Hooton was born and raised in Carlton, Nottinghamshire, where he attended Frank Wheldon Comprehensive School.

He has also appeared in several other programmes, including Peak Practice, The Bill, Heartbeat and Touching Evil.

[4] In 1997, he appeared in director Shane Meadows' first feature film, Twenty Four Seven, where he played the character 'Wolfman' Knighty.

He subsequently starred in The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Runner after Chris Gascoyne dropped out of the show, with Hooton having ten days to prepare for the role.

[1] In 2009, he attended the Eurogamer Expo alongside co-star Alex Carter where he revealed that he was trying to get sponsorship for a video game show he was planning to pitch to television studios.