http://www.theguardian.com/film/2013/dec/07/luke-evans-swaps-valleys-for-shire-hobbit
Born to a bricklayer and a cleaner in Aberbargoed, a tiny village in the Welsh valleys, Evans partly attributes his tenacity to his upbringing as a Jehovah's Witness. His family didn't celebrate birthdays or Christmas, and his education was miserable. "I was often looked at as a leper by kids at school, because I was a Jehovah's Witness. They didn't like it – you were 'weird'. And on Saturday mornings you'd be knocking at their doors. I remember standing there with my mum and dad, thinking, 'Oh my God, I know whose door this is, and I'll have to see them on Monday.' It was terrible."
Terrible but character building? "Well, I'm still here, and I'm smiling," he says, explaining that being bullied gave him thick skin and that having doors slammed in his face prepared him for rejection. "When I didn't get a job I thought, 'Don't worry, there'll be another one.' I still live by that now. Nothing really fazes me any more."
Evans had always wanted to sing, so at 16 he left school, quit the Jehovah's Witnesses and got a job to finance some singing lessons. He won a scholarship to The London Studio Centre, graduated in 2000 and rose up the theatrical ranks for nine years, starring in the likes of Rent and Miss Saigon. Then, off the back of Small Change at the Donmar Warehouse, he auditioned for the 2009 film adaptation of Dorian Gray. He didn't get the role, but his audition tape did the rounds in LA. "A lot of people said, 'Who's this guy? Where's he been?' That's how it all began."
