Appearances

Title	Role	Year	Approx. Age
True History of the Kelly Gang	Ned Kelly	2019	27
Marrowbone	Jack	2017	25
Captain Fantastic	Bodevan	2016	24
How I Live Now	Eddie	2013	21
The Boys are Back	Harry Warr	2009	17
The Thief Lord	Riccio	2006	14
Johnny and the Bomb	Johnny Maxwell	2006	14
Peter Pan	Curly	2003	11

George MacKay was born in London, to Kim Baker, a costume designer, and Paul Christopher MacKay, an Australian-born stage and lighting designer. In 2002, MacKay was spotted at his school by an acting scout, who asked the then ten-year-old if he would like to audition for a role in Peter Pan (2003). He attended a workshop, quickly landing the part of one of the Lost Boys, Curly, in what was to be his first film.

He attended the Harrodian School, a private school located in London. Theodore Chester and Rupert Simonian, two of his co-stars from Peter Pan (2003), also attended the same school. In preparation for his role in Peter Pan, George and his fellow co-stars, and the other Lost Boys, received months of intensive training in stunts with swords and how to film choreographed fight scenes.

Soon after, he had small roles in an episode of Rose and Maloney (2002) and television drama Footprints in the Snow (2005). In 2005, at the age of thirteen, he won the role of Riccio in The Thief Lord (2006), the film adaptation of Cornelia Funke's best-selling children's novel. Later on, in the same year, he also was cast in the lead role of Johnny and the Bomb (2006), a BBC drama adapted from Terry Pratchett's novel of the same name.

In the 2008 film Defiance, MacKay played Aron, the youngest of the four Bielski brothers.

George spent an exciting 3 months in Thailand working with a great cast, including Chiwetel Ejiofor, Sophie Okonedo, and Tim Roth and while filming the HBO Movie Tsunami - The Aftermath. The Dickensian drama The Old Curiosity Shop followed in 2007, before a fantastic opportunity to work with Edward Zwick on Defiance, alongside Daniel Craig. George's career took another leap forward when he was cast in Scott Hicks' film The Boys are Back again with another "A" list actor Clive Owen.

MacKay has been called a method actor by multiple media sources. With his acting roles, MacKay stated that he wanted "as much as [he] can to try and explore different roles and different characters, that's important to [him]." Flaunt writer Elizabeth Aubrey stated that MacKay is "someone who knows all about big parts," as illustrated in his lead roles in Sam Mendes' BAFTA & Academy Award-winning 1917 and Justin Kurzel's daring True History of the Kelly Gang. Aubrey added that for Mackay, "going to extremes when preparing for a role isn't something new" and that his roles are "chosen by a desire to push the boundaries of storytelling, to ask challenging questions about identity, and leave audiences with more questions than answers via stories that start important cultural conversations"

His acting in the 2021 film Wolf was called "the best performance of his still-rising career." Here he plays a young man with ?species dysphoria? who believes he?s a wolf.

George resides in London with his family. In 2014 he was named as one of the European films' Shooting Stars by European Film Promotion.