The Fantastic Four has finally entered their Marvel era with new movie First Steps, and the film has an exceptional cast that includes two of Britain’s hottest upcoming stars — Vanessa Kirby and Joseph Quinn.
Kirby and Quinn make up half of Marvel’s first family, playing siblings Sue and Johnny Storm, who are also known by their superhero monikers The Invisible Woman and Human Torch due to their respective powers. The pair are joined by Pedro Pascal and Ebon Moss-Bachrach in the film, who play Sue’s husband Reed Richards and best friend Ben Grimm.
The British stars have been rising exponentially over the last few years, but both share interesting journeys to becoming the beloved actors we know and love today.
From The Crown to Sue Storm, Vanessa Kirby’s rise to fame
Vanessa Kirby began her career on stage, she is pictured in A Streetcar Named Desire with Gillian Anderson and Ben Foster in 2014. (PA)
Kirby may well be known as a TV and film star now, but she began her acting career on stage, treading the boards in several acclaimed performances long before she graced a screen.
The actor made her stage debut in 2010, landing not one but three standout roles in All My Sons, Ghosts, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Octagon Theatre Bolton. Her performances saw her gain a lot of interest in theatre circles, with The Guardian describing her as a “significant new talent” after she played Helena in the aforementioned Shakespeare play.
Kirby has shared her joy at starting out in theatre, telling Grazia that performing on stage in Bolton was “some of the happiest times of my whole life” because of how it allowed her to experiment and perfect her craft without “caring about whether you’re well-known or not”.
Vanessa Kirby’s breakout role was in The Crown where she starred as Princess Margaret. (Netflix)
Her TV debut was in BBC’s The Hour, she had a supporting role in the drama, which was led by Ben Whishaw, Dominic West, and Romola Garai. It told the story of the comings and goings of a fictional 1950s current affairs programme. She also starred in TV shows like The Frankenstein Chronicles with Sean Bean, and Agatha Christie’s Poirot with David Suchet.
Kirby slowly began making her mark in film, starring in 2013’s About Time and TV movie The Dresser alongside Ian McKellen and Anthony Hopkins. But it was in 2015 that Kirby became a household name after she took on the role of Princess Margaret in Netflix’s The Crown.
Tom Cruise and Vanessa Kirby in Mission: Impossible – Fallout (Credit: Paramount)
The actor’s performance as Queen Elizabeth’s younger sister received huge critical acclaim, and she became an overnight sensation and went on to win the Bafta for Best Supporting Actress in 2017. The role officially put her on the map, and her career was only going up from there.
2018 and 2019 saw Kirby make her mark on two iconic action franchises. She starred as villain Alanna Mitsopolis, aka the White Widow, in Mission: Impossible — Fallout, and played Hattie Shaw, the younger sister of Jason Statham’s Deckard Shaw, in Fast & Furious spinoff Hobbs & Shaw. In 2020, Kirby won Best Actress at the Venice Film Festival for her role in the critically acclaimed Netflix drama Pieces of a Woman.
Kirby had well and truly made it, and her star power was only further improved by her role as Josephine in Ridley Scott’s epic historical film Napoleon in 2023. She also went on to return as the White Widow in Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning before landing the role of Sue Storm in Fantastic Four.
Vanessa Kirby now stars as Sue Storm in The Fantastic Four: First Steps. (Marvel)
As well as acting, Kirby has launched her own production company, Aluna Entertainment, which she hopes will be able to create more space for women in the industry. In an interview with Harper’s Bazaar she said: “There have been so few female directors, female-led movies and female protagonists in the past, which means there are lots of spaces and genres in which we haven’t seen real, messy, human women onscreen before.
“That’s a mission of mine with the company – to put women onscreen who I feel are like me, rather than invincible.”
Joseph Quinn, Stranger Things and beyond
Joseph Quinn became a worldwide sensation when he starred as Eddie Munson in Stranger Things. (Netflix)
Quinn is one of the brightest young stars of the business, having finally made his breakthrough in the industry after starring in Stranger Things series 4 as Eddie Munson back in 2022.
Fame has been a strange thing for Quinn to contend with, he once told Esquire magazine, as he said of the life-changing role: “When the world starts behaving differently towards you, that’s a strange thing. I don’t think it’s ever something you get used to. I personally haven’t, and I don’t think I will.”
But the actor’s career began years before Stranger Things, as he landed his first major role in the BBC series Dickensian in 2015 where he portrayed Arthur Havisham. Quinn was transported to Hollywood soon after, landing a small role in Game of Thrones series 7 in 2017, but he returned to the BBC and ITV for shows like Howard’s End and Les Misérables. His other notable TV roles include Catherine the Great and Steve McQueen’s Small Axe.
The actor began his career on TV, building his career in shows like Catherine the Great and BBC’s adaptation of Les Miserables. (PA)
Quinn made his film debut in 2018 with the horror movie Overlord, which was led by fellow Marvel alum Wyatt Russell, and he also starred in the British thriller Hoard in 2019. His star power in movies came after he became a worldwide sensation in Stranger Things, though, as the majority of his film roles have been released in the wake of his debut in the Netflix series.
Speaking to GQ in 2024, the actor admitted landing the Netflix show has been life-changing: “Stranger Things changed my life professionally in ways I couldn’t imagine. It’s nuts, I don’t know how else to describe it.”
Joseph Quinn plays Emperor Geta in Gladiator II, one of his recent major movies. (Paramount Pictures).
Since then, the actor has made widely interesting choices onscreen, working alongside Ridley Scott in Gladiator II as sibling emperor Geta, co-leading A Quiet Place prequel Day One and appearing in Alex Garland’s profound Iraq War movie Warfare.
The actor has enjoyed being more selective in the wake of his newfound fame, telling Vogue in 2024 that he now wants to “tell stories that are confrontational, challenge people and don’t patronise the audience. That’s where film is at its most powerful.”
Joseph Quinn as Johnny Storm in The Fantastic Four: First Steps, he’ll reprise the role in the next two Avengers movies. (Marvel Studios)
Quinn isn’t one to rest on his laurels now that The Fantastic Four is out, no, because he is about to embark on an epic journey of a different kind — playing one of The Beatles.
The actor has been cast as George Harrison in Sam Mendes’ four-movie event alongside Paul Mescal, Harris Dickinson and Barry Keoghan. And after that, he also has Avengers: Doomsday and Secret Wars to star in, no biggie.
Fantastic Four: First Steps is out now in cinemas.