At just 15 years old, Owen Cooper has already written himself into television history as the youngest male winner of an acting Emmy. Yet, while his peers see him as a global star, Owen insists that his life back home in Warrington, Cheshire, remains as ordinary as ever.
Fresh from Los Angeles and the glittering Emmy ceremony where he triumphed for his role in Netflix’s Adolescence, Owen joked that his golden statue won’t be coming into school with him. Asked whether he’d show it off to classmates, he laughed: “This will get robbed in my school. No chance. I’m definitely not taking it in.”
Despite beating acting heavyweights like Javier Bardem, Rob Delaney and Peter Sarsgaard, Owen is still grounded. He continues to live with his carer mum Noreen, 52, and IT-worker dad Andy, 45, in the family’s modest £135,000 terraced home, where they’ve been for two decades. His brothers Ollie, 21, and Connor, 31, both electricians, joined him at the ceremony, cheering him on as he made Emmy history.
Neighbours say they aren’t surprised by his success but are certain fame won’t change him. “I was like, ‘Oh my God, he only lives next door but one!’” said 77-year-old June Shingler, who stayed up late to watch the ceremony on TV. Another neighbour, Madeline, 79, recalled how Owen once called her “Nan Mad” as a child and praised him as a “lovely boy from a lovely family.”
His journey to the big stage wasn’t glamorous. A football-mad teen, Owen used to fake being ill to skip school, but his natural ability eventually found a home at the Manchester drama school Drama MOB. Co-director Esther Morgan, who runs the school alongside Coronation Street star Tina O’Brien, said: “He’s always been watchable, very natural. We never imagined he’d be collecting an Emmy at 15 – it’s just incredible.”
Owen’s fee for Adolescence was reportedly under £40,000, far from the life-changing sums many assume. Still, his career is quickly accelerating: he’s already been cast as young Heathcliff in a new big-screen adaptation of Wuthering Heights alongside Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi.
For now, though, the Emmy-winning actor is back at his desk, revising for his GCSEs and lugging around a bag of homework – proving that even TV’s newest prodigy can’t escape schoolwork. As Owen put it, “When I started drama classes, I never dreamed I’d be here. It just shows if you step out of your comfort zone, anything is possible.”
