All About Tom Hiddleston's Parents, Diana and James

The 'Loki' star has been publicly grateful for his parents' support over the years

Get to know Tom Hiddleston’s parents.

Born in February 1981, the actor was raised by his mom, Diana, and father, James, in London alongside his two sisters, Sarah and Emma.

Like his romantic life (including his relationship with fiancée Zawe Ashton), Hiddleston has kept his family mostly out of the spotlight since gaining international fame with his Marvel role as Loki.

"Everyone is entitled to a private life. I love what I do and I dedicate myself with absolute commitment to making great art and great entertainment and in my mind I don't conflict the two,” the actor, who welcomed his first child with Ashton in 2022, previously told The Telegraph about headlines surrounding his personal life. “My work is in the public sphere and I have a private life. And those two things are separate."

Though Hiddleston’s parents aren’t public figures, they have accompanied him to a handful of events over the years and the actor has spoken fondly of them in interviews.

Here’s everything to know about Hiddleston’s parents, Diana and James.

His mother was a stage manager

Hiddleston clearly got his love of the arts from his mother, Diana. In addition to being a former stage manager, per The Telegraph, Diana is a big opera fan; her parents ran the Aldeburgh Festival, an English arts festival devoted mainly to classical music.

His father ran a biotech company

While Hiddleston and his mother chose careers in the arts, his father pursued one in the sciences. Per a previous feature with The Guardian, his dad, a physical chemist, "ran a biotech company that liaised with Oxford University."

His mother got him interested in acting

Speaking with The Telegraph in 2014, Hiddleston noted that his mother’s career as a stage manager inspired his love of acting at a young age.

“She loved it, and she recognized that I loved it as well, which made it a very special thing to share,” Hiddleston told the publication of visiting the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford and the National Theatre in London with his family.

He noted that several productions he saw when he was a teenager made a big impression on him, including Sam Mendes’s 1997 version of Othello starring Simon Russell Beale — a show in which he would star in 2007. “I saw that three times,” Hiddleston told the publication.

His father initially didn’t want him to pursue acting

Despite his mom's encouragement, Hiddleston recalls that his dad was skeptical at first about him pursuing it as a full-time career.

“He was genuinely worried that I would be bored and unfulfilled,” Hiddleston told The Telegraph. “Acting was completely other from anything he knew and he just couldn’t see that it was a real job.”

Hiddleston elaborated to the Daily Mail in 2012, "My father and I used to tussle about me becoming an actor. He’s from strong, Presbyterian Scottish working-class stock, and he used to sit me down and say, “You know, 99 per cent of actors are out of work. You’ve been educated, so why do you want to spend your life pretending to be someone else when you could be your own man?”’

However, he noted that his father eventually changed his tune after seeing him in action. “He’s seen that it takes six months to make a Thor film. I’ve described my working process to him; the fact that, some days, I get up at four in the morning and don’t get home until nine at night, and he’s absolutely acknowledged that that’s real work,” he said.

His parents sent him to Eton

Hiddleston was a boarding student at the Dragon School in Oxford and Eton, attending at the same time as Prince William. Speaking with The Telegraph of his education, Hiddleston his father, who grew up as as the son of a shipyard worker before eventually attending Newcastle University, found it very important to send his own son to the prestigious school.

“My dad made himself from the ground up,” he said of his father. “So, once you’ve seen that, someone who’s come from nothing trying their hardest to give their child the best education."

He also addressed the reaction some had to hearing he went to such a storied institution. "Then you get out the other side and everyone throws fruit at you," he joked. "The labels that are attached to me are, I would hope, the least interesting things about me."

His parents divorced when he was a teenager

Around the same time Hiddleston started at Eton when he was 13, his parents divorced. “I like to think it made me more compassionate in my understanding of human frailty,” Hiddleston told The Telegraph about his parents’ split, with the publication noting that the pivotal life moment made him even more “drawn to the catharsis that acting offered.”

To the Daily Mail, Hiddleston reflected on the effect the divorce had on his future career. "‘I think I started acting because I found being away at school while my parents were divorcing really distressing ... I was really quite upset, and probably very sad and vulnerable and angry. Acting presented a way of expelling those feelings in a safe place."

His parents rarely step out for public appearances

Hiddleston's parents don't often make public appearances, but they have supported his career over the years. Though his father keeps a low profile, his mother has stepped out with Hiddleston on a few occasions, including his Othello afterparty in 2007.

In 2016, Hiddleston’s mother was seen spending time with him and his then-girlfriend Taylor Swift for a handful of outings in England amid their whirlwind romance. Most recently, Hiddleston attended Wimbledon with his mother in July 2023.

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