Luke Thompson (born 4 July 1988) is an English actor. He is best known for his role as Benedict in the Netflix period drama Bridgerton (2020–present), and has also appeared in the BBC One drama In the Club (2014–2016). In 2024, he received a Laurence Olivier Award nomination for his performance in the stage adaptation of A Little Life.

Luke Thompson was born on 4 July 1988^[1] in Southampton, England, and was brought up in France from the age of two. His father worked as an engineer and his mother as a teacher. He is one of three children.^[2][3] Thompson has stated that his grandmother is Parsi, and that he is a quarter Indian.^[4]

From 1997 to 2005, He attended the Lycée International François-Ier in Fontainebleau, a French school with an Anglophone section,^[5] where he became a proficient French speaker. He is also proficient in Italian.^[6][7] After returning to England in 2006, Thompson spent a year with the Year Out Drama Company in Stratford-upon-Avon.^[8] He went on to study English and Drama at the University of Bristol, and later trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London, graduating in 2013.^[9][10]

Thompson's first professional theatre role was as Lysander in A Midsummer Night's Dream at the Globe Theatre, for which he received nominations for both an Evening Standard Theatre Award and an Ian Charleson Award. He went on to appear in the Globe productions of Blue Stockings as Will Bennett, Julius Caesar as Mark Antony, and The Broken Heart as Ithocles. His other stage credits include James in Tiger Country at the Hampstead Theatre, Orestes in the Oresteia at the Almeida Theatre and Laertes in the 2017 production of Hamlet.^[11] In 2018, Thompson took over the role of Edgar from Jonathan Bailey in the Ian McKellen-led King Lear after Bailey declined to join the West End transfer in order to appear in the musical Company.^[12][13]

From 2014 to 2016, Thompson played Simon in the BBC One drama In the Club.^[14] He narrated a new adaptation of Frederick Forsyth’s novella The Shepherd for BBC Radio 3, broadcast on Christmas Eve 2016.^[15] Thompson made his feature film debut with a small role as a warrant officer in Christopher Nolan's 2017 World War II film Dunkirk.^[16] He later portrayed Peter Hain in Misbehaviour, a 2020 film centred on the 1970 Miss World competition.^[17]

In 2019, Thompson was cast as Benedict, the second-eldest Bridgerton sibling, in the Shondaland-produced Netflix period drama Bridgerton, which premiered in December 2020 and is based on the novels by Julia Quinn.^[18] A supporting character in the first three series, he took the lead in the fourth series, which was released in early 2026.^[19]

Thompson played Willem in the English-language stage adaptation of A Little Life, which opened at the Richmond Theatre in March 2023 before transferring to the Harold Pinter Theatre and subsequently the Savoy Theatre.^[20] His performance earned him a WhatsOnStage Award and a nomination for a Laurence Olivier Award. He also appeared as Hiram Bingham IV in the Netflix World War II miniseries Transatlantic.^[21]

In 2024, Thompson starred as Berowne in the Royal Shakespeare Company's production of Love's Labour's Lost, directed by Emily Burns, which ran from 11 April to 18 May.^[22] In 2025, Thompson took part in the Young Vic production of Tim Crouch's cold-read play An Oak Tree, which ran from 6 to 17 May.^[23]

Thompson does not use social media and keeps the details of his personal life private. In 2023, he stated that "the more you give chunks of yourself out, the more you sort of colour how you're perceived. It's a personal thing... that's from my particular experience of what it's like to be an actor."^[24]

• Luke Thompson at IMDb