Josh Lawson's trade is the aside: the profane, unimpressed line dropped into a scene that is taking itself seriously. As Kano he has made it the work he is known for, and in a film as thin as Mortal Kombat II it is nearly enough.
Fi1m perspective
Somebody in a Mortal Kombat film says something grand about realms and destiny, and Kano says something rude. That is Josh Lawson's habit and it is a good one. In the 2021 film he played the mercenary as profane, juvenile and oddly sincere, and a fair amount of what he said was his own invention rather than the script's. In Mortal Kombat II (2026), which we scored 50, he works the same seam as Karl Urban's Johnny Cage and gets slightly more out of it, though the director, Slater, has given both men one joke and a choice of rooms to tell it in. We noticed, during the long middle stretch of fights we could not tell apart, that we were waiting for Lawson to come back on. We could not say that about the fights.
The quickness is where it comes from. Lawson trained at NIDA, graduating in 2001, but the more useful schooling was a year of improvisation in Los Angeles and the panel-show improv of Thank God You're Here back home. American sitcoms followed: Doug Guggenheim in House of Lies from 2012 to 2016, Superstore from 2015 to 2018, and St. Denis Medical from 2024. Those are supporting parts, and supporting is where he is best. His one early lead, Any Questions for Ben? (2012), drew the note that he could be glib when asked to carry a film rather than puncture it.
He has also written and directed. The Little Death (2014), in which he acts as well, is an ensemble sex comedy built on long, talky scenes; Long Story Short (2021) is a time-loop romantic comedy about putting things off. We have not reviewed either, so we will say only what has been said about them: that he is good at steering actors through wordy dialogue, and that the structure and tone of his films tend to wobble, with ideas raised and then not pursued. That sounds, from the outside, like the same actor who can land a line but struggles to hold a whole picture.
Lawson has described the balance he wanted for Kano: enough comedy to make him a person, not so much that he stops belonging in the world. In the 2021 film the performance was widely cited as a highlight, so he seems to have found it. If you go to the sequel, go for Urban and for Lawson, and do not expect to remember who fought whom.
He has said he turned to writing because he wanted "to explore more control". The part that made his name is the one he did not write.
Biography
Josh Lawson is an Australian actor. He was born on 22 July 1981 in Brisbane, Queensland, and graduated from the National Institute of Dramatic Art in 2001. He also studied improvisation in Los Angeles.
Lawson is known for playing Kano in the 2021 film Mortal Kombat and its 2026 sequel Mortal Kombat II. His other credits include Tate in the sitcom Superstore (2015–2018), Doug Guggenheim in House of Lies (2012–2016), and roles in films such as The Campaign (2012), Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues (2013) and Bombshell (2019). He has directed and written several projects, including the feature The Little Death (2014) and the short film The Eleven O'Clock (2016), which received an Academy Award nomination.
His older brother is the actor Ben Lawson.
