Avan Jogia Biography

Avan Jogia is a Canadian actor, director and author whose career has spanned teen television stardom, independent film, and literary work exploring identity and fame.

Avan Tudor Jogia was born in Vancouver, British Columbia to a British-Indian father and an English-Irish mother. He attended Killarney Secondary School in Vancouver before leaving in his mid-teens to pursue acting full time. Avan has often spoken about growing up between cultures and how his mixed background later shaped his artistic interests and writing.

Avan's first major role came in the 2006 television film A Girl Like Me: The Gwen Araujo Story, in which he played Danny Araujo, the brother of a murdered transgender teenager. He went on to recurring roles on the sitcom Aliens in America and on Caprica, the science‑fiction prequel to Battlestar Galactica. His breakout came when he joined the Nickelodeon series Victorious as Beck Oliver, a calm, aspiring actor and the boyfriend of Jade West, a part he played from 2010 to 2013 and which made him widely recognizable to young audiences.

After Victorious, Avan moved into more mature material, starring as Danny Desai on the mystery drama Twisted, which centered on a teenager with a troubled past. He later played the pharaoh Tutankhamun in the historical miniseries Tut, worked as Roman Mercer in the paranormal drama Ghost Wars, and took on the surreal lead role of Ulysses Zane in Gregg Araki’s Starz series Now Apocalypse. On the film side, his credits include projects such as Ten Thousand Saints (2015), I Am Michael (2015), the horror‑comedy sequel Zombieland: Double Tap (2019), and the video‑game adaptation Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City, in which he portrayed Leon S. Kennedy.

Avan made his directorial debut with the short film Alex in 2011, in which he also starred, and later directed the neo‑noir thriller Door Mouse, released in the early 2020s. Beyond screen work, he co‑founded the advocacy group Straight But Not Narrow in 2011, an online initiative aimed at encouraging straight youth to support their LGBTQ peers. In 2019 he published Mixed Feelings, a collection of poems and short pieces about multiracial identity that he also illustrated, followed by a second poetry collection, Autopsy (of an Ex‑Teen Heartthrob), released in February 2025 and reflecting on the impact of early fame.

Throughout his career, Avan has gravitated toward characters who exist at the margins — outsiders, enigmatic leads, and figures in transition — mirroring his interest in questions of identity, belonging and transformation. He has leveraged his teen‑idol status to advocate for youth causes and LGBTQ acceptance while steadily building a body of work that spans genre television, indie cinema, and personal writing. As he moves further into directing and authorship, Avan is increasingly seen as a multifaceted artist rather than solely as a former teen star.

Filmography:

56 Days (2026)
Our Hero, Balthazar (2025)
Choose Love (2023)
Johnny & Clyde (2023)
Door Moose (2022)
Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City (2021)
The Exchange (2021)
The Artist's Wife (2019)
Zombieland: Double Tap (2019)
Shaft (2019)
Paper Year (2018)
The New Romantic (2018)
A Midsummer Night's Dream (2017)
The Year of Spectacular Men (2017)
The Outcasts (2017)
Shangri-La Suite (2016)
The Drowning (2016)
Ten Thousand Saints (2015)
I Am Michael (2015)
Streets of Hope (2014)
Triple Dog (2010)