Early life

Jarratt was born and grew up in Wongawilli

Wongawilli

Wongawilli is a southern suburb of Wollongong, Australia and is located at the foot hills of the Illawarra escarpment. The word 'Wonga' is a native aboriginal word meaning native pigeon. It contains a mixture of small rural properties and family homes. It houses a NSW Rural Fire Service station and...

, a small rural town near Wollongong, New South Wales and later in the Snowy Mountains

Snowy Mountains

The Snowy Mountains, known informally as "The Snowies", are the highest Australian mountain range and contain the Australian mainland's highest mountain, Mount Kosciuszko, which reaches 2,228 metres AHD, approximately 7310 feet....

 area. Jarratt's father was a coal miner and later concreter, who worked on the Snowy Mountains hydroelectric scheme. Both his parents were of Irish origin.. His 5xgreat grandfather, George Jarratt, born 1833, came from Croxton in Cambridgeshire, England, but his son, John, married an Irish girl, Mary Kelly. While in high school Jarratt directed and acted in a school play which was a great success and led to his school principal recommending him for an acting career.

Early work

Jarratt graduated from NIDA

National Institute of Dramatic Art

The National Institute of Dramatic Art is an Australian national training institute for students of theatre, film, and television, based in the Sydney suburb of Kensington. It is supported by the federal Office for the Arts, Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. NIDA is located adjacent...

, the Australian national drama school in 1973. His screen debut was in The Great Macarthy

The Great Macarthy

The Great Macarthy is a 1975 comedy about Australian rules football. It was an adaptation of the novel A Salute to the Great Macarthy by Barry Oakley. It stars John Jarratt as the title character as a local footballer who is signed up by the South Melbourne Football Club...

. He also appeared in Peter Weir

Peter Weir

Peter Lindsay Weir, AM is an Australian film director. After playing a leading role in the Australian New Wave cinema with his films such as Picnic at Hanging Rock, The Last Wave and Gallipoli, Weir directed a diverse group of American and international films—many of them major box office...

's Picnic at Hanging Rock

Picnic at Hanging Rock (film)

Picnic at Hanging Rock is a 1975 Australian feature film directed by Peter Weir and starring Anne-Louise Lambert, Helen Morse, Rachel Roberts and Vivean Gray. The film is adapted from the novel of the same name, by author Joan Lindsay....

in 1975 and Summer City

Summer City

Summer City is a 1977 Australian film, most notable for having Mel Gibson in his first role. It was filmed in Sydney, Australia and is also known as Coast of Terror.-Plot:...

in 1977 with Mel Gibson

Mel Gibson

Mel Colm-Cille Gerard Gibson, AO is an American actor, film director, producer and screenwriter. Born in Peekskill, New York, Gibson moved with his parents to Sydney, Australia when he was 12 years old and later studied acting at the Australian National Institute of Dramatic Art.After appearing in...

. Jarratt had the lead role in the mini series The Last Outlaw

The Last Outlaw

The Last Outlaw is a 1919 short Western film directed by John Ford. Part of this film survives in the British Film Institute film archive and in the Museum of Modern Art film archive.-Cast:* Edgar Jones* Lucille Hutton* Richard Cummings* Jack Walters...

playing Ned Kelly

Ned Kelly

Edward "Ned" Kelly was an Irish Australian bushranger. He is considered by some to be merely a cold-blooded cop killer — others, however, consider him to be a folk hero and symbol of Irish Australian resistance against the Anglo-Australian ruling class.Kelly was born in Victoria to an Irish...

 In 1979. He played a major supporting role as a young Aussie soldier in Vietnam war movie The Odd Angry Shot

The Odd Angry Shot

Based on the novel of the same name by William L. Nagle, The Odd Angry Shot is a film following the experience of Australian soldiers during the Vietnam War...

, 1980. In the later 1980s Jarrat recognised he a had problem with binge drinking and related violence and joined Alcoholics Anonymous

Alcoholics Anonymous

Alcoholics Anonymous is an international mutual aid movement which says its "primary purpose is to stay sober and help other alcoholics achieve sobriety." Now claiming more than 2 million members, AA was founded in 1935 by Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob Smith in Akron, Ohio...

, an organisation in which he continues to be active.

Television

During the 1980s John Jarratt appeared (like many other Australian actors) on ABC'S Play School. Then in the 1990s, he was a presenter on the lifestyle show Better Homes and Gardens with then-wife Noni Hazlehurst. He had guest roles in Inspector Morse

Inspector Morse (TV series)

Inspector Morse is a detective drama based on Colin Dexter's series of Chief Inspector Morse novels. The series starred John Thaw as Chief Inspector Morse and Kevin Whately as Sergeant Lewis. Dexter makes a cameo appearance in all but three of the episodes....

, Police Rescue

Police Rescue

Police Rescue was an Australian television series which originally aired on ABC TV between 1989 and 1996. It was produced by ABC and Southern Star Xanadu in association with the BBC....

, Blue Murder

Blue Murder (mini-series)

Blue Murder is a two-part Australian television miniseries produced by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation in 1995, and is based on true events. Given its confronting content, the DVD release was classified MA 15+...

, Water Rats

Water Rats (TV series)

Water Rats is an Australian TV police procedural broadcast on the Nine Network from 1996 to 2001. The series was based around the men and women of the Sydney Water Police who fight crime across Sydney Harbour and surrounding locales. The show was set on and around Goat Island in Sydney...

and Blue Heelers

Blue Heelers

Blue Heelers is an Australian police drama series which depicted the lives of police officers stationed at the fictional Mount Thomas police station in a small town in Victoria.- Overview :...

in the 1990s and 2000s. He joined the cast of McLeod's Daughters

McLeod's Daughters

McLeod's Daughters is a Logie award-winning Australian drama series that aired on the Nine Network from 2001 to 2009. It tells the story of two sisters, Claire and Tess McLeod, who are reunited after they inherit the family farm...

 in 2001, and left the show in 2006. In 2010 Jarratt appeared in a commercial for the global leaders in outdoor power equipment, Husqvarna.

Return to cinema

In 2005, he had a major role in the Australian film Wolf Creek

Wolf Creek (film)

Wolf Creek is a 2005 independent Australian horror film written, co-produced and directed by Greg McLean. The story revolves around three backpackers who find themselves held captive by a serial killer in the Australian outback...

, playing the villain Mick Taylor. In 2007, he appeared in two films, Rogue and The Final Winter

The Final Winter

The Final Winter is an Australian drama film released in 2007. It was directed by Brian Andrews and Jane Forrest and produced by Anthony Coffee, and Michelle Russell, while independently produced it is being distributed by Paramount Pictures. It was written by Matthew Nable who also starred as the...

. Jarratt also had a small role in the 2008 film, Australia

Australia (2008 film)

Australia is a 2008 epic historical romance film directed by Baz Luhrmann and starring Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman. It is the second-highest grossing Australian film of all time, behind Crocodile Dundee. The screenplay was written by Luhrmann and screenwriter Stuart Beattie, with Ronald Harwood...

as a soldier.

In 2008, Jarratt has launched his own film production company, Winnah Films. Winnah's first feature film, Savages Crossing (originally carrying the working title Flood) went into Principal Photography outside Ipswich in Queensland in February. Savages Crossing is a fast paced thriller set in the Australian outback and stars John Jarratt, and Craig McLachlan amongst a sterling cast of Australian actors. In 2009, he appears as the father of a teenage girl via phone in Telstra's "Next G" commercials.

In 2010, Jarratt is to star in the upcoming ensemble exploitation extravaganza, Bad Behaviour, written and directed by Joseph Sims. Principal Photography wrapped on 5 February 2010 and is set to be released in cinemas later in the year. In the same year Jarrat also has a role in the supernatural horror movie Needle.

He is currently set to reprise his role as Mick Taylor in a sequel to Wolf Creek due to go into production in 2011 with Matt Hearn producing and Greg McLean directing.

Personal life

Jarratt has been married three times. With his first wife, Rosa, he had two children, Zadia and Ebony. He was married to actress Noni Hazlehurst, with whom he had two more children, Charlie and William. Most recently, he remarried to Cody Jarrett, whom he met as a producer on Better Homes and Gardens, and had a further two boys, Jackson and Riley.

John Jarratt is now living at Doonan on the Sunshine Coast, Queensland

Sunshine Coast, Queensland

The Sunshine Coast is an urban area in South East Queensland, north of the state capital of Brisbane on the Pacific Ocean coastline. Although it does not have a central business district, by population it ranks as the 10th largest metropolis in Australia and the third largest in...

, after living in the Blue Mountains, NSW

Filmography

Year	Film	Role
1975	The Great Macarthy The Great Macarthy The Great Macarthy is a 1975 comedy about Australian rules football. It was an adaptation of the novel A Salute to the Great Macarthy by Barry Oakley. It stars John Jarratt as the title character as a local footballer who is signed up by the South Melbourne Football Club...	Mccarthy
	Picnic at Hanging Rock Picnic at Hanging Rock Picnic at Hanging Rock is a 1967 drama and mystery novel by Australian author Joan Lindsay. She wrote it over a four-week period at her home Mulberry Hill in Baxter, on Victoria's Mornington Peninsula. It was first published in 1967 in Australia by Cheshire Publishing and was released in...	Albert Crundall
1977	Summer City Summer City Summer City is a 1977 Australian film, most notable for having Mel Gibson in his first role. It was filmed in Sydney, Australia and is also known as Coast of Terror.-Plot:...	Sandy
1979	The Odd Angry Shot The Odd Angry Shot Based on the novel of the same name by William L. Nagle, The Odd Angry Shot is a film following the experience of Australian soldiers during the Vietnam War...	Bill
2005	Wolf Creek Wolf Creek (film) Wolf Creek is a 2005 independent Australian horror film written, co-produced and directed by Greg McLean. The story revolves around three backpackers who find themselves held captive by a serial killer in the Australian outback...	Mick Taylor
2007	Rogue Rogue (film) War is a 2007 American action thriller film, directed by Phillip G. Atwell who makes his film debut, with fight choreography by Corey Yuen. The film was released in North America on August 24, 2007 and stars action film actors Jet Li and Jason Statham, making their second collaboration after the...	Russell
	The Final Winter The Final Winter The Final Winter is an Australian drama film released in 2007. It was directed by Brian Andrews and Jane Forrest and produced by Anthony Coffee, and Michelle Russell, while independently produced it is being distributed by Paramount Pictures. It was written by Matthew Nable who also starred as the...	Colgate
2011	Bad Behaviour	Ricky
2012	Wolf Creek 2	Mick Taylor

External links

• John Jarratt's Film Oz Profile