Joey Ansah was born in 1982 in Hammersmith, London, England, 2nd in
line to an older brother, Ryan, 3 years his senior. He is of mixed
ethnicity, with his mother Nicola, originating from Plymouth, Devon,
England and his father Kofi, originally from Ghana, west Africa. Joey
grew up and spent the first 10 years of his life in Streatham, South
London, attending private school first at Oakfield School and then at
Dulwich College Prep. During these early years in London, his interest
and enjoyment for acting and performance became evident, as he took
part in all of the stage performances that were on offer. The almost
obsessive interest in martial arts and action cinema began very young.
As early as Joey can recount, he has memories of his father renting
Action and martial arts films from the local video shop which he would
avidly watch. Arnold, Stallone, Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan and Van Damme
became instinctive idols and sources of inspiration which remain to
this day. Joey's family then emigrated to Accra, Ghana. This was
initially a culture shock to say the least for a young Joey, who had up
to this point spent most of his life in the almost exclusively white,
upper-middle class environment of the English public-school system. In
Accra, Joey attended Ghana's top International school for almost 5
years. During this period he was able to truly get in touch with
African culture, and obtain a balanced understanding, love and pride
for both halves of his heritage. Acting and stage performance continued
here for a time as well. It was in Ghana that Joey's love for martial
arts, dancing and stunts really took off. He joined the local Tae Kwon
Do class which he trained at for 4 years. He became embroiled in the
Hip Hop dance craze that was present at the school in Ghana. He also
fell in love with motorbikes and began riding with friends - including
the sons of an Australian former motocross champion.
A few months before his 15th birthday, Joey moved back to England (this
time to Plymouth) with his mother and 1-year old sister, Tanoa. He
attended Devonport High school for boys where he completed his
secondary education. During this time Joey also began obsessively
training for the rare Martial art of Ninjutsu with military personnel
in Plymouth. After a brief stint high diving, Joey became very
interested in acrobatics and tumbling, and began to develop this aspect
of Ninjutsu to a very high level. After passing his A-levels, Joey
moved to Oxford where he did a 3 year degree in Human biology at Oxford
Brookes University. Whilst continuing to practice Ninjutsu and
Acrobatics, he also took up the Brazilian martial art of Capoeira in
which he has trained ever since. It was during these 3 years in Oxford
that Joey began his professional work in show-business, getting work
and experience wherever he could. In the first couple of years at
University, Joey did his fair share of extras and walk-on parts and he
saw this as a valuable opportunity to spend lots of time on varied
film, TV and commercial sets, learning the film making process and more
importantly watching and intently studying established actors at work.
Rather than frowning upon doing extras work as many do, he viewed this
as an invaluable learning period. Joey also worked as a model, both on
the catwalk and in TV and print campaigns. His work in stunts also
occurred at this time, working on Batman Begins as a stuntman, in
addition to working as trainer and fight choreographer on the Sci-Fi
series Starhyke (2006). He has used his Dance, martial arts and
acrobatic abilities for various music videos and Live international
shows.
Straight after graduating from University, Joey moved back to London
and landed a major role in the award winning UK indie film, Lovestruck
(2005). Following that he got an acting agent and his full time acting
career began. Over the last 2 years he has been working consistently in
a varied range of TV and film projects. With notable TV appearances as
the terrorist Abbud in the hit TV show Spooks (2005) (aka MI5 in the
USA), Roman emperor Geta in the prime time BBC docuseries Timewatch
(2006). In 2006 Joey landed a major role in the upcoming, ground
breaking UK action Feature 'Underground'.
His big Hollywood break came in the form of him being cast in the
upcoming Bourne Ultimatum (2007) by award-winning director, Paul
Greengrass, in which he plays 'Desh', a Blackbriar super assassin
working for the CIA who goes up against Jason Bourne (Matt Damon). The
Bourne Ultimatum (2007) is released in the US and UK Aug
3rd.
