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James Dominic Frain (born 14 March 1968) is an English stage and screen actor. He is possibly best known for his role in the Showtime series The Tudors in which he appeared as Thomas Cromwell from 2007 to 2009, and for his role as vampire Franklin Mott in season three of the HBO drama True Blood, as well as his role of Chief Magistrate Gérard de Villefort in The Count of Monte Cristo. Frain was born in Leeds, West Yorkshire, and raised in Bishop's Stortford, Hertfordshire, the eldest of eight children of a teacher mother and stockbroker father. He was educated at Newport Free Grammar... MORE

James Dominic Frain (born 14 March 1968) is an English stage and screen actor. He is possibly best known for his role in the Showtime series The Tudors in which he appeared as Thomas Cromwell from 2007 to 2009, and for his role as vampire Franklin Mott in season three of the HBO drama True Blood, as well as his role of Chief Magistrate Gérard de Villefort in The Count of Monte Cristo. Frain was born in Leeds, West Yorkshire, and raised in Bishop's Stortford, Hertfordshire, the eldest of eight children of a teacher mother and stockbroker father. He was educated at Newport Free Grammar School, studied English, Film and Drama at the University of East Anglia and trained as an actor at the Central School of Speech and Drama in London. While in his final year there he made his film debut in Shadowlands (1993) as a result of being spotted by Richard Attenborough and has had a successful film career on both sides of the Atlantic ever since. Skilled at accents and capable of playing a large variety of roles, he was nominated for Best Actor at the 1995 Venice Film Festival for his performance as a Northern Irish terrorist in Thaddeus O'Sullivan's controversial Nothing Personal (1995) and LESS