Dua Lipa’s new man Callum Turner’s rise from council estate and drug addiction to Hollywood hunk working with Spielberg
STROLLING in Beverly Hills with Dua Lipa on his arm, actor Callum Turner has more than one reason to look like he doesn’t have a care in the world.
Not only is the 33-year-old British star dating the Grammy-winning One Kiss singer, he is setting Hollywood alight with his performances in Steven Spielberg’s World War Two TV series Masters Of The Air and George Clooney’s latest movie The Boys In The Boat.
That’s quite a turnaround for the Londoner who admits he lost “four years of my life” to a heavy cannabis habit after his dreams of being a professional footballer bit the dust.
Callum could not be more different from Dua’s previous boyfriends Anwar Hadid, brother of model Gigi, and French director Romain Gavras — or the public school-educated actors who currently dominate much of this country’s film and television scene.
He grew up on a council estate, brought up by his single mum Rose, spent his evenings kicking a ball about with his mates and left school aged just 16.
Beautiful upbringing
But former model and DJ Callum is not one to complain about class privilege or to act as if he has a cross to bear.
The actor, who has also dated Oscar-nominated British actress Vanessa Kirby, said: “It was a tough upbringing in certain ways but also a brilliant, beautiful upbringing in others. There was a lot of love in my life and community.”
There is often an expectation that someone like Callum, from Chelsea in West London, will be posh, because it is Britain’s richest borough.
But there are council estates dotted among the streets of multi-million-pound mansions, and Callum grew up on one of those.
He said last month: “I am a working-class kid from an estate in Chelsea. One thing about working-class people is that they are aspirational and want to better themselves, no matter what.”
Callum’s mum Rose, who he has described as his “best friend”, clearly helped to give him that positive attitude.
She wanted to be an actress, but instead went into promoting nights at clubs such as London’s legendary Ministry of Sound.
Callum described his relationship with his dad as “loose” and says that instead his father figures “were a lot of different gay guys”.
His mum’s pals included Culture Club singer Boy George and the equally flamboyant Steve Strange, frontman of synth-pop band Visage.
Steve, who died in 2015 aged 55, lived “on and off” in the Turner household and was godfather to Callum, who recalled: “Living with Steve was brilliant — him screaming at my mum, ‘Don’t wear that out. Everyone’s going to see you and they’ll take the p*** out of me’.”
At school Callum had little interest in acting, instead dreaming of playing for his favourite team, Chelsea.
He described his happy childhood as “running around and playing out, football till all hours” — although his “strict” mum made sure he was back inside by 10pm.
After Callum left school he played semi-professionally for a lower- league side, but by 17 he realised he was not going to make it as a footballer and got more interested in DJing on club nights.
He once told the capital’s Time Out magazine: “I’ve been going out with my mum since I was 16. It surprised my friends at the time, but now they think it’s cool.
“I got into DJing through going out with my mum and through my love of music.”
When he turned 18 in 2008 Callum began to focus on acting, taking drama courses and appearing in his first short film in 2010.
To pay his rent between acting projects he worked three jobs, two in shops and another in a bar.
At around the same time he became a model, working in Japan and fronting one of posh label Burberry’s campaigns in 2011.
But Callum also started to get mixed up with drugs, smoking cannabis from 18 until he was 26.
He has admitted: “I was a big stoner. I used to smoke so much weed. I was dealing with a depression or a frustration, and not having the understanding or the tools to deal with how I felt, so I self-medicated for too long.
“I was acting, doing films, and smoking weed every day. I never smoked on set but as soon as I got home I was like a real addict.
“I definitely missed four years of my life.”
During this period he worked on TV dramas such as Ripper Street and War And Peace, and had a number of minor roles in movies including Victor Frankenstein in 2015.
Giving up drugs does appear to have supercharged his career, because afterwards he won the lead role alongside Kate Beckinsale in The Only Living Boy In New York in 2017.
He followed that success by being cast as the heroic Theseus Scamander in JK Rowling’s Harry Potter prequel Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes Of Grindelwald in 2018.
By then he was in a serious relationship with Vanessa Kirby, who he had met while making the 2014 film Queen And Country.
She called him “my best friend” but work commitments killed off the romance four years ago.
Matching jeans
Since then their careers have soared, with Vanessa most recently starring in Sir Ridley Scott’s epic Napoleon as Empress Joephine.
Last month Callum began dating Dua, just as his two biggest projects so far were released.
They were spotted together at the Los Angeles premiere of the Apple TV+ series Masters Of The Air, which is produced by Spielberg and stars Elvis actor Austin Butler.
Dua, 28, was then spotted going for food with Callum and their friends in the city, then on Tuesday they grabbed a coffee and a kiss on a Beverly Hills street, with the pair both wearing matching faded jeans and white tops.
Previously Dua had been dating Romain, 42, who followed his father Costa-Gavras into directing movies.
It is very unlikely you will hear Callum confirm his new romantic entanglement because he has never commented on his other halves.
Unlike many young stars he doesn’t even have a presence on social media. Instead he is letting his work do the talking.
For the role of real-life American Olympic gold medal-winning rowing hero Joe Rantz in his new film The Boys In The Boat, Callum had to learn to be an oarsman.
The dedicated actor said: “We rowed for four hours a day, every day, for the first two months and then an hour after filming.”
While the movie, which was directed by Clooney, received a lukewarm reception from critics, Callum’s performance as the lead was praised, with The Sun describing him as “a gem to watch”.
Reviewers have been far more fulsome in their praise of Masters Of The Air, which received an 84 per cent positive rating on the Rotten Tomatoes review website.
For the miniseries Callum again had to take on the part of a true hero, playing American B-17 Flying Fortress pilot John C Egan, who risked his life on bombing raids over Nazi military targets during World War Two.
It brought back memories of his own grandfather’s brave decision to go off to fight the Nazis while he was still a schoolboy.
I’m a working class kid from an estate in Chelsea. One thing about working class people is they are aspirational and want to better themselves, no matter what.
Callum Turner
Callum said: “My grandad was 16 years old when he went to war.
“He came back from school with a piece of paper and got his mum to sign it.
“She thought it was for a school trip but actually it was a permission form for him to join the Army.
“And he went. He ended up in a prisoner of war camp, but he came back.”
Now Callum’s ambition is to become such a big name in the film industry that he can get any movie made, just by agreeing to take part in it.
And he doesn’t think his working-class background will hinder those dreams.
He said: “It was the modelling that people had a hang-up over. It wasn’t about where I was from.”
