Idris Elba is PEOPLE Magazine's 33rd Sexiest Man Alive (VIDEO)

Elba is PEOPLE’s 33rd Sexiest Man Alive, joining a long list of Hollywood’s hottest, starting with a then-29-year-old Mel Gibson in 1985 to last year’s pick Blake Shelton.

Though he was an athlete at his all-boys school in London, playing first-string football, basketball, cricket, hockey and rugby, the actor insists he went through an awkward phase first. “I was very tall and skinny,” says the 6’3″ Elba. “And my name was Idrissa Akuna Elba, okay? I got picked on a little bit. But as soon as I could grow a mustache, I was the coolest kid on the block. Grew a mustache, had some muscles, bonkers.”
See video below: