Bio
Sean Cameron Michael is a South African actor best known to international viewers for his starring role as the Governor, Richard Guthrie, in the pirate drama series Black Sails.
Although it's still his performance as Fergus Buchan in Regardt van den Bergh's award-winning Faith Like Potatoes feature film that the South African public mostly recognises Sean for, Michael has performed in numerous local and international television series, shorts and feature films.
Television audiences will remember him as the presenter of SABC's Teleschool, as drug dealer Brett in M-Net's Egoli, as womanizing lawyer Miles in the controversial This Life SABC3 series and as Muller in Darrell Roodt's Ella Blue mini-series for M-Net.
Born in Cape Town, Sean has been passionate about acting since he was 12 years old. His parents were both involved in the entertainment industry - his father an opera singer with The Melody Makers and his mother an award-winning modern dancer.
In 2013 he was seen as Russian mafia boss Vladimir in kykNET's Thomas@ series, while in 2014 he played builder Sakkie in the SABC2 Afrikaans drama series Swartwater drama. In October 2014 he played policeman Swanepoel in the second season of SABC1's period drama series When We Were Black, directed by multiple award-winning Khalo Matabane.
Internationally the actor first gained popularity playing the role of Don Beatty in Dean Devlin's 2005 Emmy-winning mini-series The Triangle. He has also worked as a casting agent for a number of productions, including e.tv's reality competition Fear Factor.
In 2008 he appeared in the M-Net mini-series Ella Blue (March to April), playing baddie Muller, a representative of the Department of Census and Statistics who is sent to a small coastal community to classify the people living there according to their race.
In 2008 he joined the cast of 24 playing controversial UN worker, Charles Solenz, in Fox's multi Emmy and Golden Globe nominated feature 24: Redemption (opposite Jon Voight and Kiefer Sutherland). Over 12-million viewers tuned in for the premiere, while the NY Post singled out Sean's performance saying that 24 had found a new villain in Africa and that his character was possibly the most spineless role ever created for the series.
He also worked with Games of Thrones' Charles Dance in the Emmy-nominated Strike Back series, as well as Oscar winner William Hurt in BBC Films' Royal Television Society's award-winning feature The Challenger Disaster.
He can also be seen in the title role of the American feature film Allan Quatermain and the Temple of Skulls, a retelling of the H. Rider Haggard classic novel King Solomon's Mines.
In 2013 he secured the recurring role of Richard Guthrie in the Michael Bay-produced pirate adventure series Black Sails for Starz Entertainment. Season 1 premiered in January 2014 to the highest ratings for original series in the cable channel's history and garnered four Emmy nominations and two wins.
In 2014 Sean was also seen playing the supporting role of Lester in Zentropa Entertainment's feature The Salvation for director Kristian Levring. The Danish western premiered at Cannes to a six-minute standing ovation and stars Mads Mikkelsen, Jonathan Pryce and Eva Green.