Jasper Pääkkönen

Joona Jasper Pääkkönen was born on 15 July 1980 in Helsinki, Finland, to actor Seppo Pääkkönen and Virve Havelin. His uncle Antti Pääkkönen is also an actor. He attended Kallio Upper Secondary School of Performing Arts and spent a year as an exchange student at Owings Mills High School in Maryland (1997–98).

Pääkkönen began acting at age seven, with his first film role in The Glory and Misery of Human Life (1988). He gained fame as Saku Salin in the Finnish soap opera Salatut elämät (1999–2002). He has starred in numerous box office hits in Finland, earning the title of 'most profitable film actor in Finland' according to Ilta-Sanomat. Notable films include Bad Boys, Frozen Land (2005), Matti: Hell Is for Heroes (2006), Lapland Odyssey (2010), and Heart of a Lion (2013), for which he won a Jussi Award for Best Supporting Actor.

His international breakthrough came in 2015 when he was cast as Halfdan the Black in the History Channel series Vikings (2016–2020). He later appeared in Spike Lee's BlacKkKlansman (2018) as Felix Kendrickson and in Da 5 Bloods (2020).

Pääkkönen is also known as a poker player. In 2006, he took 1st place in the PAF Poker Challenge in Mariehamn, Åland, winning €15,000. In 2009, he co-founded the poker magazine Pokerisivut.com with film producer Markus Selin. The magazine won the Best Overall Affiliate award at the London 2010 iGB Affiliate Awards, but ceased publication in 2010 due to a new Finnish lottery law.

Pääkkönen and Markus Selin owned shares in iGameGroup, a Malta-based company that was sold to Swedish firm Unibet for €59 million. According to the Paradise Papers leak, Pääkkönen was among hundreds of Finns with investments in Malta, a known tax haven.

Pääkkönen is a passionate fly fisherman and environmentalist. He is a member of the Vision fly fishing world team, a brand ambassador for Patagonia, and founded Superflies.com, which sells flies and raises funds for endangered fish species. He also co-owns the Löyly spa in Helsinki, named one of the World's 100 Greatest Places by Time Magazine.

Pääkkönen married Alexandra Escat in 2017 and has two children.