Skandar Keynes is an English political adviser and former actor. Best known for starring as Edmund Pevensie in the Chronicles of Narniafilm series since 2005, he appeared in all three installments, ,Prince Caspian, and most recently ,which was released on 10 December 2010.
On his father's side, Keynes is of English descent, and is the grandson of physiologist Richard Keynes, the nephew of two Cambridge professors, the historian Simon Keynes, and the neuroscientist Roger Keynes, the cousin of Catholic writer and apologist Laura Keynes, and the great-great-nephew of economist John Maynard Keynes. His great-great-great-grandfather was naturalist Charles Darwin. Keynes' great-grandparents were Nobel Prize laureateEdgar Adrian, 1st Baron Adrian and Hester Adrian, Baroness Adrian. On his mother's side, Keynes is of Lebanese, Persian and Turkish descent. His maternal grandfather was Lebanese writer Cecil Fadlo Hourani, who was an advisor to the late Tunisian president Habib Bourguiba. The Hourani family were immigrants to Manchester from Marjeyoun in southern Lebanon. Cecil's two brothers were Albert Hourani, a historian of the Middle East, and George Hourani, philosopher, historian, and classicist. His maternal grandmother, Furugh Afnan, was the great-granddaughter of Bahá'u'lláh, founder of the Bahá'í Faith, making Skandar a great-great-great-grandson of Baha'u'llah. The nickname Skandar is Proto-Iranian for the Greek name "Alexander", or is short for "Iskandar," an Arabic variant.) Lebanese nationality law states that citizenship is passed on patrilineally, so Keynes is legally a foreigner in the country he considers his second home.
Career
Keynes auditioned for the role of Edmund Pevensie in ' at the same time as he auditioned for the role of Simon Brown in Nanny McPhee, winning the former while losing the latter to Thomas Sangster. His voice changed, due to puberty, during the filming of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, so the director used his sister Soumaya to voice some of his lines in the movie. He reprised his role as Edmund in ', released 16 May 2008. Keynes said he enjoyed the action-oriented stuntwork in the film but bruised his heel during a stunt with a horse. When he later had to run in the same scene, he did so while on pain medication and worried it was noticeable. He starred again as Edmund in , the third installment of The Chronicles of Narnia film series. Filming began in July 2009, and finished in December of the same year. The film was released on 10 December 2010 in Britain and the U.S. In preparation for this film, Keynes studied to earn his Professional Association of Diving Instructors license for underwater scenes. Keynes contributed his voice in 2014 to the audio project, In Freedom's Cause as Sir Allan Kerr, which would be the final project of his official acting career. In 2016, Keynes announced that he is no longer pursuing a career in acting and was now a parliamentary adviser to Crispin Blunt, MP.
Personal life
Keynes attended the Anna Scher Theatre School from 2000 to 2005, having attended Thornhill Primary School from 1996 to 2002. He attended the all-boys City of London School from 2005. There he wrote as a film critic for the review section of The Citizen, the City of London School weekly school newspaper. He sat his GCSEs in May and June 2008 and started Sixth Form and his first year of his A-level studies the following September. He studied biology, chemistry, maths, further maths and history at A-level. In October 2010, he began his degree in Arabic and Middle Eastern History at Pembroke College, Cambridge. Keynes was listed as one of Business Insider "16 Incredibly Impressive Students At Cambridge University." Keynes received his degree in Middle Eastern Studies in 2014. He and his family have visited Marjeyoun since he was a child. "We've been coming every year to Lebanon and visiting Marjeyoun despite the political situation. I was here in 1996 during Operation Grapes of Wrath. I was four at the time and I had no concept that it was war," Keynes told a reporter. "I remember when the gravity of the situation dawned on me. It was during the 2006 July war, I was 14 then... but it didn't really shake my view of Lebanon as effectively a second home, a place where I come to and I have family." Keynes explains that he is cognizant of the political situation:
