Charlie Hunnam May Have Played a Lot of ‘Tough Guys’ But He Is Actually a ‘Hippie Who Smiles a Lot’

Charlie Hunnam is known for playing tough guys. Most notably, he starred as biker Jax Teller on Sons of Anarchy for seven seasons. But in his real life, Hunnam claims he isn’t anything like the characters he plays on TV and in the movies. In fact, Hunnam says he’s a “hippie who smiles a lot.”

Charlie Hunnam plays a lot of ‘tough guys,’ but he’s ‘not like that at all’

When asked about his habit of playing “bada**” characters during his career — which has given him a tough-guy persona — Hunnam insisted that he’s nothing like that in real life. Instead, the 42-year-old claims to be the exact opposite.

“I play a lot of tough guys and violent characters, but I’m not like that at all,” Hunnam told Cosmopolitan in 2014. “I’m a hippie who smiles a lot and is pretty relaxed. I’ve often had an escape fantasy that I would go out into the woods by myself for a year or two and discover who I am and what life is about.”

Hunnam may say that he’s not a tough guy, but he steps up when he needs to. Especially when it comes to keeping his girlfriend and their home safe.

The ‘hippie who smiles a lot’ went after home burglars with a bat

During an appearance on Conan in 2013, Hunnam revealed he’d been the victim of burglars twice. After watching one of them try to get into his house by ripping his garage door open, Hunnam grabbed the only weapon he had — a baseball bat — to see what would happen.

The actor explained that he works hard for what he has, and he lives with his longtime girlfriend Morgana McNelis. He wasn’t going to back down, and he was going to protect what was important.

When the Sons of Anarchy alum went outside with the bat, he says the burglar came around the corner and stopped cold. Hunnam yelled, “So we got business motherf**cker?”

After the first attempted break-in, Hunnam made it his business to “arm” himself with more than a baseball bat and “take it up a notch.” He started accumulating different items when he saw something he liked, and he found some interesting things at swap meets.

“I got a hatchet, I have a samurai sword, but I also have a machete,” Hunnam revealed.

Charlie Hunnam channels his ‘gangster’ dad when he needs to be tough on screen

Hunnam explained that the tough guy fans see on screen is actually him channeling his father. He says his late dad Billy had a “gangster vibe” and has been an inspiration throughout his entire life, both on and off-screen. He describes his dad as “the toughest, most savage dude” he’s ever met.

“I feel like I’ve been playing him a lot in my career,” Hunnam said, per The Irish Times. 

To channel his father, Hunnam started martial arts training so he could fight and defend himself. And he says that’s what kept him from being a bully.

“He [Billy] was a formidable guy, and when I was younger I was actively playing the role of my father, especially in my film work,” Hunnam told Esquire. 

“A lot of people who have come into contact with violence and felt victimized in their childhood will grow into a person who perpetuates that cycle and themselves becomes a bully. What I did was play a lot of really hard characters. I felt that I exorcized those fears by being a macho dude on screen.”

All seven seasons of Sons of Anarchy are available to stream on Hulu.