A young dramatic actor of film and TV who has appeared in several dark big-screen dramas, the Irish-born O'Conor (not to be confused with the late American actor Hugh O'Connor) began acting at the age of eight. O'Conor was still a relative unknown pre-teen when he co-starred with Liam Neeson in the British-made feature Lamb (1985), playing the ten-year-old Owen, a lonely epileptic boy who is temporarily rescued from a violent and oppressive children's home by Brother Sebastian (Neeson). It was three years before the actor landed another major film role, that of the youthful version of Martin Sheen's narrator (seen in flashbacks) in the 1988 film adaptation of Hugh Leonard's heartwarming Tony-winning play "Da". His next film was the Daniel Day Lewis tour de force My Left Foot: The Story of Christy Brown (1989). Directed by Jim Sheridan, the film told the story of the severely handicapped writer Christy Brown. Once again, O'Conor played the lead as a child, but this was a much more demanding and widely-seen performance. Much lighter in tone was the big-budget remake of _The Three Musketeers (1993)_, in which O'Conor played the Boy King Louis, who is protected from assassination by the title characters. O'Conor's first starring role came with Ben Ross' dark British comedy The Young Poisoner's Handbook (1995), in which he was an amateur toxicologist unwisely paroled from prison after testing his theories on family and friends, with fatal results. Based on a true story, it was a thoroughly unpleasant bit of work, yet found an appreciative audience. The following year, O'Conor played a teen trying to form a rock band in 1959 Russia in Red Hot (1993).
毕业于都柏林大学，后来进入伦敦音乐与戏剧学院学习。他因出演第四频道的《IT群英》和BBC二台的《罗马帝国》和《红色贝雷帽》，并因文献电视片《The Year London Blew Up》的获奖而被人们熟知。他也常常出现在爱尔兰电视台，并在电影《如何众叛亲离》中客串。Chris O'Dowd在众多电影中出演，在 2005年的电影《节日》中，他扮演了一个喜剧角色Tommy O'Dwyer，并因此获得了苏格兰电影和电视学院奖。2006年在电影《维拉·德雷克》中出演，在2007上映的德国电影《Hotel Very Welcome》中饰演主角之一Liam，最近他与 Marc Wootton，Dean Lennox Kelly， Anna Faris共同出演了喜剧科幻片《有关时间旅行的热门问题》。
