Liam Pádraic Aiken (born January 7, 1990) is an American actor. He has starred in films such as Stepmom (1998), Road to Perdition (2002), and Good Boy! (2003), and played Klaus Baudelaire in Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events (2004), based on the series of books. He also starred in the films Nor'easter (2012), Ned Rifle (2014), The Bloodhound (2020), Bashira (2021), and V13 (2025).
Personal life
Aiken is the only child of Moya Aiken, an Irish-born artist; and Bill Aiken, an American, MTV producer, who was of Scots-Irish descent. Bill died of esophageal cancer in September 1992, at age 34, when Liam was two years old. , Aiken resides in Los Angeles.
He would make his professional acting debut in a Ford Motor Company commercial by Ford Aerostar. and his film debut in Henry Fool (1997). His first major film role came when he starred in Stepmom (1998). He appeared in Road to Perdition (2002) and the family film Good Boy! (2003). He was considered to play Cole Sear in The Sixth Sense (1999), but the role went to Haley Joel Osment. but Daniel Radcliffe ultimately won the role, due to J. K. Rowling's insistence that the part should go to a British actor.
right|thumb|Aiken at the 2006 [[Toronto International Film Festival]]
Aiken went on to play intelligent 12-year-old orphan Klaus Baudelaire in Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events (2004). He also appeared in The Killer Inside Me (2010). In September 2011, he appeared in the CBS series A Gifted Man. From 2012 to 2015, he narrated the audiobook versions of All the Wrong Questions, a prequel series to A Series of Unfortunate Events.
In 2012, he portrayed a boy who returns home after being missing for years in Nor'easter, directed by Andrew Brotzman. In 2014, he played the title role in Ned Rifle, the third film in a trilogy that began with Henry Fool and continued with Fay Grim (2006). In 2020, he co-starred The Bloodhound, a mystery film inspired by the Edgar Allan Poe short story "The Fall of the House of Usher."
In 2021, he portrayed an electronic musician who suffering a series of nightmares with bizarre and mysterious appearances in Bashira, directed by Nickson Fong. He also played J.R. in Montauk, directed by Sean Nalaboff.
Filmography
Film
{| class="wikitable sortable"
|-
! Year
! Title
! Role
! Notes
|-
| 1997
| Henry Fool
| Ned
|
|-
| rowspan=3|1998
| Montana
| Kid
|
|-
| '
| Nathan
|
|-
| Stepmom
| Ben Harrison
|
|-
| rowspan=2|2013
| Munchausen
| Son
| Short film
|-
| How to Be a Man
| Bryan
|
|-
| 2014
| Ned Rifle
| Ned
|
|-
| rowspan="2" | 2017
| The Emoji Movie
| Ronnie Ram Tech
|Voice
|-
| 2021
| Bashira
| Andy
|
|-
|2022
|A Soldiers Heart
|
|Short film
|-
| 2025
| Montauk
| J.R.
| previously called Kingfish;
|-
| 2025
| V13
| Hugo
|
|-
|}
Television
{| class="wikitable sortable"
|-
! Year
! Title
! Role
! Notes
|-
| 1990
| Night After Night with Allan Havey
| Himself
|-
| 1998, 2007, 2024
| Law & Order
| Jack Ericson/Tory Quinlann/Thomas Norton
| 3 episodes
|-
| 2003 || Young Artist Award || Best Performance in a Feature Film - Supporting Young Actor || || Road to Perdition ||style="text-align:center;" |
|-
| 2004 || Young Artist Award || Best Performance in a Feature Film - Leading Young Actor || || Good Boy! || style="text-align:center;" |
|-
|rowspan="2"|2005 || Young Artist Award || Best Performance in a Feature Film - Leading Young Actor || || rowspan = "2"|Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events ||style="text-align:center;" |
|-
|| Critics Choice Award || Best Young Actor || ||style="text-align:center;" |
|}