As a child, he lived in Elanora Heights, Paddington, and Wollstonecraft in Sydney with his father, Gerald Nixon, a Recording Engineer, and his mother, Vanessa, a Nurse.
[citation needed] He graduated from the Australian National University with an Arts degree, majoring in anthropology, Sociology, and English, and was going to continue in the world of Academia but opted instead to pursue an Acting career.
His film work includes Matthew Saville's NOISE (2007), Cate Shortland's Somersault (2004), Triangle (2009), and Julia Leigh's Sleeping Beauty (2011).
Nixon was flown from Sydney to Los Angeles in 2007 to audition personally for Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg for the role of Leckie in the HBO/Playtone/DreamWorks Co-production of The Pacific.
In addition to his work in front of the camera, Nixon is also a respected voice-over artist, having lent his voice to many major campaigns including Mitsubishi, McDonald's, Nissan, IGA, and NIB.