Half Man stars Jamie Bell as a Scottish man grappling with his sexuality – so it’s no surprise viewers may be curious about the actor himself.
The BBC drama follows Niall (Bell) and Ruben (Richard Gadd), two “brothers” – not related by blood, but connected by their mums – across three turbulent decades, all building towards a reunion at a wedding.
While it’s not based on a true story, Half Man clearly shares DNA with Baby Reindeer. Both characters wrestle with identity, masculinity, and repression – and neither show offers easy answers.
Bell and his younger counterpart Mitchell Robertson are both involved in some intense, graphic scenes. But away from the screen, Bell’s own life is far less ambiguous.
Jamie Bell’s sexuality explained after Half Man
Jamie Bell has never explicitly said, “I’m straight”, but there’s no reason to believe he isn’t straight.
Rumours around his sexuality date back to his breakout role in Billy Elliot. However, he addressed speculation head-on when he was 19.
“Me, gay? That’s absurd. People can think what they want. But I do find all these rumours about whether I’m gay weird. And on a personal level, it’s a bit odd to be talking about it,” he said (via The Mirror).
Bell has only been publicly linked to women. Still, he’s taken on multiple roles tied to LGBTQ+ stories, including All of Us Strangers and Rocketman, as well as the homoerotic undertones of The Eagle.
That pattern came up in an interview with Awards Watch.
“There are these patterns to your life that you are not aware of,” he said.
Who has Jamie Bell dated?
There are reports online that Bell once dated an actress named Amy Derova, but there’s no clear evidence to support it.
What is confirmed: he was married to Westworld star Evan Rachel Wood from 2012 to 2014, and they share a son.
The pair first met at Sundance and later appeared together in Green Day’s Wake Me Up When September Ends video.
Their son was born in 2013, but the couple split a year later. In 2020, Bell accused Wood of “withholding [their] son”, while she said she was acting to protect him from her former fiancé, Marilyn Manson.
As of October 2025, they share joint legal and physical custody.
Is Jamie Bell married?
Jamie Bell is married to actress Kate Mara, known for House of Cards, 24, and The Martian.
They met on the set of 2015’s Fantastic Four.
“We were friends but… we didn’t really know each other,” she said on the Where Everybody Knows Your Name podcast.
The experience of making the film wasn’t exactly smooth.
“He was single and I was trying to set him up with all these people. Cause I thought, ‘Oh god, I’ve [got to] set him up with someone. He’s the biggest catch. How is he not with someone amazing?'” she recalled.
“And then, yeah, we fell in love on the press tour of that movie ’cause it was trauma bonding.”
Mara’s family is also well-known in the US. Her sister is Rooney Mara, while her relatives have long-standing ties to the Pittsburgh Steelers and New York Giants.
Bell and Mara married in 2017 and have two children together.
Read more: The best BBC iPlayer films you can watch now
Half Man episode 1 is available to stream on BBC iPlayer now.
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