Netflix's One Piece: Why Koby Looks So Familiar
Throughout Netflix's "One Piece," protagonist Luffy (Iñaki Godoy) attempts to recruit some of the colorful personalities he meets on his journey to be members of his pirate crew. His first close ally, however, is a boy named Koby, who dreams of being a Marine and working on the other side of the law from the pirating world.
To Luffy, following a lifelong dream is the most important thing a person can do, so he encourages Koby become a Marine even if it might put a damper on their friendship. Koby does just that and ends up in the employ of intimidating Marine Vice Admiral Garp (Vincent Regan). As it so happens, Garp decides to pursue Luffy, inciting Koby to have to figure out where his allegiances lie.
Koby is played by an Australian actor named Morgan Davies, who may look familiar from some of his film and TV performance leading up to his "One Piece" role.
One of Morgan Davies' first film roles was in The Tree
Morgan Davies got his start acting as a child, appearing first in an Australian drama titled "Green Fire Envy" that premiered in 2008 when he was just six years old. He then followed that performance up with a part in the 2010 Charlotte Gainsbourg drama "The Tree."
Gainsbourg stars as Dawn, the suddenly single a mother of four children. Davies plays one of those children named Simone. At that point in Davies' career he had yet to come out as transgender — which he first shared publicly in 2020 — so in this film, as in plenty of projects moving forward, he plays a female character.
Simone, notably, tells Dawn soon after her father Peter (Aden Young)'s death that she can hear him communicating through a tree near their home. Gradually, the tree starts to physically impose upon their house, but its importance to Simone and the connection she and Dawn feel between it and Peter makes them hesitant to proceed with its removal.
The following year Davies played a part in the Willem Dafoe drama The Hunter
Even though he was still just a child, Morgan Davies hit the ground running at the start of his film career and followed up his considerable role in "The Tree" with a part opposite Willem Dafoe the very next year in "The Hunter."
Dafoe plays Martin, a mercenary on a mission to find and extract some DNA from what is supposedly a living Tasmanian tiger, contrary to rumors of their extinction. Once he arrives in Tasmania, Martin stays with a woman named Lucy (Frances O'Connor) and her two daughters, one of whom, named Katie, is played by Davies.
All the while Martin is claiming to be a biologist, hiding the fact that his true objective is to locate a rare animal for nefarious purposes. Katie and her sister, however, break through Martin's icy exterior and befriend him. This found familial relationship ends up becoming a vulnerability his employers attempt to exploit, leading Martin to have to decide whether or not he values his job more than his newfound companionship.
He's a part of The Girlfriend Experience Season 2
Season 1 of "The Girlfriend Experience" premiered to Starz in 2016, loosely adapting the core idea of Steven Soderbergh's 2009 feature of the same name to a TV format. Starz quickly renewed the show for a second season that premiered just over a year later, near the end of 2017. Rather than continue Season 1's story, Season 2 follows an anthology format, revolving around two separate, entirely new groups of characters.
One of the protagonists of Season 2 is Bria (Carmen Ejogo), who's just adopted a new identity courtesy of the Witness Protection Program after leaving an abusive husband. She brings her daughter Kayla along with her, who's played by Morgan Davies. At first their relationship is complicated by the fact that Bria must work as an escort to make ends meet, but soon the specter of the dangerous man she left behind begins to loom larger and larger over their new life together.
He plays an impactful role in Australian TV series The End
In 2020, Morgan Davies debuted in the Australian TV series "The End" as a boy named Oberon undergoing treatment for gender dysphoria. This role effectively inspired to Davies come out as transgender to the general public after a complicated relationship with his gender identity and career over the course of the prior few years.
Davies told OUTInPerth that he initially came out to some of his close confidants when he was 13 years old, which would have been in 2014 or 2015. However, he chose to continue playing female characters after noticing that these were the only parts being offered to him at the time. His agent eventually presented him with the role of Oberon, thinking that he might personally relate to the character. Davies was angry at first, but ended up spinning his acceptance of the role into a broader acceptance of himself.
"I knew that if I took the role, not only would I have to come out to myself, but also all my friends. I was still in high school, I knew playing a trans character I'd have to come out to everyone, it was so scary and daunting to me," he said. "I came out that day, to everyone, and while I was terrified, it ended up being not as scary as I thought it was."
Davies appears in all 10 episodes of "The End" as a member of the show's main cast.
He's one of the kids in Evil Dead Rise
Between "The End" and "One Piece," Morgan Davies appeared in his first feature film outside of the Australian film industry as one of the two young stars of the 2013 "Evil Dead" remake sequel "Evil Dead Rise," which premiered in 2023.
Its plot kicks off when newly pregnant Beth (Lily Sullivan) meets up with her financially struggling sister Ellie (Alyssa Sutherland). She's the mother of three kids: Kassie (Nell Fisher), Bridget (Gabrielle Echols), and Danny (Davies). Soon after Beth's arrival, teenagers Bridget and Danny discover a collection of occult artifacts in the basement of their apartment building. Ellie then ends up possessed by a demonic entity, and Beth and the three children must band together to survive.
"Evil Dead Rise" premiered just months before "One Piece," kicking off the current chapter of Davies' career as a performer in big-budget Hollywood projects.