Table of Biography
Cole Sprouse is an American actor and photographer. Cole Sprouse started as a child actor alongside his twin brother Dylan. Their most popular show is “Suite Life of Zack and Cody”. His solo projects include “Riverdale” and “Five Feet Apart” among others.
Early Life and Childhood
Cole Sprouse was born on 4 August 1992 and currently is 31 years old. His parents are his father Matthew Sprouse and his mother Melanie Wright. Similarly, his parents were teachers at an English language school in Tuscany, Italy. He has a twin brother Dylan Sprouse and together the twins are called the “Sprouse Brothers/Bros”. Moreover, he is 15 minutes younger than Dylan. They together won the hearts of many viewers after the twins starred in the Disney show The Suite Life of Zack & Cody.
Both the twin brothers have dual citizenship in Italy and the USA. Moreover, talking about his childhood, he began snowboarding at age four. Similarly, he was born in Arezzo, Italy, but doesn’t have Italian ancestry. Instead, he has English, Scottish, Danish, and German ancestry. Likewise, he was named after jazz singer and pianist Nat King Cole.
His parents moved from Italy to their native California only four months after the twins’ birth. Hence, they grew up in Long Beach. Then in 2012, the Sprouse family moved from Long Beach to Calabasas in California. Moreover, the twins’ grandmother’s name is Jonine Booth Wright and she was an actor and drama teacher during her younger days. She was also responsible for the pair’s appearance in TV commercials at the young age of 6 months.
He and Dylan are good friends with Kyle Massey of That’s So Raven. The Sprouse family also had three dogs. Bubba belonged to Dylan and he sadly passed away in 2017, Pinky is their father, and Curry belongs to their stepmother.
Caption: Cole Sprouse with his twin brother Dylan Sprouse in past and present photographs. Source: People and Teen Vogue
Cole Sprouse – Education
While filming The Suite Life of Zack & Cody, the Sprouse Brothers received on-set tutoring for three hours daily for school. The brothers were getting “straight A’s and honors”. Then, in their last year of high school, the Sprouse brothers took Advanced Placement classes where Cole chose AP Psychology and AP Government and Dylan chose AP Psychology and AP Spanish.
In the year 2010, the Sprouse brothers joined New York University. They initially planned to attend the university in the fall of 2010 but they deferred for one year. He and Dylan attended the Gallatin School of Individualized Study which allows students to plan their curriculum. He focused on humanities and archaeology whereas Dylan focused on video game design.
Later, he studied archaeology, geographic information systems, and satellite imaging at New York University. Dylan and Riverdale co-star Mendes were also fellow students at NYU. Both brothers graduated in May of 2015, walking away with the diploma together. As a prank, the twins switched places to get their diplomas. After graduation, he took a job as an archaeological assistant in an artifact laboratory in Brooklyn, where he was working when he read the script for Riverdale.
Cole Sprouse – Career and Professional Life
Cole Sprouse is an actor, entrepreneur, and photographer best known for his role as Cody Martin in The Suite Life of Zack & Cody and its spin-off The Suite Life on Deck.
As with many twins, he and his brother have often played the same role, due to child labor laws in California restricting the number of times children can be filmed in a day. Casting twins in a single role thus allows more time for the character to be filmed.
Caption: Cole Sprouse in the Disney’s “Suite Life of Zack and Cody”. Source: Teen Vogue
Similarly, he has been on screen from the young age of six months. The twins started appearing in TV commercials advertising diapers at such a young age. He also gained fame for his role in the comedy film Big Daddy (1999). For this, the twins play the single role of Julian McGrath. They also played the same role in the show Grace Under Fire as Patrick Kelly at a young age. The twins played a small role in a thriller titled The Astronaut’s Wife in the year 1999.
During 2009 and 2010, the Sprouse brothers appeared in advertisements for Dannon Danimals. It is a French food-manufacturing company. Then in August 2010, they entered a deal with Nintendo DS as part of endorsing their products. Moreover, People magazine also printed the twins on its May 2009 cover. It had 80 pages describing the film The Suite Life on Deck and the work of the twin brothers.
More details on Combined Projects
He has noted that his childhood entry into acting alongside his twin resulted from their family’s need for money. However, he came to appreciate many of the opportunities his early career presented him with.
The Sprouse brothers shared the role of Patrick, the youngest son of Brett Butler’s character on the TV show Grace Under Fire that broadcasted from 1993 to 98. Then in 1999, they made their feature film debut playing Adam Sandler’s son in Big Daddy. Moreover, they were seen as a set of alien twins in the movie The Astronaut’s Wife.
Then, the Sprouse brothers reached a much higher level of fame with their Disney Channel sitcom The Suite Life of Zack and Cody in which he played Cody who is the more conscientious of the on-screen twins. Suite Life is a top-rated series that ran from 2005 to 2008 on Disney Channel.
Similarly, the Sprouse brothers also headlined a Suite Life TV movie and the spinoff The Suite Life on Deck that broadcasted from 2008 to 2011. In addition, Suite Life characters, Zack and Cody, also showed up on other Disney hits like That’s So Raven, Wizards of Waverly Place, and Miley Cyrus’ Hannah Montana.
Solo Career
The projects that Cole undertook which Dylan is not a part of include Friends from 2000 to 2002. For this, he played the character, Ben Geller, for seven episodes. Ben is the son of David Schwimmer’s character Ross. Working on the set of Friends, it is believed that he developed a crush on Jennifer Aniston.
Similarly, he also played the role of Jughead Jones in Riverdale since 2017. Then he appeared in Five Feet Apart, as the character Will Newman in 2019. He credits social media for facilitating his stepping back into the spotlight. She also told People magazine in 2017:
“I anticipated we would go to college and then we would fade out, that was kind of what we wanted at the time, but social media hung onto my brother and I, and thankfully fans hung onto my brother and I, and I think it’s one of the reasons that this reemergence can come back with a little more strength, and I’m very thankful for that.”
Along with Dylan, he became a successful American child star and as an adult, he embraced photography and made the choice to return to acting with the television series Riverdale.
More Details on Solo Career
After taking time out to get a college degree, he started his adult acting career with the CW series Riverdale. It is a noirish spin on the world of Archie Comics and it premiered in January 2017. Though he’d initially been up for Archie, he was drawn to the character of Jughead Jones. The character Jughead is an outsider who serves as the show’s narrator.
Moreover, he was cast as Jughead but had to dye his blonde hair black for the role. Later he noted that this change makes it easier for people to distinguish him from his twin Dylan. Other stars in this successful series include KJ Apa as Archie, Camila Mendes as Veronica, and Lili Reinhart as Betty Cooper.
Further, he also appeared in Five Feet Apart. He played the character William “Will” Newman in this 2019 American romantic drama film. His co-star in the film was Haley Lu Richardson. The pair played cystic fibrosis patients who developed feelings for one another. Though the film was a commercial success, it drew mixed reviews, and some in the cystic fibrosis community criticized it for the trivialization of a series of illnesses.
Beyond Acting
Moreover, he is a talented photographer. He has also credited photography as offering a positive outlet when he was experiencing depression. He has photographed magazine covers and fashion shoots. His works have appeared in publications like The Sunday Times and L’Uomo Vogue. So far, he has photographed model Kendall Jenner, Game of Thrones actress Sophie Turner, singer Sam Smith, and his Riverdale co-star Lili Reinhart among many others.
Talking about his passion for photography with The Sunday Times in 2017, he said:
“I’ve been dabbling with the notion that if and when photography takes a more prevalent role in my life, I will likely never return to acting.”
Caption: Cole Sprouse was captured while working as a photographer. Source: Instagram
Sprouse Bros Brand
In the year 2005, the Cole Sprouse brothers and Dualstar Entertainment signed a licensing agreement to produce Sprouse Bros branded merchandise for the preteen and teenage market. This brand included a clothing line, a comics series, and a magazine. It also included a personal hygiene line and a line of sportswear.
Speaking about the brand, Dylan said that they wanted to “reach out to the nerd group and the cool group” and “appeal to everybody”. Dualstar and Leisure Publishing LLC launched a magazine whose target was boys. They did so in 2006 and it is called Sprouse Bros. Code.
Simon & Schuster Inc. also published two volumes of a book series titled Sprouse Bros. 47 R.O.N.I.N. It featured the Sprouse twins as “young James Bonds or undercover agents”. However, in 2008, the brothers ended their association with the Olsens’ Dualstar. Nevertheless, they continued with their clothing line. They exclusively sold the items in their clothing lines online until mid-March 2012. But the online store could no longer be accessed after that.
Cole Sprouse – Net Worth 2024
Moving on to his net worth and earnings, Cole has a net worth estimation of around 8 million dollars. He earns through his involvement in acting, photography, and much more. When he was young, both Dylan and he earned $20,000 each for every episode of The Suite Life of Zack & Cody. This made the twins the richest child actors in the industry by 2010.
Furthermore, the media also named the twins one of the wealthiest children alive in 2007. Also, in 2010, the twins were the highest-paid teenage Disney television actors. According to MSN, the pair were the richest teenage twins in the world by the end of the 2000s.
Relationship Status
Cole Sprouse is currently single. He was dating his Riverdale co-star Lili Reinhart. The pair’s on-screen characters, Jughead and Betty, are also the onscreen couple who broke up in January 2020. He shared the breakup news via Instagram posts captioning:
“Lili and I initially separated in January of this year, deciding to more permanently split in March. What an incredible experience I had, I’ll always feel lucky and cherish that I had the chance to fall in love. I wish her nothing but the utmost love and happiness moving forward. All I’ll say about it, anything else you hear doesn’t matter.”
He added,
“Also her movie comes out soon! I’m sure she’s just as incredible in it as everything else she does. Thanks guys ❤️”
More about their relationship
A few months after the show’s 2017 launch, their public and social media interactions led to rumors that they were dating. They were spotted cozying up to each other during ComicCon in July of the same year. However, the two were wary of publicly confirming a romance, and he admitted that he wanted to maintain a private life.
In January 2018, the lovers were seen together in Hawaii. Then in April of the same year, they were spotted kissing in Paris, and later that month his social media revealed the two vacationing in Mexico. The said couple then attended the May 2018 Met Gala together.
Additionally, it seems like Lili Reinhart has also become quite the muse for his photography. His Instagram is filled with beautiful pictures of her. They kept their relationship fairly private, which resulted in several rumors about their breakup. However, the couple is having a good laugh about the rumors.
Further, in July 2019, it was rumored that Sprouse and Reinhart had split after two years of dating but they are in deep love with each other, which they occasionally share on their social media posts. Both of them used to occasionally share their adoration, respect, and love for each other in public.
Caption: Cole Sprouse and Lili Reinhart cuddling for a sweet photograph. Source: Diply
Controversy
Dylan was caught up in a major controversy when he sent some nude photos to a lady friend over his cellphone. Unfortunately, these photos went online and he lost his good image in the industry. Cole Sprouse stood by him in this difficult time and after this incident, the twins were shunned by the Hollywood film industry for some time.
Moreover, he spent some time off the Riverdale set and exercised his professional photography skills in Manila, the capital of the Philippines. One user commented that many of his photos “showed the real Philippines in its most vulnerable state. No pretensions, just a clear reality.” However, one of those photos and captions caught flack from fans and viewers. He shared a photo that featured an impoverished child with the caption “Well I’m not your parent, don’t gotta follow me around.”
Viewers accused the actor of sensationalizing poverty and he received mounds of negative comments on the post. With all the negative responses to the photo, he promptly apologized through an Instagram Story and one fan account captured the moment. The Instagram Story read:
“For those of you that took offense to this photo or the caption, I removed it. My apologies, and not my intention. Certainly not seeking to sensationalize poverty nor poke fun, shoulda thought more about the words used, and the implications of those words I hadn’t even considered.” Then he continues “I’ll continue to post about my travels through Manila, showing all sides of the city experiences.”
Body Measurements
Talking about Cole’s body measurement stats, he stands tall at a height of 5 feet 11 inches or 1.8 m and weighs around 70 kg. He has beautiful green eyes and blonde hair color that he dyed black for his Riverdale character.
Social Media
Cole Sprouse has several accounts on Instagram alone. Likewise, he has a personal account that features his original photography and personal photos @sprousemasterworks. This account had 1,058 post shares and 32.8m followers in September 2020. Moreover, he joined Twitter in March 2011 and so far has 9.9 million followers.
Similarly, his other Instagram account is @camera_duels. On this account, he shares photos of people trying to photograph him in public. Although he created this account to call out invasions of privacy, fans ended up considering an appearance there as a badge of honor, which limited its effectiveness as a deterrent. The last post on this account was shared in August 2019.