Nico Birnbaum was born in Kiel. Although being an actor from the north of Germany, he frequently gravitated towards the more sunnier south of Europe. He thus studied literature and philosophy in Aix-en-Provence in France, wrote part of his thesis on Franz Kafka in Florence and also lived in Rome where he worked as a translator and German teacher.He gained his first professional acting experience at the Florentine film school Scuola Nazionale die Cinema Indipendente. Here he acted in a number of short films and took part in his first feature film Reality News by Salvatore Vitiello.After accomplishing his PhD with summa cum laude in 2013, he gave up his academic career in favour of pursuing his dream of becoming a professional actor.He has since played supporting roles in several TV-series. E.g. Martin Hellwig a shady reporter in Unter Uns or Sandro Wollmers, a mafia drug-dealer in Verbotene Liebe. In between, he went on tour as FBI-agent in a stage play called Einsteins Verrat as part of the Berlin Schlosspark Theatre crew. He also performed the half-hour English monologue Warning Signs by David Kantounas at the Hebbel theatre in Berlin.