How Jonathan Bailey Charmed Us All

This story is part of the 2025 TIME100 Next. Read Ariana Grande’s tribute to Jonathan Bailey here .

If you see a familiar face whizzing past you on a Lime Bike in London, it could very well be Jonathan Bailey . He might look dialed in, headphones on as he races to a rehearsal or interview. But chances are, his heart is elsewhere—specifically, two hours south to the Sussex coast. There, the sea and his family offer a counterbalance to the intensity of his career.

“In film and music, the silence is always more profound when there’s been a brilliant cacophony before it,” Bailey, 37, says during an interview in early September, of his decision to move to Brighton during the pandemic. “Everything’s slightly more extreme now than it has been in the past, so for every extraordinary thing