As a student in Sarah Lawrence College in 1980, he studied acting, philosophy and history. He also studied German Expressionist Film in college. Despite his parents' wealth, Elwes supplemented his income by working his way through school.

His very devout Catholic mother took him to meet Pope John Paul II in the Vatican when Cary was 22 years old. Cary portrayed the young pontiff in the docudrama Pope John Paul II (2005) (TV).

Is a distant relative of the famous Archaeologist Lord Carnarvon, and a distant nephew of Henry VIII Tudor, King of England, as well as he is a distant nephew of his third wife, Jane Seymour.

Is the ambassador for the Audrey Hepburn Children's Fund. As ambassador, he traveled to Banda Aceh, Indonesia for the documentary "The Children of the Tsunami", which was filmed 90 days after the tsunami of December 2004 to document the damage and recovery efforts.

Cousin of Amanda Elwes.

His paternal grandfather was the famous portrait-painter Simon Elwes.

Played a number of villainous roles. His first role as a villain was in Leather Jackets (1992).

Was chosen for the part of Westley in The Princess Bride (1987) after Rob Reiner saw him in Lady Jane (1986). He spent weeks training in fencing with both his left hand and right hand while performing acrobatics.

Met his wife Lisa Marie in 1991 at a Malibu chili cook-off.

Last name is pronounced El-wez.

Became engaged in Paris to Lisa Marie Kurbikoff. [12 December 1997]

For the video game The Bard's Tale (2004) (VG), he spent at least 20 hours in Los Angeles and London recording studios to bring his title character to life. In order for his character to converse with nonplayable characters in either a 'snarky' or 'nice' tone, both leavened with comic relief, Cary had to record two responses for every interaction - a total of 1,200 lines and a lot of his own script improvising.

Brother of Cassian Elwes and Damian Elwes.

Is an accomplished horseman.

His recurring character on "The X Files" (1993)'s 9th season, FBI Assistant Director Brad Follmer, is named after the show's creator/executive producer Chris Carter's assistant, Brad Follmer.

His great grandfather (on his father's side) was a chamberlain to the Pope.

Daughter, Dominique, was born on April 24, 2007.

Having been a dramatic actor, he had never done a comedy prior to his acclaimed performance in The Princess Bride (1987).

Raised as a Catholic. He was an altar boy at Brompton Oratory in London. His mother, father, and paternal grandfather were also Catholics.

Made his film debut in Marek Kanievska's award-winning drama Another Country (1984). Based on that performance, Cary was chosen by renown Director of The Royal Shakespeare Company, Trevor Nunn, to star opposite Helena Bonham Carter in the highly acclaimed historical epic Lady Jane (1986).

Stepson of Elliott Kastner.

Played a filmmaker 4 times: as John Houseman in Cradle Will Rock (1999), as Fritz Arno Wagner in Shadow of the Vampire (2000), as Fritz Hippler in Uprising (2001) (TV), and as Thomas H. Ince in The Cat's Meow (2001).

He has had cameo appearences in several movies that his brother, Cassian Elwes, produced such as The Chase (1994) and Never on Tuesday (1988).

Prepares intensely for most of his acting roles. (For example, for Days of Thunder (1990), he had to rely on practical research to meet the physical demands of playing a race car driver. For his role as Air Force Colonel James Burton in The Pentagon Wars (1998) (TV), he spent a few days in Burton's home interviewing him and poring over his BFV files, and even filing boxes of Burton's Bradley documents and giving every page back to Burton.).

Was a projectionist at school.