Colin Andrew Firth was born on 10 September 1960 in Grayshott, Hampshire, England. His father, David Firth, was a lecturer in history, and his mother, Shirley Jean (née Rollings), was a teacher of comparative religion. The family moved frequently throughout his childhood, following his father’s academic postings — including a period in Nigeria, where David Firth taught at the University of Ibadan, and the year of 1971–72 in St. Louis, Missouri, where his father held a visiting post teaching history at St. Louis Community College — Florissant Valley. The family lived in Florissant, the working-class suburb in the Missouri River bottoms north of the city, and eleven-year-old Colin attended Hazelwood Junior High. Mercilessly teased for his English accent, he taught himself a flat Missouri vowel and adopted the local pose of indifference to schoolwork — survival tactics he has since described in interviews as the formative experience of his early life. Firth has spoken of the St. Louis year as giving him an early, vivid sense of being an outsider looking in — an experience that perhaps informs the observational precision of so many of his screen performances.
On returning to England, Firth attended Montgomery of Alamein Secondary School in Winchester. He subsequently won a place at Drama Centre London — one of Britain’s most prestigious drama schools. He left after just one term, however, having been offered the role of Guy Bennett in Julian Mitchell’s play Another Country. That early departure from formal training in favour of a live stage opportunity set the tone for a career guided by instinct as much as craft.