Koen Smit

Koen Frederik Smit was born in a village in the north of The Netherlands and was always interested in acting and performing from a young age, resulting in performing for his classmates in primary school and joining in the talent show on his high school every year in multiple disciplines. Playing piano, singing, acting his own plays and dancing his own choreographies and he was also the presenter of his high school talent show in his finals year. Years later he was asked to be the head judge on this same talent show and he gladly accepted. After high school Smit went to Amsterdam to study acting, singing, music, dancing, writing and performance development at the Theatreschool of the Amsterdam Institute for the Arts. Being a big fan of the 80's series FAME this was a dream come true. And like in that series it wasn't always easy for a young village boy in the big city. But he survived and graduated in 1998. After doing some theatre, his big break came in 1999 when he auditioned for the Dutch original soap opera Goudkust and got the part of Jeroen van Cloppenburg. After doing this for two years the series was unfortunately canceled. But Smit had already set his mind on going back to theatre, being a voice over and when there was no play to be played or animation to be dubbed he started working as a casting director for mainly voice overs as well. With the cultural landscape in Holland getting more and more bothered by cuts and loss of funding he decided to make casting director his primary job. He became the face of a Dutch travel agent in 2008, and is still the main character in their funny TV commercials and on their website, and is seen nation wide on billboards in his yellow suit.