01 Starting advantages
9/24 starting-position score
Strongest documented signals: Parent / family domain, Inherited audience / network, Frontier geography.
Describes the starting position, not what the person later made of it.
Cohort percentile: 79
Kodi Smit-McPhee
Creators / artists · Film/TV/Entertainment · milestone at age 25 ·T3 Domain-recognized
Milestone (age 25)
Nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor and won the Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actor for The Power of the Dog (2021) at age 25, following a child acting career that began at age 9.
Smit-McPhee began acting at age 9 in Australia, making his feature debut in Romulus, My Father (2007) at age 11. He gained recognition in The Road (2009) and Let Me In (2010) as a child actor, then dropped out of high school to pursue acting full-time. His critically acclaimed performance in The Power of the Dog (2021) earned him Oscar and Golden Globe recognition.
Starting point
Born in Adelaide, Australia to actor Andy McPhee; sister Sianoa is also an actress; family relocated to Los Angeles to support his career.
Current position (2025)
Australian actor with Oscar and Golden Globe recognition; recent roles in 'Maria' (2024) and 'Memoir of a Snail' (2024); resides in Los Angeles.
How this path compounded
02 Built or converted leverage
12/25 multiplying-capacity score
Strongest observed levers:Domain proximity, Started serious reps before 20, Prior reps.
Measures what was present, not whether it was inherited, earned, self-built, external, or mixed.
Cohort percentile: 53
03 Compounding trajectory
7 documented steps
The timeline below shows the sequence of work and transitions around the selected early milestone. It is evidence of a path, not proof that every step was necessary.
Milestone at age 25
04 Observed career standing
T3 · Domain-recognized
Notable and widely recognized within the domain. The tier summarizes documented career recognition through the data cutoff—not Kodi Smit-McPhee's worth or future potential.
Question four · where did the leverage come from?
Kodi Smit-McPhee's leverage provenance
Each non-zero lever gets a best-supported origin, evidence signals, and confidence. Unresolved is the honest default when the biography cannot distinguish self-built, advantage-enabled, earned, external, or mixed.
Started serious reps before 201/1
Advantage-enabledmedium confidence
One or more documented starting advantages plausibly enabled this lever.
Parent / family domain (2/2)Dedicated mentor / coach (1/2)
Domain proximity2/2
Advantage-enabledmedium confidence
One or more documented starting advantages plausibly enabled this lever.
Direct domain exposure (1/2)Parent / family domain (2/2)Frontier geography (1/2)
Prior reps2/3
Advantage-enabledmedium confidence
One or more documented starting advantages plausibly enabled this lever.
Parent / family domain (2/2)Dedicated mentor / coach (1/2)
Scarce skill depth2/3
Advantage-enabledmedium confidence
One or more documented starting advantages plausibly enabled this lever.
Parent / family domain (2/2)Dedicated mentor / coach (1/2)
Concentration intensity2/3
Advantage-enabledmedium confidence
One or more documented starting advantages plausibly enabled this lever.
Dedicated mentor / coach (1/2)Adversity / constraint catalyst (1/2)
Capital safety1/2
Unresolvedlow confidence
No current annotation distinguishes self-built, enabled, or earned origins for this lever.
No decisive linked signal
Elite ecosystem network1/3
Advantage-enabledmedium confidence
One or more documented starting advantages plausibly enabled this lever.
Inherited audience / network (1/2)Parent / family domain (2/2)Frontier geography (1/2)Exceptional peer / cofounder (1/2)
Structural wave / timing1/3
Externalmedium confidence
A structural wave is external to the person, even when their position improved access to it.
Frontier geography (1/2)
This is a bounded inference from the current annotations—not a claim about private effort, merit, or the percentage of Kodi Smit-McPhee's outcome attributable to any origin.
Structural luck, Encounter luck, Event luck, Outcome variance can change every arrow in the path. This successful-only dataset cannot observe the near-identical paths that did not break through, so luck stays visible and unscored.
Within Creators / artists, Kodi Smit-McPhee's starting-advantage total is at the 79th percentile. Separately, their built or converted leverage total is at the 53th percentile. Other T3 profiles average 7.0 / 24 starting advantage and 11.7 / 25 leverage. Similar scores appear in other tiers, so these figures describe positioning—not a cause.
Trajectory
- 2007 · age 11Film debut in Romulus, My FatherMade his feature film debut alongside Eric Bana in 'Romulus, My Father,' winning the Australian Film Institute Award for Best Young Actor.
- 2009 · age 13Starred in The RoadPlayed Viggo Mortensen's son in the acclaimed post-apocalyptic film 'The Road,' earning international recognition and Critics' Choice Award nomination.
- 2010 · age 14Lead role in Let Me InStarred in the vampire film 'Let Me In,' an English adaptation of the Swedish film 'Let the Right One In,' receiving critical praise.
- 2014 · age 18Dawn of the Planet of the ApesAppeared in 'Dawn of the Planet of the Apes,' which grossed over $700 million worldwide, his first major blockbuster.
- 2016 · age 20Joined X-Men franchise as NightcrawlerPortrayed Kurt Wagner/Nightcrawler in 'X-Men: Apocalypse,' reprising the role in 'Deadpool 2' (2018) and 'Dark Phoenix' (2019).
- 2021 · age 25Golden Globe and Oscar nomination for The Power of the DogWon the Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actor and received an Academy Award nomination for Jane Campion's 'The Power of the Dog,' premiered at the Venice Film Festival.
- 2024 · age 28Recent roles in Maria and Memoir of a SnailAppeared in Pablo Larrain's 'Maria' and voiced a lead character in the animated film 'Memoir of a Snail,' continuing his diverse career.
Primary leverage engine
Early child acting career
Early specialization / prior reps
Secondary engine
Family acting connections
Built/converted leverage
12 / 25
evidence: Medium
Built or converted leverage
Multiplying capacity documented later in the path. Measures what was present, not whether it was inherited, earned, self-built, external, or mixed.
Starting-advantage scores (0–2 each)
Access or conditions documented near the beginning of the path. Zero means "no clear evidence in reviewed sources," not "advantage was absent."
Family context
Born in Adelaide, South Australia to Sonja Smit and Andy McPhee. His father is an actor and former professional wrestler. His older sister Sianoa Smit-McPhee is an actress and singer. He was diagnosed with spondylitis, a degenerative form of arthritis, as a child.
Parent / family domain
Father Andy McPhee is an actor and former professional wrestler. Older sister Sianoa Smit-McPhee is an actress and singer. Direct family acting lineage.
Archetype & tags
Family-domain apprenticeshipactor-wrestler-fatheractress-sisterchild-acting-from-age-9australian-film-industrydropped-out-of-high-school
Evidence summary
Smit-McPhee grew up in an acting family — his father Andy McPhee is an actor and former professional wrestler, and his sister Sianoa is an actress. This family-domain apprenticeship gave him early entry into acting at age 9, leading to a feature film debut at 11 in Romulus, My Father alongside Eric Bana. He dropped out of high school to pursue acting full-time, demonstrating extreme concentration intensity. He was diagnosed with spondylitis as a child, which may have created urgency and a distinctive perspective. His years of child acting in Australian and American films built exceptional prior reps before his adult breakout in The Power of the Dog.
advantage confidence: Medium · source count: 3 · audit: not_independently_audited · status: subagent_researched_beta
Sources
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