miniseries “The Thorn Birds.” Bryan has more than 90 acting credits to his name, including the films “Breaker Morant” (1980), “Stir” (1980), “Give My Regards to Broad Street” (1984), “Rebel” (1985), “Cocktail” (1988), “Gorillas in the Mist” (1988), “Two Hands” (1999), “Along Came Polly” (2004), “Beautiful Kate” (2009), “The Light Between Oceans” (2016), and “Anyone but You” (2023), the miniseries “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea” (1997), “Journey to the Center of the Earth” (1999), “Old School” (2014), “Lessons from the Grave” (2014), “Let’s Talk About” (2015), “Faraway Downs” (2023), and “Boy Swallows Universe” (2024), and the television series “The Wanderer” (1994), “Bloom” (2019–2020), “Darby and Joan” (2022), and “C*A*U*G*H*T” (2023).
Brown produced “Beautiful Kate,” “Lessons from the Grave,” and “Let’s Talk About” as well as the films “F/X2” (1991), “Dead Heart” (1996), “Dirty Deeds” (2002), “Martha’s New Coat” (2003), “Cactus” (2008), and “Palm Beach” (2019), the TV series “Twisted Tales” (1996–1998), and the miniseries “Two Twisted” (2006). In 2005, he was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for “service to the community through a range of charitable organisations committed to providing assistance and support to families and young people and to the Australian film and television industry.” In 2023, a theatre in Bankstown, Sydney, was named the Bryan Brown Theatre & Function Centre in his honor.
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Early Life
Bryan Brown was born Bryan Neathway Brown on June 23, 1947, in Panania, New South Wales, Australia. His father, John (better known as “Jack”), was a salesman. His mother, Molly, studied at the Edith Paull Drama School and was a pianist and a house cleaner. Bryan has a younger sister named Kristine. Brown was an actuarial student at the financial services company AMP, which had a drama club. During a speech at ARTEXPRESS 2005 at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Bryan said of his time at AMP, “They invited staff to come down and audition for the end-of-year staff review, so I went down for something different. They gave me a piece of paper with a scene on it and asked me to read it. Funny thing happened when I did; I got this strange, overwhelming excitement that had only ever happened to me when I’d scored a try at football. True. I couldn’t wait to go to work each day after that – for the first time, let me tell you – so that I could go to rehearsal after work. I couldn’t explain it, but I wanted more of it. That day led to me becoming an actor, which I’ve been for the past 32 years.”
(Photo by Dominique Charriau/WireImage)
Career
In 1972, Brown went to England and was cast in minor roles at London’s Old Vic. After returning to Australia, he joined the Genesian Theatre in Sydney, where he appeared in “A Man for All Seasons.” In 1975, he performed in a Queensland Theatre Company tour of “The Rainmaker.” Bryan’s first film was 1975’s “Scobie Malone,” and he followed it with the short film “The Love Letters from Teralba Road” (1977) and the feature films “Third Person Plural” (1978), “The Irishman” (1978), “Weekend of Shadows” (1978), “The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith” (1978), “Newsfront” (1978), “Money Movers” (1978), “Cathy’s Child” (1979), and “The Odd Angry Shot” (1979). He appeared in the miniseries “Against the Wind” (1978), “A Town Like Alice” (1981), and “Eureka Stockade” (1984), and he played Luke O’Neill in the 1983 ABC miniseries “The Thorn Birds.” Brown earned nominations from the Primetime Emmys and Golden Globes for his performance, and the miniseries won a Golden Globe for Best Miniseries or Motion Picture Made for Television and a People’s Choice Award for Best TV Miniseries. In the ’80s, Bryan appeared in films such as “Breaker Morant” (1980), “Stir” (1980), “Far East” (1982), “Give My Regards to Broad Street” (1984), “The Empty Beach” (1985), “Rebel” (1985), and “The Good Wife” (1987), and in 1988, he co-starred with Tom Cruise and Elisabeth Shue in “Cocktail” and with Sigourney Weaver in “Gorillas in the Mist.” “Cocktail” grossed $171.5 million at the box office, and “Gorillas in the Mist” received a Golden Globe nomination for Best Motion Picture – Drama.
Brown played Adam/Zachary on the fantasy series “The Wanderer” in 1994, and he starred in the TV movies “Dead in the Water” (1991), “Devlin” (1992), “Age of Treason” (1993), “The Last Hit” (1993), “Full Body Massage” (1995), “Dogboys” (1998), and “On the Border” (1998) and the miniseries “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea” (1997) and “Journey to the Center of the Earth” (1999). He appeared in the films “Blood Oath” (1990), “Sweet Talker” (1991), “F/X2” (1991), “Dead Heart” (1996), “Dear Claudia” (1999), “Two Hands” (1999), “Grizzly Falls” (1999), “Dirty Deeds” (2002), “Cactus” (2008), “Australia” (2008), and “Beautiful Kate” (2009), and he co-starred with Ben Stiller and Jennifer Aniston in 2004’s “Along Came Polly,” which brought in $178.3 million at the box office. Bryan starred in the TV movies “On the Beach” (2000), “Revenge of the Middle-Aged Woman” (2004), “The Poseidon Adventure” (2005), and “Joanne Lees: Murder in the Outback” (2007), then he guest-starred on “The Good Wife” (2012) and appeared in the miniseries “Better Man” (2013), “Old School” (2014), “Lessons from the Grave” (2014), “Let’s Talk About” (2015), “Halal Gurls” (2019), “Hungry Ghosts” (2020), “Faraway Downs” (2023), and “Boy Swallows Universe” (2024). He played Ray Reed on “Bloom” (2019–2020), Jack Darby on “Darby and Joan” (2022), and Prime Minister Warren Whistle on “C*A*U*G*H*T” (2023), and he portrayed the Egyptian god Osiris in the 2016 film “Gods of Egypt.” Brown appeared in the films “Limbo” (2010), “Love Birds” (2011), “The Light Between Oceans” (2016), “Australia Day” (2017), “Palm Beach” (2019), and “Anyone but You” (2023), and he voiced Mr. Rabbit in 2018’s “Peter Rabbit.”
(Photo by Ron Galella, Ltd./Ron Galella Collection via Getty Images)
Personal Life
Bryan married Rachel Ward, his co-star in “The Thorn Birds,” on April 16, 1983. Before they began dating, Brown read Ward’s palm and predicted her future. He told “A Current Affair,” “So we were sitting around waiting for a take one day and I said ‘give us a look at your hand’… She gave me her hand and there were three lines and I said ‘you’re gonna have three kids.’ Well I was right, they were my kids.” The couple has welcomed daughters Matilda and Rosie and son Joe, and Matilda appeared in “Palm Beach” and wrote, directed, produced, and starred in the miniseries “Lessons from the Grave” and “Let’s Talk About” alongside Bryan. “Palm Beach” was directed by Ward.
Awards and Nominations
Brown has won Film Critics Circle of Australia Awards for Best Supporting Actor – Male for “Two Hands” (2000) and “Beautiful Kate” (2010), and he was honored with the organization’s Special Achievement Award in 1997. He has received seven Australian Film Institute Award nominations, winning for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for “Breaker Morant” in 2000 and “Two Hands” in 2009. Bryan earned a Primetime Emmy nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Limited Series or a Special and a Golden Globe nomination for Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Series, Miniseries or Motion Picture Made for Television for “The Thorn Birds.” He was inducted into the Logie Awards Hall of Fame in 1989, and he won Logie Awards for Best Lead Actor in a Miniseries/Telemovie for “A Town Like Alice” (1982) and Most Popular Actor in a Miniseries/Telemovie for “The Shiralee” (1989). Brown received the Chauvel Award at the 2000 Brisbane International Film Festival, and he was named CinefestOZ Screen Legend at 2012 CinefestOz. He won the Longford Lyell Award at the 2018 Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts Awards, and “Bloom” earned him nominations for Best Lead Actor in a Television Drama in 2019 and 2020.
