Leonardo Wilhelm DiCaprio d kæpri.o born November 11, 1974 is an American actor and film producer. He has been nominated for ten Golden Globe Awards, winning two, and five Academy Awards.
DiCaprio began his career by appearing in television commercials, after which he had recurring roles in TV series such as the soap opera Santa Barbara and the sitcom Growing Pains in the early 1990s. His first major film release was opposite Robert De Niro in This Boy's Life 1993. DiCaprio was praised for his supporting role in What's Eating Gilbert Grape 1993 which earned him a Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor nomination. He gained public recognition with leading roles in The Basketball Diaries 1995 and Romeo + Juliet 1996 before achieving international fame with James Cameron's epic romance Titanic 1997 which became the highest grossing movie to that point.
Since the 2000s, DiCaprio has received critical acclaim for his work in a wide range of film genres. Some of his notable films include Catch Me If You Can 2002 Gangs of New York 2002 Blood Diamond 2006 The Departed 2006 Revolutionary Road 2008 Shutter Island 2010 Inception 2010 and Django Unchained 2012 His portrayal of Howard Hughes in The Aviator 2004 and Jordan Belfort in The Wolf of Wall Street 2013 won him the Golden Globe Awards for Best Actor in a Drama and Best Actor in a Musical or Comedy, respectively. In addition to acting, DiCaprio owns a production company named Appian Way Productions. He is also a committed environmentalist.DiCaprio, an only child, was born in Hollywood Los Angeles, California, to mother Irmelin née Indenbirken a legal secretary, and father George DiCaprio, an underground comics artist and producer and distributor of comic books. DiCaprio's father is of half Italian from the Naples area and half German from Bavaria descent. DiCaprio's maternal grandfather, Wilhelm Indenbirken, was German. His maternal grandmother, Helene Indenbirken 1915–2008 a German citizen, was born as Yelena Smirnova in Russia.
DiCaprio's parents met while attending college and subsequently moved to Los Angeles. He was named Leonardo because his pregnant mother was looking at a Leonardo da Vinci painting in a museum in Italy when DiCaprio first kicked. His parents divorced when he was a year old, and he lived mostly with his mother. The two lived in several Los Angeles neighborhoods, such as Echo Park, and at 1874 Hillhurst Avenue, Los Feliz district which was later converted into a local public library while his mother worked several jobs to support them.He attended Seeds Elementary School and John Marshall High School a few blocks away, after attending the Los Angeles Center for Enriched Studies for four years. However, he dropped out of high school following his third year, eventually earning his general equivalency diploma GED. DiCaprio spent part of his childhood in Germany with his maternal grandparents, Wilhelm and Helene. He speaks German fluently.
Career
Early career
DiCaprio's career began with his appearance in several commercials and educational films. After being removed from the set of children's television series Romper Room for being disruptive at the age of five he followed his older stepbrother Adam Farrar into television commercials, landing an ad for Matchbox cars at 14. In 1990, he got his break on television when he was cast in the short-lived series based on the movie Parenthood. After Parenthood, DiCaprio had bit parts on several shows, including The New Lassie and Roseanne, as well as a brief stint on the soap opera Santa Barbara, playing the young Mason Capwell. His involvement in Parenthood and the daily soap earned him a nomination for the Young Artist Award for Best Young Actor each.
1991–1995: Breaking into film
His debut film role was in the comedic sci-fi horror film Critters 3, in which he played the stepson of an evil landlord, a role that DiCaprio described as your average, no-depth, standard kid with blond hair. Released in 1991, the movie went direct-to-video. Soon after, he became a recurring cast member on the ABC sitcom Growing Pains, playing Luke Brower, a homeless boy who is taken in by the Seaver family. DiCaprio made his big screen breakthrough in 1992, when he was handpicked by Robert De Niro out of 400 young actors to play the lead role in This Boy's Life.
Later in 1993, DiCaprio co-starred as the mentally handicapped brother of Johnny Depp's character in What's Eating Gilbert Grape, a comic-tragic odyssey of a dysfunctional Iowa family. Director Lasse Hallström admitted he was initially looking for a less good-looking actor but finally settled on DiCaprio as he had emerged as "the most observant actor among all auditionees. Budgeted at US$11.0 million the film became a financial and critical success, resulting in a domestic box office total of US$9.1 million and various accolades for DiCaprio, who was awarded the National Board of Review Award and nominated for both an Academy Award and a Golden Globe for his portrayal. New York Times critic Janet Maslin praised DiCaprio's performance, writing "the film's real show-stopping turn comes from Mr. DiCaprio, who makes Arnie's many tics so startling and vivid that at first he is difficult to watch. The performance has a sharp, desperate intensity from beginning to end.
DiCaprio's first effort of 1995 was Sam Raimi's The Quick and the Dead, a western film. Sony Pictures was dubious over DiCaprio's casting, and as a result, co-star Sharon Stone decided to pay for the actor's salary herself. The film was released to a dismal box office performance, barely grossing US$18.5 million in the US and received mixed reviews from critics. DiCaprio next starred in Total Eclipse, a fictionalized account of the homosexual relationship between Arthur Rimbaud and Paul Verlaine. He replaced River Phoenix, who had died during pre-production on the project. A minor arthouse success, the film grossed US$0.34 million throughout its domestic theatrical run.
DiCaprio appeared in the mostly improvised short film called Don's Plum, as a favor to aspiring director R.D. Robb. When Robb decided to expand the black-and-white film to feature length, however, DiCaprio and Maguire had its release blocked by court order, arguing that they never intended to make it a theatrical release, as it would have commercial value thanks to their stardom. The film eventually premiered at the 2001 Berlin International Film Festival, where it was well received by critics, with Time Out New York writer Mike D'Angelo calling it "the best film in Berlin". DiCaprio's last film of the year 1995 was The Basketball Diaries, a biopic about Jim Carroll.
1996–2001: Mainstream success
In 1996, DiCaprio appeared opposite Claire Danes in Baz Luhrmann's film Romeo + Juliet, an abridged modernization of William Shakespeare's romantic tragedy of the same name which retained the original Shakespearean dialogue. The project achieved a worldwide box office take of $147 million.
Later that year, he starred in Jerry Zaks' family drama Marvin's Room, reuniting with Robert De Niro. Based on Scott McPherson's screenplay adaptation of his own 1991 stage play of the same name, the film revolves around two sisters, played by Meryl Streep and Diane Keaton, who are reunited through tragedy after 17 years of estrangement. DiCaprio portrayed the character of Hank, Streep's troubled son, who has been committed to a mental asylum for setting fire to his mother's house. In 1997, DiCaprio starred in James Cameron's Titanic 1997 as twenty-year-old Jack Dawson, a penniless Wisconsin man who wins two tickets for the third-class on the ill-fated RMS Titanic. DiCaprio initially refused to portray the character but was eventually encouraged to pursue the role by Cameron, who strongly believed in his acting ability.Against expectations, the film went on to become the highest-grossing film to dateit was surpassed in 2010 by Cameron's film Avatar grossing more than $1.843 billion in box-office receipts worldwide and transformed DiCaprio into a commercial movie superstar, resulting in fan worship among teenage girls and young women in general that became known as "Leo-Mania. More than 200 fans contacted the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to protest his not being nominated for the 70th Academy Awards. He was nominated for other high-profile awards, including a second Golden Globe nomination. Upon the success of Titanic, DiCaprio stated in 2000: "I have no connection with me during that whole Titanic phenomenon and what my face became around the world I'll never reach that state of popularity again, and I don't expect to. It's not something I'm going to try to achieve either.
The following year, DiCaprio made a self-mocking cameo appearance in Woody Allen's caustic satire of the fame industry, Celebrity 1998. That year, he also starred in the dual roles of the villainous King Louis XIV and his secret, sympathetic twin brother Philippe in Randall Wallace's The Man in the Iron Mask, based on the same-titled 1939 film. Despite receiving a rather mixed to negative response the film became a box office success, grossing US$180 million internationally. Though DiCaprio's performance was generally well-received, with Entertainment Weekly critic Owen Gleiberman writing that "the shockingly androgynous DiCaprio looks barely old enough to be playing anyone with hormones, but he's a fluid and instinctive actor, with the face of a mischievous angel, he was awarded a Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Screen Couple for both incarnations the following year.
DiCaprio's next project was the drama film The Beach 2000 an adaption of Alex Garland's same-titled 1996 novel. He played an American backpacking tourist looking for the perfect way of life in a secret island commune in the Gulf of Thailand. Budgeted at $US50 million, the film became a financial success, grossing $US144 million worldwide, but as with DiCaprio's previous project, the film was largely panned by critics. Todd McCarthy of Variety noted that "Richard is too much the American Everyman and not enough of a well-defined individual to entirely capture one's interest and imagination, and DiCaprio, while perfectly watchable, does not endow him with the quirks or distinguishing marks to make this man from nowhere a dimensional character. The next year, he was nominated for another Razzie Award for his work on the film.DiCaprio's first film of 2002 was the biographical crime drama film Catch Me If You Can, based on the life of Frank Abagnale Jr., who, before his 19th birthday, used his charm, confidence, and several different personas, to make millions in the 1960s writing bad checks. Directed by Steven Spielberg, the film was shot in 147 different locations in only 52 days, making it "the most adventurous, super-charged movie-making" DiCaprio had experienced yet. Catch Me If You Can received favourable reviews and proved to be an international success, becoming Dicaprio's highest-grossing film since Titanic with a total of US$351.1 million worldwide. Roger Ebert praised his performance, and noted that while "DiCaprio, who in recent films has played dark and troubled characters, is breezy and charming here, playing a boy who discovers what he is good at, and does it The following year, DiCaprio received his third Golden Globe nomination for his work on the film.
Also in 2002, DiCaprio appeared in Martin Scorsese's Gangs of New York, a historical film set in the mid-19th century in the Five Points district of New York City. Director Scorsese initially struggled selling his idea of realizing the film until DiCaprio became interested in playing protagonist Amsterdam Vallon, a young leader of the Irish faction, and thus, Miramax Films got involved with financing the project. Nonetheless production on the film was plagued by blown-out budgets and producer-director squabbles, resulting in a marathon eight-month shoot and, at US$103 million, the most expensive film Scorsese had ever made.Upon its release, Gangs of New York became a financial and critical success however. DiCaprio's acting was well-received but remained overshadowed by Daniel Day-Lewis' performance among most critics.Forging a collaboration with Scorsese, the two paired again for a biopic of the eccentric and obsessive American film director and aviation pioneer Howard Hughes in The Aviator 2004. Centering on Hughes' life from the late 1920s to 1947, DiCaprio initially developed the project with Michael Mann, who decided against directing it after back-to-back film biographies in Ali and The Insider. The actor eventually pitched John Logan's script to Scorsese, who quickly signed on to direct. Altogether, DiCaprio reportedly spent more than a year and a half in preparation for the film which was not necessarily shot in continuity because of actors and locations schedules. The Aviator became a critical and financial success. DiCaprio received rave reviews for his performance and won a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor, also receiving another Academy Award nomination.
In 2006, DiCaprio starred in both Blood Diamond and The Departed. In Edward Zwick's war film Blood Diamond, he starred as a diamond smuggler from Rhodesia who is involved in the Sierra Leone Civil War. The film itself received generally favorable reviews, and DiCaprio was praised for the authenticity of his South African Afrikaner accent, known as a difficult accent to imitate. In Scorsese's The Departed he played the role of Billy Costigan, a state trooper working undercover in an Irish Mob in Boston. Highly anticipated, the film was released to overwhelmingly positive reviews and became one of the highest-rated wide release films of 2006. Budgeted at US$90 million, it also emerged as DiCaprio and Scorsese's highest-grossing collaboration to date, easily beating The Aviator´s previous record of US$213.7 million. DiCaprio's performance in The Departed was applauded by critics and earned him a Satellite Award for Best Supporting Actor. The same year, both the Golden Globes and the Screen Actors Guild nominated DiCaprio twice in the Best Actor category for both of his 2006 features, and in addition, DiCaprio earned his third Academy Award nomination for Blood Diamond.
In 2008, DiCaprio starred in Body of Lies, a spy film based on the novel of the same name by David Ignatius, set in context of the Middle East and the War on Terror, telling the story of three men battling a terrorist organization, and each other. Directed by Ridley Scott, DiCaprio dyed his hair brown and wore brown contacts for the role, which he chose to pursue because he considered it a throwback to political films of the 1970s such as The Parallax View 1974 and Three Days of the Condor 1975. The film received mixed reviews from critics and at a budget of US$67.5 million, became a moderate box office success, grossing US$115 million worldwide.The same year, DiCaprio reunited with Kate Winslet to film the drama Revolutionary Road 2008, directed by Winslet's then-husband Sam Mendes. As both actors had been reluctant to make romantic films similar to Titanic, it was Winslet who suggested that both should work with her on a film adaptation of the 1961 novel of the same name by Richard Yates after reading the script by Justin Haythe, knowing that plot had little in common with the 1997 blockbuster. Once DiCaprio agreed to do the film, it went almost immediately into production. He noted that he saw his character as "unheroic" and "slightly cowardly" and that he was "willing to be just a product of his environment. Portraying a couple in a failing marriage in the 1950s, DiCaprio and Winslet watched period videos promoting life in the suburbs to prepare themselves for Revolutionary Road, which eventually earned them favorable reviews. For his portrayal DiCaprio garnered his seventh Golden Globes nomination.
DiCaprio continued his collaborative streak with Scorsese in the 2010 psychological thriller film Shutter Island 2010 based on the 2003 novel of the same name by Dennis Lehane. He played U.S. Marshal Edward "Teddy" Daniels, who is investigating a psychiatric facility located on an island and comes to question his own sanity. The film grossed $294 million.
Also in 2010, DiCaprio starred in director Christopher Nolan's science-fiction film Inception. Inspired by the experience of lucid dreaming and dream incubation DiCaprio portrays the character of Dom Cobb, an "extractor" who enters the dreams of others to obtain information that is otherwise inaccessible. Cobb is promised a chance to regain his old life in exchange for planting an idea in a corporate target's mind. DiCaprio, the first actor to be cast in the film was "intrigued by this concept — this dream-heist notion and how this character's gonna unlock his dreamworld and ultimately affect his real life. Released to critical acclaim, the film grossed over $825 million worldwide. In July of the same year, it was announced that DiCaprio had pulled out of a Viking movie to be directed by Mel Gibson amid controversy over Gibson's rage-fueled rant tapes and domestic violence probe.In 2011, DiCaprio starred alongside Armie Hammer and Naomi Watts in Clint Eastwood's J. Edgar, a biopic about J. Edgar Hoover. Written by Dustin Lance Black, the film focuses on the career of the FBI director from the Palmer Raids onwards, including an examination of his private life as an alleged closeted homosexual. Reviews towards the film were mostly mixed, with many critics commending DiCaprio's performance but feeling that, overall, the film lacked coherence. Roger Ebert praised DiCaprio's performance as a "fully-realized, subtle and persuasive performance, hinting at more than Hoover ever revealed, perhaps even to himself.
In 2012, DiCaprio starred as villainous Calvin Candie in Quentin Tarantino spaghetti western, Django Unchained. The film received positive reviews from critics and earned DiCaprio his ninth nomination from the Golden Globes. Django Unchained grossed $424 million worldwide.DiCaprio's next film was The Great Gatsby again with Baz Luhrmann who filmed with him Romeo + Juliet in 1996 a big screen adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's 1925 novel, also starring Carey Mulligan and Tobey Maguire; the film was released on May 10, 2013. It received mixed reviews from critics however, DiCaprio's portrayal as Jay Gatsby was praised by critics. Critic Rafer Guzman of Newsday praised DiCaprio by stating, "As for Leonardo DiCaprio, he is now the Gatsby to beat. Despite a borderline comedic entrance haloed by fireworks and accompanied by Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue"—DiCaprio nails this maddeningly enigmatic character. He's as tough as Alan Ladd in '49, as suave as Redford in 74, but also vulnerable, touching, funny a faker, a human. You hear it all in Gatsby's favorite phrase, "old sport a verbal tic that stumped other actors It's a tremendous, hard-won performance.Matt Zoller Seitz of Roger Ebert.com described his performance as Gatsby as "The movie's greatest and simplest special effect," and states "This is an iconic performance — maybe his career best. The film grossed $348 million worldwide and became Luhrmann's highest grossing film.
DiCaprio reunited with Scorsese for the fifth time in The Wolf of Wall Street, a true story based on the life of stockbroker Jordan Belfort, who was arrested in the late 1990s for securities fraud and money laundering. Filming began on August 8, 2012, in New York and the film was released on December 25, 2013. The role earned him a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor in a Musical or Comedy and his fourth Academy Award nomination for acting. In January 2013, DiCaprio said he was going to take a long break from acting and would fly around the world doing good for the environment.
In April 2014, DiCaprio was cast in The Revenant, directed by Alejandro González Iñárritu.
Personal life
DiCaprio's romantic relationships have been widely covered in the media. DiCaprio dated model Kristen Zang on-and-off for several years, and British model and socialite Emma Miller. In 2000, he met Brazilian model Gisele Bündchen with whom he had an on-and-off relationship until their separation in 2005. DiCaprio began a relationship with model Bar Refaeli in November 2005 after meeting her at a Las Vegas party thrown for members of U2. In the course of their trip to Israel in March 2007, the couple met with Israeli president Shimon Peres and visited Refaeli's hometown of Hod HaSharon. The relationship was on hold for a period of six months starting in June 2009; in early 2010, the romance was rekindled. In May 2011, it was reported that the couple had ended their romantic relationship. In August 2011, it was reported that he was in a relationship with actress Blake Lively since mid-May. They ended their relationship in October 2011. DiCaprio dated model Erin Heatherton from December 2011 to October 2012. Since May 2013, DiCaprio has been dating German model Toni Garrn.
DiCaprio owns a home in Los Angeles and an apartment in Battery Park City in Lower Manhattan. In 2009, he bought an island off mainland Belize on which he is planning to create an eco-friendly resort.
In 2005, DiCaprio's face was severely injured when model Aretha Wilson hit him over the head with a broken bottle at a Hollywood party. After pleading guilty in 2010, Wilson was sentenced to prison for two years.
In 2014, he purchased the original Dinah Shore residence designed by mid-century modern architect Donald Wexler in Palm Springs.A committed environmentalist, DiCaprio has received praise from environmental groups for his activism. He owns an electric Tesla Roadste a Fisker Karma plug-in hybrid and a Toyota Prius. He has also installed solar panels on his house. In an interview with Ukula about his film the 11th Hour, DiCaprio cited global warming as the number-one environmental challenge.
At the 2007 Oscar ceremony, DiCaprio and former Vice President Al Gore appeared to announce that the Academy Awards had incorporated environmentally intelligent practices throughout the planning and production processes, thus affirming their commitment to the environment, and on July 7, 2007, DiCaprio presented at the American leg of Live Earth. In 2010, his environmental work earned DiCaprio a nomination for the VH1 Do Something Award. The awards show, produced by VH1, is dedicated to honoring people who do good and is powered by Do Something, a New York-based organization that aims to empower and inspire young people. On September 16th, 2014, DiCaprio, has been appointed as a United Nations representative on climate change.
In 1998, DiCaprio and his mother donated $35,000 for a "Leonardo DiCaprio Computer Center" at the Los Feliz branch of the Los Angeles Public Library, the site of his childhood home. It was rebuilt after the 1994 Northridge earthquake and opened in early 1999. During the filming of Blood Diamond, DiCaprio worked with 24 orphaned children from the SOS Children's Village in Maputo, Mozambique, and was said to be extremely touched by his interactions with the children. In 2010, he donated $1 million to relief efforts in Haiti after the earthquake.
During the 2004 presidential election, DiCaprio campaigned and donated to John Kerry's presidential bid. The FEC showed DiCaprio gave $2,300 to Barack Obama's presidential campaign in the 2008 election, the maximum contribution an individual can give in that election cycle, and $5,000 to Obama's 2012 campaign.
In November 2010, DiCaprio donated $1 million to the Wildlife Conservation Society at Russia's tiger summit. DiCaprio's persistence in reaching the event after encountering two plane delays caused then Prime Minister Vladimir Putin to describe him as a "muzhik" or "real man. In 2011, DiCaprio joined the Animal Legal Defense Fund's campaign to free Tony, a tiger who has spent the last decade at the Tiger Truck Stop in Grosse Tete, Louisiana. DiCaprio is an activist for gay rights; in April 2013, he donated $61,000 to GLAAD, an organization which promotes the image of LGBT people in the media.
George Timothy Clooney born May 6, 1961 is an American actor, filmmaker and activist. He has received three Golden Globe Awards for his work as an actor and two Academy Awards, one for acting and the other for producing.
Clooney made his acting debut on television in 1978, and later gained wide recognition in his role as Dr. Doug Ross on the long-running medical drama ER from 1994 to 1999, for which he received two Emmy Award nominations. While working on ER, he began attracting a variety of leading roles in films, including Batman & Robin 1997 and Out of Sight 1998 in which he first worked with long-time collaborator Steven Soderbergh. In 1999, Clooney took the lead role in Three Kings, a well-received war satire set during the Gulf War. In 2001, Clooney's fame widened with the release of his biggest commercial success, Ocean's Eleven, the first of the film trilogy, a remake of the 1960 film with Frank Sinatra as Danny Ocean. He made his directorial debut a year later with the biographical thriller Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, and has since directed Good Night, and Good Luck 2005 Leatherheads 2008 The Ides of March 2011 and The Monuments Men 2014. He won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for the Middle East thriller Syriana 2005 and subsequently earned Best Actor nominations for Michael Clayton 2007 Up in the Air 2009 and The Descendants 2011. In 2013, he received the Academy Award for Best Picture for producing the film Argo, alongside Ben Affleck and Grant Heslov. He is the only person ever to be nominated for Academy Awards in six categories.
Clooney has been described as one of the most beautiful men in the world. In 2005, TV Guide ranked Clooney No. 1 on its "50 Sexiest Stars of All Time" list. In 2009, he was included in Time's annual Time 100 as one of the "Most Influential People in the World.
Clooney is also noted for his political activism and has served as one of the United Nations Messengers of Peace since January 31, 2008. His humanitarian work includes his advocacy of finding a resolution for the Darfur conflict, raising funds for the 2010 Haiti earthquake, 2004 Tsunami, and 9 11 victims, and creating documentaries such as Sand and Sorrow to raise awareness about international crises. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Clooney was born in Lexington, Kentucky, in 1961. His mother, Nina Bruce née Warren was a beauty pageant queen and city councilwoman. His father, Nick Clooney, is a former anchorman, game show host, and hosted AMC for five years in the late 90s. Clooney has mainly Irish and some German ancestry. His maternal four times great grandmother, Mary Ann Sparrow, was the half-sister of Nancy Hanks the mother of President Abraham Lincoln. Clooney has an older sister named Adelia known as Ada. His aunt was the famed cabaret singer and actress Rosemary Clooney. His cousin Gabriel Ferrer is married to singer Debby Boone.
Clooney was raised a strict Roman Catholic but has said he does not know if he believes in Heaven or even God. He has said, "Yes, we were Catholic, big time, whole family, whole group. He began his education at the Blessed Sacrament School in Fort Mitchell, Kentucky. Spending part of his childhood in Ohio, he attended St. Michael's School in Columbus then Western Row Elementary School a public school in Mason, Ohio, from 1968 to 1974 and St. Susanna School in Mason, where he served as an altar boy. The Clooneys moved back to Kentucky when George was midway through the seventh grade.
In middle school Clooney developed Bell's palsy, a condition that partially paralyzes the face. The malady went away within a year. In an interview with Larry King, he stated that "yes, it goes away. It takes about nine months to go away. It was the first year of high school, which was a bad time for having half your face paralyzed.
After his parents moved to Augusta, Kentucky, Clooney attended Augusta High School. He has stated that he earned all As and a B in school and was an enthusiastic baseball and basketball player. He tried out to play professional baseball with the Cincinnati Reds in 1977 but he did not pass the first round of player cuts and was not offered a contract. He attended Northern Kentucky University from 1979 to 1981, majoring in Broadcast Journalism, and very briefly attended the University of Cincinnati, but did not graduate from either. He made money selling women's shoes, insurance door-to-door, stocking shelves, working construction, and cutting tobacco. Clooney's first role was as an extra in the television mini-series Centennial in 1978, which was based on the novel of the same name by James A. Michener, and was partly filmed in Clooney's hometown of Augusta, Kentucky. Clooney's first major role came in 1984 in the short-lived sitcom E/R not to be confused with ER, the better known hospital drama, on which Clooney also co starred a decade later. He played a handyman on the series The Facts of Life, and appeared as Bobby Hopkins, a detective, on an episode of The Golden Girls. His first prominent role was a semi regular supporting role in the sitcom Roseanne, playing Roseanne Barr's supervisor Booker Brooks, followed by the role of a construction worker on Baby Talk, a co starring role on the CBS drama Bodies of Evidence as Detective Ryan Walker, and then a year-long turn as Det. James Falconer on Sisters. In 1988, Clooney also played a role in Return of the Killer Tomatoes. During this period Clooney was a student at the Beverly Hills Playhouse acting school for five years.
Clooney rose to fame when he played Dr. Doug Ross, alongside Anthony Edwards, Julianna Margulies, and Noah Wyle, on the hit NBC drama ER from 1994 to 1999. After leaving the series in 1999, he made a cameo appearance in the 6th season and returned for a guest spot in the show's final season. For his work on the series, Clooney received two Emmy Award nominations for Outstanding Lead Actor In A Drama Series in 1995 and 1996. He also earned three Golden Globe Award nominations for Best Actor Television Series Drama in 1995, 1996, and 1997 losing to co-star Anthony Edwards.
Clooney began appearing in films while working on ER. His first major Hollywood role was in From Dusk till Dawn, directed by Robert Rodriguez. He followed its success with One Fine Day with Michelle Pfeiffer, and The Peacemaker with Nicole Kidman. Clooney was then cast as Batman in Joel Schumacher's Batman & Robin, which was a modest box office performer, but a critical failure with Clooney himself calling the film "a waste of money. In 1998, he co-starred in Out of Sight opposite Jennifer Lopez, marking the first of his many collaborations with director Steven Soderbergh. He also starred in Three Kings during the last weeks of his contract with ER. After leaving ER, Clooney starred in the commercially successful films The Perfect Storm and O Brother, Where Art Thou. In 2001, he teamed up with Soderbergh again for Ocean's Eleven, a remake of the 1960s Rat Pack film of the same name. As of 2011, it was Clooney's most successful film, earning more than $450 million worldwide. The film spawned two sequels starring Clooney, Ocean's Twelve in 2004 and Ocean's Thirteen in 2007.
In 2001, Clooney and Soderbergh co-founded Section Eight Productions, for which Grant Heslov was president of television. Clooney made his directorial debut in the 2002 film Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, based on the autobiography of TV producer Chuck Barris. Though the film didn't do well at the box office, Clooney's direction showed promise.
In 2005, Clooney starred in Syriana, which was based loosely on former Central Intelligence Agency agent Robert Baer's memoirs of his service in the Middle East. He suffered an accident on the set of Syriana, which caused a brain injury with complications from a punctured dura. The same year he directed, produced, and starred in Good Night, and Good Luck, a film about 1950s television journalist Edward R. Murrow's famous war of words with Senator Joseph McCarthy. At the 2006 Academy Awards, Clooney was nominated for Best Director and Best Original Screenplay for Good Night, and Good Luck, as well as Best Supporting Actor for Syriana. He won the Oscar for his role in Syriana.
Clooney next appeared in The Good German 2006 a film noir directed by Soderbergh that is set in post World War II Germany. In August 2006, Clooney and Heslov started the production company Smokehouse Pictures. In October 2006, Clooney received the American Cinematheque Award, which honors someone in the entertainment industry who has made "a significant contribution to the art of motion pictures. On January 22, 2008, Clooney was nominated for an Academy Award and many other awards for Best Actor for Michael Clayton 2007. Later that year, he directed his third film, Leatherheads, in which he also starred. On April 4, 2008, Variety reported that Clooney had quietly resigned from the Writers Guild of America over a dispute concerning Leatherheads. Clooney, who is the director, producer, and star of the film, claimed that he had contributed in writing "all but two scenes" of it, and requested a writing credit alongside Duncan Brantley and Rick Reilly, who had worked on the screenplay for 17 years. Clooney lost an arbitration vote 2 1 and withdrew from the union over the decision. He became a financial core status non member, meaning he no longer has voting rights, and cannot run for office or attend membership meetings, according to the WGA's constitution.
He next co starred with Ewan McGregor and Kevin Spacey in The Men Who Stare At Goats, which was directed by Heslov and released in November 2009. Also in November 2009, he voiced Mr. Fox in Wes Anderson's animated feature Fantastic Mr. Fox. The same year, Clooney starred in Up in the Air, which was initially given limited release, and then wide released on December 25, 2009. For his performance in the film, which was directed by Jason Reitman, he was nominated for a Golden Globe, a Screen Actors Guild Award, BAFTA, and an Academy Award. 2010 saw the release of The American, based on the novel A Very Private Gentleman by Martin Booth and directed by Anton Corbijn. Clooney played the lead role, and was a co-producer of the film.
As of 2011, Clooney is represented by Bryan Lourd, co-chairman of Creative Artists Agency CAA.
In 2011 Clooney starred in The Descendants as a husband whose wife has an accident that leaves her in a coma. He earned critical praise for his work, and won the Broadcast Film Critics Association Award for Best Actor and the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama. Also, he was nominated for the Screen Actors Guild for Best Actor, the BAFTA Award for Best Actor, and the Academy Award for Best Actor. He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for The Ides of March.
In 2013, Clooney won the Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture Drama, the BAFTA Award for Best Picture and the Academy Award for Best Picture for producing Argo. He is the only person in Academy Award history to be nominated for Oscars in six different categories: Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor, Best Director, Best Original Screenplay and Best Adapted Screenplay.
Clooney co starred with Sandra Bullock in Gravity 2013 a science fiction film directed by Alfonso Cuarón. He co wrote directed and starred in The Monuments Men an adaption of The Monuments Men Allied Heroes Nazi Thieves and the Greatest Treasure Hunt in History by Robert M. Edsel. Clooney also produced August Osage County 2013 an adaptation of the play of the same name. The film stars Meryl Streep and Julia Roberts
Clooney supported Barack Obama's campaign in the 2008 presidential election and in the 2012 presidential election. He is a supporter of gay rights. In 2003, he opposed the Iraq war saying You can't beat your enemy anymore through wars instead you create an entire generation of people seeking revenge.Our opponents are going to resort to car bombs and suicide attacks because they have no other way to win.I believe [Donald Rumsfeld] thinks this is a war that can be won, but there is no such thing anymore. We can't beat anyone anymore. Clooney is involved with Not On Our Watch Project, an organization that focuses global attention and resources to stop and prevent mass atrocities, along with Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Don Cheadle, David Pressman, and Jerry Weintraub.
In February 2009, he visited Goz Beida, Chad, with NY Times columnist Nicholas D. Kristof. In January 2010, he organized the Telethon Hope for Haiti Now which collected donations for the 2010 Haiti earthquake victims.
In March 2012, Clooney was featured with Martin Sheen and Brad Pitt in a performance of Dustin Lance Black's play, '8'a staged reenactment of the federal trial that overturned California's Prop 8 ban on same sex marriage as attorney David Boies. The production was held at the Wilshire Ebell Theatre and broadcast on YouTube to raise money for the American Foundation for Equal Rights. In September 2012, Clooney offered to take an auction winner out to lunch to benefit the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network GLSEN. GLSEN works to create a safe space in schools for children who are or may be perceived to be gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender.
Clooney has advocated a resolution of the Darfur conflict. He spoke at a 2006 Save Darfur rally in Washington, D.C. In April 2006, he spent ten days in Chad and Sudan with his father to make the TV special "A Journey to Darfur" reflecting the situation of Darfur's refugees, and advocated for action. The documentary was broadcast on American cable TV as well as in the UK and France. In 2008, it was released on DVD with the sale proceeds being donated to the International Rescue Committee. In September of the same year, he spoke to the UN Security Council with Nobel Prize winner Elie Wiesel to ask the UN to find a solution to the conflict and to help the people of Darfur. In December, he visited China and Egypt with Don Cheadle and two Olympic winners to ask both governments to pressure Sudan's government. On March 25 2007 he sent an open letter to German Chancellor Angela Merkel, calling on the European Union to take decisive action" in the region given the failure of Sudan President Omar al-Bashir to respond to UN resolutions. He narrated and was co-executive producer of the 2007 documentary Sand and Sorrow. Clooney also appeared in the documentary film Darfur Now a call to action film released in November 2007 for people all over the world to help stop the Darfur crisis. In December 2007, Clooney and fellow actor Don Cheadle received the Summit Peace Award from the Nobel Peace Prize Laureates in Rome. In his acceptance speech, Clooney said that "Don and I stand here before you as failures. The simple truth is that when it comes to the atrocities in Darfur those people are not better off now than they were years ago.On January 18, 2008, the United Nations announced Clooney's appointment as a UN messenger of peace, effective January 31.
Clooney conceived of and, with John Prendergast, human rights activist co founder of the Enough Project, and Strategic Advisor for Not On Our Watch Project initiated the Satellite Sentinel Project SSP after an October 2010 trip to South Sudan. SSP aims to monitor armed activity for signs of renewed civil war between Sudan and South Sudan, and to detect and deter mass atrocities along the border regions there.
Clooney and John Prendergast co wrote a Washington Post op ed piece in May 2011 titled "Dancing with a dictator in Sudan arguing that.
President Omar al-Bashir has been indicted by the International Criminal Court for genocide is escalating bombing and food aid obstruction in Darfur and he now threatens the entire north-south peace process. the evidence shows that incentives alone are insufficient to change Khartoum's calculations. International support should be sought immediately for denying debt relief expanding the ICC indictments, diplomatically isolating the regime, suspending all non-humanitarian aid, obstructing state-controlled bank transactions and freezing accounts holding oil wealth diverted by senior regime officials.
On March 16, 2012, Clooney was arrested outside the Sudanese Embassy for civil disobedience. He intended to be arrested when he planned the protest. Several other prominent participants were also arrested, including Martin Luther King III.Clooney was married to actress Talia Balsam from 1989 to 1993. He also had a relationship with actress Ginger Lynn Allen. After meeting British model Lisa Snowdon in 2000, he had a five-year on-again, off-again relationship with her. In June 2007, he started dating reality personality Sarah Larson, but the couple broke up in May 2008. In July 2009, Clooney was in a relationship with Italian actress Elisabetta Canalis until they split in June 2011. In July 2011, Clooney started dating former WWE Diva Stacy Keibler and they ended their relationship in July 2013. Clooney has also dated actresses Kelly Preston 1987 1989 Renée Zellweger 2001 and Krista Allen 2002 2008 as well as French reality TV personality Céline Balitran 1996 1999.
Despite his highly publicized relationships with women, Clooney's sexual orientation has been the subject of media scrutiny. When asked about the subject in an interview with The Advocate Clooney stated The last thing you’ll ever see me do is jump up and down, saying These are lies!’ That would be unfair and unkind to my good friends in the gay community. I’m not going to let anyone make it seem like being gay is a bad thing.
Clooney became engaged to British Lebanese human rights lawyer Amal Alamuddin on April 28, 2014 as confirmed by a representative at Alamuddin's chambers Doughty Street Chambers.
In July 2014, Clooney publicly criticized the British tabloid newspaper the Daily Mail after it claimed his fiancée's mother opposes their marriage on religious grounds. When the tabloid apologized for its false story, Clooney refused to accept the apology. He called the paper "the worst kind of tabloid. One that makes up its facts to the detriment of its readers. On August 7 2014 Clooney and Alamuddin obtained marriage licenses at the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea of the United Kingdom. Alamuddin and Clooney were officially married on September 27 2014 at Ca' Farsetti. They were married by Clooney’s friend Walter Veltroni the former mayor of Rome.
Clooney's main home is in Los Angeles. He purchased the 7 354 square foot 683.2 m2 house in 1995 through his George Guifoyle Trust. His home in Italy is in the village of Laglio, on Lake Como near the former residence of Italian author Ada Negri. Clooney also maintains a home in Los Cabos, Mexico that is next door to the home of Cindy Crawford and Rande Gerber.
In 2014, George Clooney and his new British wife Amal Alamuddin bought the Mill House on an island in the River Thames at Sonning Eye in England at a cost of around £10 million.
On September 21, 2007, Clooney and then-girlfriend Sarah Larson were injured in a motorcycle accident in Weehawken, New Jersey. Clooney's motorcycle was hit by a car. The driver of the car reported that Clooney attempted to pass him on the right while Clooney said that the driver signaled left and then decided to make an abrupt right turn and clipped his motorcycle. On October 9, 2007, more than two dozen staff at the hospital were suspended without pay for looking at Clooney's medical records in violation of federal law.
Clooney has appeared in commercials outside the US for Fiat, Nespresso, and Martini vermouth. Clooney was named one of Time magazine's 100 Most Influential People in the World in 2007, 2008, and 2009.
He was parodied in the South Park episode "Smug Alert which mocks his acceptance speech at the 78th Academy Awards. However, Clooney has also lent his voice to South Park as Sparky the Dog in "Big Gay Al's Big Gay Boat Ride" and as the emergency room doctor in South Park Bigger Longer & Uncut. Clooney was caricatured in the American Dad! episode Tears of a Clooney, in which Francine sees her plan to destroy him materialize.
Main article List of awards and nominations received by George Clooney
Throughout his career, Clooney has won two Academy Awards one for Best Supporting Actor for his role in Syriana and one for Best Picture as one of the producers for Argo, as well as a BAFTA and a Golden Globe. For his role in The Descendants, he won a Golden Globe Award and was nominated for an Academy Award, BAFTA Award Satellite Award, and two Screen Actors Guild Awards: Best Lead Actor and Best Cast.
Keira Christina Knightley k r na tli born 26 March 1985 is an English actress and singer. She began acting as a child on television and made her film debut in 1995. She had a supporting role as Sabé in Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace 1999 and her first significant role came in The Hole 2001. She gained widespread recognition in 2002 after co-starring in the film Bend It Like Beckham and achieved international fame in 2003 after appearing as Elizabeth Swann in the Pirates of the Caribbean film series 2003–present.
Since the Pirates of the Caribbean films, Knightley has become known for starring in period drama films such as Pride & Prejudice 2005 Atonement 2007 Silk 2007 The Duchess 2008 A Dangerous Method 2011 and Anna Karenina 2012. Knightley has also appeared in a variety of genres of Hollywood films, including the romantic comedy Love Actually 2003 the historical action King Arthur 2004 the psychological thriller The Jacket 2005 biographical action Domino 2005 the historical drama The Edge of Love 2008 the film noir London Boulevard 2010 the dystopian science fiction Never Let Me Go 2010 the romantic drama Last Night 2010 and the dark comedy Seeking a Friend for the End of the World 2012.
Knightley earned nominations for the Academy Award for Best Actress and the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress for her role as Elizabeth Bennet in Joe Wright's 2005 adaptation of Jane Austen's novel Pride and Prejudice. Two years later she was nominated again for the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress, as well as the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role for her performance in Wright's Atonement. In its 2008 list, Forbes identified Knightley as the second highest-paid actress in Hollywood, with reported earnings of US$32 million in 2007, making her the only non-American on the list of highest-paid actresses that year.
In 2014, Knightley appeared in four films, Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit, Begin Again, Laggies and The Imitation Game. Knightley has received rave reviews and praise for her work as Joan Clarke in The Imitation Game, and has been nominated for multiple awards, including; Screen Actors Guild Award nominations for Best Supporting Actress and Best Ensemble Cast as well as a Golden Globe nomination for Best Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture and a Broadcast Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting Actress and Best Ensemble Cast. She was also nominated for Best Song at the Broadcast Film Critics Association Awards for "Lost Stars" from Begin Again.
In October 2015, Knightley will make her Broadway debut in the title role of Thérèse Raquin.Knightley was born in Teddington, London, England, the daughter of Sharman Macdonald, an actress turned playwright, and Will Knightley, an actor. Her Scottish-born mother is of Scots and Welsh descent, and her father is of English ancestry. She has an older brother,
Knightley lived in Richmond, attending Stanley Junior School, Teddington School and Esher College. She was diagnosed with dyslexia at the age of six but, as she was successful in school, she was permitted to acquire a talent agent and pursue an acting career. She requested an agent at the age of three. Knightley has noted that she was "single-minded about acting" during her childhood. She performed in a number of local amateur productions, which included After Juliet written by her mother, and United States written by her drama teacher, Ian McShane.She focused on art, history, and English literature while at Esher, but left after a year to focus on her acting.
1993–2002: Career beginnings
After getting an agent at 6, Knightley worked mostly on commercials and small TV roles. Her first role was "Little Girl" in Royal Celebration, a 1993 TV film. A year later, she had a small role in the film A Village Affair. She later starred in 1995's Innocent Lies and 1998's Coming Home. She was a princess in the 1996 film The Treasure Seekers. Later in 1999, she appeared as Rose in Oliver Twist.
Knightley appeared in several television films in the mid- to late 1990s—as well as ITV1's The Bill before being cast as Sabé, Padmé Amidala's decoy, in the 1999 science fiction blockbuster Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace. Sabé's dialogue was dubbed over with Natalie Portman's voice. This was to hide the fact that the handmaiden Padmé played by Portman was actually disclosed as the real Queen Amidala at the end of the film. Knightley was cast in the role because of her close resemblance to Portman; even the two actresses' mothers had difficulty telling their daughters apart when the girls were in full makeup. In 2000 Knightley appeared in the video to Five's song Don't Wanna Let You Go.
Knightley's first starring role was in 2001, when she played the daughter of Robin Hood in the made-for-television Walt Disney Productions feature Princess of Thieves. She trained for several weeks in archery, fencing and horse riding. During this time, Knightley also appeared in The Hole, a thriller that received a directto-video release in the United States. Its director Nick Hamm described her as "a young version of Julie Christie.
She appeared in the miniseries adaptation of Doctor Zhivago as Lara alongside Scottish actor Hans Matheson in the title role, which first aired in 2002 to good reviews and high ratings. In the same year, she also was in the film Pure, in which she portrays a pregnant teenager who is a heroin addict and had a child taken by social services. Knightley's breakthrough role was in the football-themed film Bend It Like Beckham, which was a success in its August 2002 UK release, grossing US$18 million, and in its March 2003 U.S. release, grossing US$32 million.
2003–07: The Pirate Trilogy, Breakthrough and acclaim
After Bend It Like Beckham's UK release raised her profile, Knightley was cast in the big-budget action film Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, along with Orlando Bloom and Johnny Depp. Produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, it opened in July 2003 to positive reviews and high box office grosses becoming one of the biggest hits of summer 2003 and cementing Knightley as the new "It" girl.
Knightley had a role in the British romantic comedy Love Actually, which opened in November 2003, which co-starred her childhood idol Emma Thompson. Her next film, King Arthur, opened in July 2004 to negative reviews in preparation for the role she took boxing, fighting, archery and horseriding lessons for four days a week for three months.
In the same month, Knightley was voted by readers of Hello! magazine as the film industry's most promising teen star. Additionally, TIME magazine noted in a 2004 feature that Knightley seemed dedicated to developing herself as a serious actress rather than a film star.
She appeared in three films in 2005, the first of which was The Jacket, alongside Adrien Brody. She next appeared in Tony Scott's Domino, an action film based on the life of bounty hunter Domino Harvey. The film has been Knightley's greatest critical flop to date. Knightley's critics often suggested she was nothing more than a pretty face, which led her to comment to Elle magazine, "I always feel like I’m the one with everything to prove.Pride & Prejudice was released in 2005. Knightley had loved the book since she was seven, and with her first cheque for acting she bought a doll's house of the hero's mansion. She said of her character, "The beauty of Elizabeth is that every woman who ever reads the book seems to recognise herself with all her faults and imperfections. If you give an actress who is even remotely good the chance to play a fantastic character like that, they are going to revel in it. Variety wrote about her portrayal of Elizabeth Bennet: "Looking every bit a star, Knightley, who's shown more spirit than acting smarts so far in her career, really steps up to the plate here, holding her own against the more classically trained Matthew Macfadyen, as well as vets like Brenda Blethyn, Donald Sutherland, Penelope Wilton and Judi Dench with a luminous strength that recalls a young Audrey Hepburn. More than the older Jennifer Ehle in the TV series, she catches Elizabeth's essential skittishness and youthful braggadocio, making her final conversion all the more moving. The film grossed more than US$100 million worldwide,and Knightley earned a Golden Globe nomination and an Oscar nomination the Oscar ultimately went to Reese Witherspoon. The Academy Award nomination made her the third-youngest performer ever nominated. BAFTA's decision not to nominate her drew criticism from Pride & Prejudice producer Tim Bevan.
In 2006, Knightley was invited to join the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Her biggest financial hit thus far, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, was released in July 2006.
Knightley starred in three major films in 2007: Silk, an adaptation of the novel by Alessandro Baricco, Atonement, a feature film adaptation of Ian McEwan's novel of the same name co-starring James McAvoy, Vanessa Redgrave and Brenda Blethyn and Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, which was released in May 2007. For her performance in Atonement, Knightley was nominated for a Golden Globe Award in the Best Dramatic Actress category for the role, as well as a BAFTA Award. Critic Richard Roeper was puzzled by both Knightley's and McAvoy's Academy Award snubs, stating I thought McAvoy and Knightley were superb.
In 2008, Knightley appeared alongside Sienna Miller, Cillian Murphy and Matthew Rhys in John Maybury's The Edge of Love, a fictional wartime drama about Welsh poet Dylan Thomas, his wife Caitlin Macnamara, childhood friend Vera Williams, and her romance and marriage with a British soldier. Penned by Knightley's mother, Sharman Macdonald, the playwright initially crafted the screenplay with Knightley as Macnamara in her mind. Once her daughter agreed to portray Williams, Macdonald enlarged the character, making her a singer.
Knightley, who watched Marlene Dietrich films for preparation, was expecting to mime to her prerecorded voice, but was told by Maybury to sing live in front of the crew while shooting. "I was shaking like a leaf," Knightley later commented, "I thought my knees were going to buckle. In the first couple of songs, I sounded like a pubescent boy, it was so embarrassing. While the actress received positive reviews for her role the film became a moderate critical and commercial arthouse success.She then filmed Saul Dibb's The Duchess 2008, based on the best-selling biography Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire by Amanda Foreman in which she played 18th-century English aristocrat Georgiana Cavendish, Duchess of Devonshire opposite Ralph Fiennes. Well received by critics Knightley garnered largely positive reviews by critics, with The Epoch Times writing "Knightley's performance gains new depth she not only perfectly portrays a witty and feminine Georgiana early in the film, but also a caring mother, and an abandoned woman later on. The following year, she was nominated for a BIFA Award for Best Actress for her performance.
In December 2009, Knightley made her West End debut in Martin Crimp's version of Molière's comedy The Misanthrope, at the Comedy Theatre in London alongside Damian Lewis, Tara FitzGerald and Dominic Rowan. Reviews for her portrayal of Jennifer in the play were generally positive. The Daily Telegraph described her performance as revealing "both power and poignancy" and The Independent called her performance "not only strikingly convincing but, at times, rather thrilling in its satiric aplomb. The Guardian, however, noted that due to the nature of the role "one could say that she is not unduly stretched. In recognition of her theatre debut, Knightley was nominated for the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role in the play. Knightley also received an Evening Standard Award nomination for the Natasha Richardson Award for Best Actress.
In 2010, Knightley appeared in Massy Tadjedin's romantic drama Last Night, in which she co-starred with Eva Mendes, Sam Worthington and Guillaume Canet. The same year, Knightley completed work on an adaptation of Kazuo Ishiguro's dystopian novel Never Let Me Go with Andrew Garfield and Carey Mulligan. Filming took place in Norfolk and Clevedon in Somerset Also in 2010, she starred in London Boulevard with Colin Farrell, written by William Monahan.
2011–present: Cronenberg, New beginning, Broadway announcement
Knightley's only film of 2011 was David Cronenberg's historical drama A Dangerous Method, co-starring Viggo Mortensen, Michael Fassbender and Vincent Cassel. Based on writer Christopher Hampton's 2002 stage play The Talking Cure and set on the eve of World War I, the film depicts the turbulent relationships between fledgling psychiatrist Carl Jung, his mentor Sigmund Freud and Sabina Spielrein. Spielrein, the troubled but beautiful young psychoanalyst who comes between Jung and Freud, is played by Knightley. The costume film premiered at the 68th Venice International Film Festival to a positive reception, while Knightley earned generally favourable reviews by critics, Andrew O'Hehir of Salon.com noting her "the real star of this film.
In 2012, she appeared with Steve Carell in the dramedy Seeking a Friend for the End of the World. During the same year, she reunited with director Joe Wright for the production of Anna Karenina, in which she starred as the title character. Knightley garnered positive reviews for her performance, prompting early Oscar buzz.
In May 2012, Knightley was cast to replace Scarlett Johansson in director John Carney's Begin Again, after Johansson withdrew due to personal reasons. The film was released in 2013.
Knightley's first film of 2014 premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, prior to its US general-release opening on 24 October. Titled Laggies, the film also stars Chloe Grace Moretz and Sam Rockwell, and is directed by Lynn Shelton. Shortly afterward, the London, UK, premiere of Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit, in which Knightley plays Cathy Muller alongside Chris Pine, was held at the end of January.Also in 2014, she starred opposite Mark Ruffalo in Begin Again, and although she plays a singer-songwriter, she revealed in July that music doesn't "sink in" for her, and she is more interested in books and drama. Knightley also referred to the end of a chapter of her career, which the Guardian described as "mired in neurotic roles. She then appeared again with her Atonement co-star Benedict Cumberbatch in the 2014 historical drama film The Imitation Game. She played Joan Clarke, opposite Cumberbatch's Alan Turing.
Knightley is slated to appear in a film adaptation of the novel, The Emperor's Children, with Rachel McAdams, Emma Thompson and Richard Gere. The dark comedy was written by Noah Baumbach and will be directed by Scott Cooper. Knightley's broadway debut was announced in October 2014, stating that she will appear as the title character in a new adaptation of Thérèse Raquin by Helen Edmundson—the show's official debut after the previews is scheduled for 29 October 2015.
Knightley has been described by press reports as "famously open with media although Knightley herself has stated "I don't talk about my private life. Knightley has appeared many times in FHMs 100 Sexiest Women in the World list. Ranked No. 79 in 2004 she climbed to No. 18 in 2005, and was named "the sexiest woman in the world in 2006 In 2007, she was 12th, 10th in 2008 and came in 36th in 2009. The US edition ranked her No. 54 in 2004, No. 11 in 2005, and No. 5 in 2006. In May 2006, she was No. 9 on Maxim's 2006 Hot 100. Knightley appeared nude, along with Scarlett Johansson, on the cover of Vanity Fair magazine's March 2006 "Hollywood issue.
Knightley was the celebrity face for the luxury goods brand Asprey, Shiatzy Chen as well as Lux haircare products in Japanese television commercials. In April 2006, she was confirmed as the new celebrity face of Chanel's perfume Coco Mademoiselle, though the first photo from the campaign was not released until May 2007.
A 41-year-old man was charged with harassment in February 2010 after trying to contact the actress on several occasions outside the Comedy Theatre in London, where she appeared in the play The Misanthrope. The subsequent trial folded after the actress was unavailable to testify in court.
Knightley received media attention for her perspectives on feminism, voiced in an interview for Harper's Bazaar UK published in the February 2014 edition. Knightley explained that female artists face greater hurdles in the film industry compared to their male counterparts, and also revealed that she was perplexed by the use of "feminist" in a derogatory sense:
I think it's great that the discussions are finally being allowed to be had as opposed to anybody mentioning feminism and everybody going, 'Oh, fucking shut up.' Somehow, it became a dirty word. I thought it was really weird for a long time, and I think it's great that we're coming out of that.
In the September 2014 issue of Interview, Knightley posed topless, on the condition that she not be photoshopped, to draw attention to how "women's bodies are a battleground and photography is partly to blame.
Personal life
Knightley was in a relationship with actor Del Synnott from 2001 to 2003. The couple met during the filming of Princess of Thieves. Knightley was also in a relationship with actor Jamie Dornan from 2003 to 2005. She dated her Pride & Prejudice co-star Rupert Friend from 2005 until December 2010. She subsequently began dating musician James Righton, of Klaxons, in late February 2011. Knightley and Righton married on 4 May 2013 in Mazan, Vaucluse, Southern France. The couple live in Islington. On 12 December, 2014 Keira confirmed through a spokesperson that she was pregnant with her first child.
Knightley has denied rumours she is anorexic, although her family has a history of anorexia. Knightley sued the Daily Mail after they claimed she lied about having anorexia. The article said that a teenage girl died from anorexia, indicating that Knightley's physical appearance may have influenced her in some way—she was awarded a settlement. In July 2006, Knightley said she has become a workaholic suggesting that she would take a one-year break from acting to travel and focus on her personal life.
Speaking to the press in July 2014, Knightley explained that she felt like she had reached the end of the first stage of her career, and the 2014 film Begin Again was like it's beginning again." Knightley also acknowledged the criticism she previously faced about merely being lucky in her career Its really annoying, let's face it. 'Fuck off, you little shit.' I do totally get it.
Charity work
Knightley is the face of an Amnesty International campaign to support human rights, marking the 60th anniversary of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights. In 2004, she travelled to Ethiopia alongside Richard Curtis, Sanjeev Bhaskar and Julian Metcalfe on behalf of the Comic Relief charity. She posed for photos for WaterAid in 2005 and also for the American Library Association's "Read" campaign a promotional poster of Pride & Prejudice. The dress she wore to the 2006 Academy Awards was donated to the charity Oxfam, where it raised £4,300.
In April 2009, Knightley appeared in a video to raise awareness of domestic abuse entitled Cut shot for Women's Aid. The video created controversy, with some sources calling it too graphic, while other groups support the video for showing a realistic depiction of domestic violence.
In November 2010, Knightley became patron ofhe SMA Trust, a British charity that funds medical research into the disease spinal muscular atrophy.
For International Women's Day 2014, Knightley was one of the artist signatories of Amnesty International's letter to UK Prime Minister David Cameron, in which the organisation campaigned for women's rights in Afghanistan.
Milena Markivna Mila Kunis mil 'ku n s born August 14 1983 is an American actress. In 1991, at the age of seven, she moved from the USSR to Los Angeles with her family. After being enrolled in acting classes as an after-school activity, she was soon discovered by an agent. She appeared in several television series and commercials, before acquiring her first significant role prior to her 15th birthday, playing Jackie Burkhart on the television series That '70s Show. In September 1999, she began voicing Meg Griffin on the animated series Family Guy.
Her breakout film role came in 2008 playing Rachel Jansen in Forgetting Sarah Marshall. Subsequent film roles included Mona Sax in Max Payne, Solara in The Book of Eli, Jamie in Friends with Benefits, Lori in the comedy Ted, and Theodora in Oz the Great and Powerful. Her performance as Lily in Black Swan gained her worldwide accolades, including receiving the Premio Marcello Mastroianni for Best Young Actor or Actress at the 67th Venice International Film Festival, and nominations for a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress and a Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role.Kunis was born in Chernivtsi, in the Ukrainian SSR now Ukraine. Her mother, Elvira, is a physics teacher who runs a pharmacy, and her father, Mark Kunis, is a mechanical engineer who works as a cab driver. Kunis has an elder brother named Michael born c. 1976 She stated in 2011 that her parents had "amazing jobs", and that the family was "very lucky and not poor they had decided to leave the USSR because they saw "no future" there for Kunis and her brother.In 1991 when she was seven years old, her family moved to Los Angeles, California, with $250. "That was all we were allowed to take with us. My parents had given up good jobs and degrees, which were not transferable. We arrived in New York on a Wednesday and by Friday morning my brother and I were at school in LA.
Kunis comes from a Jewish family and has cited antisemitism in the former Soviet Union as one of several reasons for her family's move to the United States. She has stated that her parents "raised Jewish as much as they could," although religion was suppressed in the Soviet Union.On her second day in Los Angeles, Kunis was enrolled at Rosewood Elementary School, not knowing a word of English. She later recalled: "I blocked out second grade completely. I have no recollection of it. I always talk to my mom and my grandma about it. It was because I cried every day. I didn't understand the culture. I didn't understand the people. I didn't understand the language. My first sentence of my essay to get into college was like, 'Imagine being blind and deaf at age seven.' And that's kind of what it felt like moving to the States.
In Los Angeles, she attended Hubert Howe Bancroft Middle School. She used an on-set tutor for most of her high school years while filming That '70s Show.When not on the set, she attended Fairfax High School, from which she graduated in 2001. She briefly attended UCLA and Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles.
1994–2000: Career beginnings and television work
At age nine, Kunis was enrolled by her father in acting classes after school at the Beverly Hills Studios, where she met Susan Curtis, who would become her manager. On her first audition she landed the role for a Barbie commercial.Shortly after, she did a commercial for the Lisa Frank product line. Her first television roles took place in 1994, first appearing on Days of Our Lives, and a few months later doing her first of two appearances on Baywatch. She had a minor role on 7th Heaven and supporting roles in Santa with Muscles, Honey, We Shrunk Ourselves, and the Angelina Jolie film Gia, as the young Gia Carangi.
At the age of 10, Kunis auditioned for but failed to get the role of a Russian Jewish girl who moves to America in the film Make a Wish, Molly. Instead, she was cast in the secondary role of a Mexican girl In 1998, Kunis was cast as Jackie Burkhart in the Fox sitcom That '70s Show. All who auditioned were required to be at least 18 years old; Kunis, who was 14 at the time, told the casting directors she would be 18 but did not say when. Though they eventually figured it out, the producers still thought Kunis was the best fit for the role. That '70s Show ran for eight seasons. She won two consecutive Young Star Awards as Best Young Actress in a Comedy TV Series in 1999 and 2000 for her performances.
In 1999, Kunis replaced Lacey Chabert in the role of Meg Griffin on the animated sitcom Family Guy created by Seth MacFarlane for Fox. Kunis won the role after auditions and a slight rewrite of the character, in part due to her performance on That '70s Show. MacFarlane called Kunis back after her first audition, instructing her to speak slower, and then told her to come back another time and enunciate more. Upon claiming that she had mastered these speech particulars, MacFarlane hired her. MacFarlane added What Mila Kunis brought to it was in a lot of ways, I thought, almost more right for the character. I say that Lacey did a phenomenal job, but there was something about Mila – something very natural about Mila. She was 15 when she started, so you were listening to a 15-year-old. Often times with animation they'll have adult actors doing the voices of teenagers and they always sound like Saturday morning voices. They sound often times very forced. She had a very natural quality to Meg that really made what we did with that character kind of really work. Kunis was nominated for an Annie Award in the category of Voice Acting in an Animated Television Production in 2007.She also voiced Meg in the Family Guy Video Game!. Kunis described her character as "the scapegoat.
2001–08: Transition to film
In 2001, she appeared in Get Over It opposite Kirsten Dunst. She followed that up in 2002, by starring in the straight-to-DVD horror film American Psycho 2 alongside William Shatner, a sequel to the 2000 film American Psycho. American Psycho 2 was panned by critics and later, Kunis herself expressed embarrassment over the film. In 2004, Kunis starred in the film adaptation Tony n' Tina's Wedding. Although the film was shot in 2004, it did not have a theatrical release until 2007. Most critics did not like the film, which mustered a 25% approval from Rotten Tomatoes. DVD talk concluded that "fans would be much better off pretending the movie never happened in the first place.
In 2005, Kunis co-starred with Jon Heder in Moving McAllister, which was not released theatrically until 2007. The film received generally poor reviews and had a limited two-week run in theaters. She followed up with After Sex starring alongside Zoe Saldana, who had also appeared in Get Over It. In October 2006, she began filming Boot Camp originally titled Straight Edge. The film was not released in theatres in the United States, but was released on DVD on August 25, 2009.Kunis starred as Rachel Jansen in the 2008 comedy film, Forgetting Sarah Marshall, co-produced by Judd Apatow. The role, which she won after unsuccessfully auditioning for Knocked Up entailed improvisation on her part. The film garnered positive reviews,and was a commercial success, grossing $105 million worldwide. Kunis's performance was well-received; Joe Morgenstern of The Wall Street Journal praised her "fresh beauty and focused energy, while James Berardinelli wrote that she is "adept with her performance and understands the concept of comic timing. She was nominated for a Teen Choice Award. In an interview, Kunis credited Apatow with helping her to expand her career from That '70s Show.
Also in 2008, Kunis portrayed Mona Sax, an assassin, alongside Mark Wahlberg in the action film Max Payne, based on the video game of the same name. Kunis underwent training in guns, boxing, and martial arts for her role. Max Payne was relatively successful at the box office, grossing $85 million worldwide but was panned by critics, with several reviewers calling Kunis miscast.Travis Estvold of Boise Weekly wrote that she was "horribly miscast as some sort of undersized, warble-voiced crime boss Director John Moore defended his choice of Kunis saying, "Mila just bowled us over She wasn't an obvious choice, but she just wears Mona so well. We needed someone who would not be just a fop or foil to Max we needed somebody who had to be that character and convey her own agenda. I think Mila just knocked it out of the park. She was nominated for another Teen Choice Award for her role in the film.
2009–12: Film breakthrough and acclaim
In 2009, she appeared in the comedy film Extract with Ben Affleck and Jason Bateman. The film received mostly positive reviews and grossed $10.8 million at the box office. Roger Ebert, while critical of the film itself, wrote that Kunis "brings her role to within shouting distance of credibility. Director Mike Judge commented that part of what was surprising to learn about Kunis was her ability to make references to the cult animation film Rejected. Judge said: "As beautiful as Mila is, you could believe that maybe she would cross paths with you in the real world. After seeing Kunis perform in Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Judge wanted to cast her in the role of Cindy in Extract: "I just thought, 'Wow, this girl's perfect.' And she really wanted to do it, which was fantastic." Said Kunis, "I'm a huge fan of Mike Judge's from Office Space, so I was, like, 'Okay, this is a very easy decision.' I told them I would do anything needed to be in this production– like craft service, or, say, acting.In 2010, she starred alongside Denzel Washington in the action film The Book of Eli. Although the film received mixed reviews it performed well at the box office, grossing over $157 million worldwide. Film critic Richard Roeper praised Kunis's performance, calling it a "particularly strong piece of work Several other reviews were equally positive, including that of Pete Hammond of Boxoffice magazine, who wrote that she's ideally cast in the key female role Even reviewers who didn't necessarily like the film complimented her performance, such as James Berardinelli, who wrote that "the demands of the role prove to be within her range, which is perhaps surprising considering she has been thus far pigeonholed into more lightweight parts and Colin Covert of the Star Tribune, who wrote that she "generated a spark and brought a degree of determination to her character, developing an independent female character who's not always in need of rescuing. Other critics, such as Claudia Puig of USA Today felt she was miscast, noting that "she looked as if she dropped in from a Ray-Ban commercial. Kunis received another Teen Choice Award nomination for her performance. Kunis was also cast in a minor role in the 2010 comedy film Date Night, starring Tina Fey and Steve Carell. She garnered several positive reviews for her performance.Michael Phillips of the Chicago Tribune concluded her performance with James Franco helped save the film and gave it "a shot in the arm.
Kunis was nominated for multiple awards, including her first Golden Globe, for the 2010 film Black Swan. She played a rival ballet dancer to the main character, played by Natalie Portman. Director Darren Aronofsky cast Kunis in the film based on her performance in Forgetting Sarah Marshall, and on the recommendation of co-star and close friend Natalie Portman. She underwent a training regimen that included cardiovascular exercise, a 1,200-calorie a day diet she lost 20 pounds that she regained after filming ended and ballet classes for four hours a day, seven days a week.During the demanding production, she suffered injuries including a torn ligament and a dislocated shoulder. Black Swan received widespread acclaim from critics and was nominated for five Academy Awards, including Best Picture. The film grossed over $106.9 million in the United States and Canada while grossing over $329 million worldwide. Reviews of Kunis's performance have been positive with Kirk Honeycutt of The Hollywood Reporter stating, "Kunis makes a perfect alternate to Portman, equally as lithe and dark but a smirk of self-assurance in place of Portman's wide-eyed fearfulness. Guy Lodge of In Contention also praised Kunis, saying, "it's the cool, throaty-voiced Kunis who is the surprise package here, intelligently watching and reflecting her co-star in such a manner that we're as uncertain as Nina of her ingenuousness. Kunis's performance won her the Marcello Mastroianni Award for Best Young Actor or Actress at the 67th Venice International Film Festival and earned her Golden Globe Award and Screen Actors Guild Award nominations for Best Supporting Actress. At the 37th annual Saturn Awards, she was also honored with the Best Supporting Actress award for her performance.
Kunis was cast alongside Justin Timberlake in the 2011 romantic comedy Friends with Benefits. Director Will Gluck stated that he wrote the story with Kunis and Timberlake in mind. Friends with Benefits achieved success at the box office, grossing over $149 million worldwide, and received mostly positive reviews with critics praising the chemistry between Kunis and Timberlake. Manohla Dargis of The New York Times wrote that "Ms. Kunis is fast proving that she's a gift that keeps giving to mainstream romantic comedy" and "her energy is so invigorating and expansive and her presence so vibrant that she fills the screen.
In 2012, Kunis co-starred with Mark Wahlberg in Ted, her most commercially successful film to date. The film was directed and co-written by Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane. Kunis played the girlfriend of Wahlberg's character. When MacFarlane first conceived the project, he considered Kunis too young for the role. However, the film remained in development for several years and when it was finally ready to begin production, he ended up casting her.Ted has received generally positive reviews from critics and was a commercial success, grossing $549 million worldwide. Drew McWeeny of HitFix wrote that Kunis "brings some lovely subtle grace notes to a role that easily could have just been 'the pushy girlfriend.
2013–present: Future projects
In 2013, Kunis played Theodora, the youngest of three witches, opposite James Franco, in the Walt Disney Pictures' prequel, Oz the Great and Powerful. She dedicated her performance in the film to Margaret Hamilton, the original Wicked Witch of the West in the 1939 film. The film, and Kunis's performance, received mixed reviews from critics. Kim Newman of Empire Magazine wrote that Kunis "walks away with the honours as the wavering witch Theodora, whose heartbreak brings another, less-expected depth to this 3D spectacle. In contrast, Todd McCarthy of The Hollywood Reporter found Kunis's performance to be uncertain as her character seemed to be in a state of limbo. Oz the Great and Powerful was a commercial success, grossing over $493 million worldwide.
Also in 2013 Kunis co-starred in the crime thriller Blood Ties with Clive Owen, Billy Crudup, and Marion Cotillard. The film premiered at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival and had a limited release in the United States in 2014.Blood Ties received mixed reviews. Kunis was also cast in the comedy The Angriest Man in Brooklyn, alongside Robin Williams and Peter Dinklage. The film had a limited theatrical and VOD release and received poor reviews The Paul Haggis-directed film Third Person co-starring with Liam Neeson, Olivia Wilde and James Franco premiered at the 2013 Toronto Film Festival and had a limited release in 2014, but also received mostly negative reviews. Kunis' performance was praised by some critics; Deborah Young of The Hollywood Reporter wrote that her role gives her "enormous room to express her talent" and she "gives her story a shot of raw intensity.
Kunis will be co-starring with Channing Tatum in the sci-fi film, Jupiter Ascending. Directed by the Wachowskis the film was originally scheduled to be released on July 18, 2014 but on June 3, 2014, the film's release was delayed until February 6, 2015.
Kunis is set to be an executive producer for a feminist-themed TV series for the CW network. Meridian Hills, is a drama about the women's liberation movement in the 1970s. She will not appear on-screen.In October 2014 it was announced Kunis, along with her partners, had launched a new production company called Orchard Farm Productions. The company has a first-look deal with ABC Studios, where the company is based. Under the agreement, the team will develop and produce TV projects for broadcast and cable.
In the media
In 2007, Kunis participated in a video for the website Funny or Die appearing alongside James Franco. The video was a parody of the MTV show The Hills and was a huge success for the website, with well over one million views. Shawn Levy, director of Date Night, stated that part of what made him decide to cast Kunis with James Franco in the film was the chemistry he felt they had in the Funny or Die video. In December 2008, Kunis was featured in Gap's "Shine Your Own Star" Christmas campaign.
In 2010, she was featured in the Women We Love" segment in Esquire with an accompanied video. Kunis was among several female stars photographed by Canadian singer/songwriter Bryan Adams in conjunction with the Calvin Klein Collections for a feature titled American Women 2010, with the proceeds from the photographs donated to the NYC AIDS foundation During the summer of 2010 Kunis served with Randy Jackson as the Master of Ceremonies for the 9th Annual Chrysalis Foundation Benefit. The Chrysalis Foundation is a Los Angeles-based non-profit organization formed to help economically disadvantaged and homeless individuals to become self-sufficient through employment opportunities.
GQ magazine named Kunis the Knockout of the Year for 2011 with Men's Health naming her one of the "100 Hottest Women of All-Time. FHM magazine ranked her number 9 on its 2012 Hot 100 list but she reached number 1 on their 2013 "100 Sexiest Women in the World" list which brings to an end a four-year run by British women.
Prior to this in 2008 Kunis stated, "You've got to base your career on something other than being FHM's top 100 number one girl. Your looks are going to die out, and then what's going to be left Maxim has consistently ranked Kunis on its Hot 100 list, reaching a ranking of number 5 in both 2009 and 2011 and number 3 in 2012 Esquire magazine named her 2012's Sexiest Woman Alive. She ranked #2 on AskMen's list of Top 99 Women for 2013, behind only Jennifer Lawrence. In 2013, she responded to those lists: "All I can say is, I feel honored to be considered sexy.
Christian Dior signed Kunis in 2012 to be the face of its Spring fashion campaign. In February 2013, she was named Gemfields global brand ambassador and the face of their advertising campaign. Gemfields is a luxury company that produces emeralds, rubies, and amethysts. She visited Gemfields' mine in Zambia.
In 2013, she appeared in Forbes list of 100 powerful celebrities, ranking #89 on the basis of five criteria Money, TV/Radio, Press, Social, and Marketability with her highest ranking as #14 in marketability. She earned $11 million for the year ending in June 2013.
In 2014, Kunis appeared in a range of global advertising for Beam, Inc. makers of Jim Beam bourbon.
Personal life
On September 14, 2011, the FBI announced it was investigating the alleged hacking of Kunis's cellphone and email accounts, along with those of other celebrities. Christopher Chaney from Jacksonville, Florida, later pleaded guilty in federal court to nine counts of computer hacking.
In November 2011, Kunis was escorted by Sgt. Scott Moore to a United States Marine Corps Ball in Greenville, North Carolina. Kunis had accepted Moore's invitation in July after he posted it as a YouTube video while serving with the 3rd Battalion, 2nd Marine Regiment, in Afghanistan's Helmand province. The event celebrated the Marine Corps' 236th anniversary.Kunis supports the Democratic Party and Barack Obama. In a 2012 interview, she criticized the Republican Party, saying: "The way that Republicans attack women is so offensive to me. And the way they talk about religion is offensive. I may not be a practicing Jew, but why we gotta talk about Jesus all the time.
Health
In January 2011, she revealed her struggle with an eye condition called chronic iritis that had caused blindness in one eye. However, a couple of months earlier she had surgery that corrected the problem. Kunis also has the condition heterochromia iridum, where the irises have different colors. One eye left is brown, and the other right is green.
Relationships
Kunis began dating actor Macaulay Culkin in 2002. During their relationship, there were rumors of the couple getting married, but Kunis denied them. In an interview with BlackBook magazine, Kunis stated that marriage is "not something that's important to me. Kunis said she tried her best to protect her and Culkin's privacy, noting that "We don't talk about it to the press. It's already more high profile than I want it to be. When asked if it was difficult to stay out of the tabloids and press, Kunis responded: "I keep my personal life as personal as I physically, mentally, possibly can." Asked if that is difficult she said, "I don't care. I will go to my grave trying. It is hard, but I'll end up going to a bar that's a hole in the wall. I won't go to the 'it's-happening' place.On January 3, 2011, Kunis's publicist confirmed reports that Kunis and Culkin had ended their relationship, saying "The split was amicable, and they remain close friends.
Kunis began dating her former That '70s Show co-star Ashton Kutcher in April 2012. After they became engaged in February 2014 she gave birth to their daughter Wyatt Isabelle on September 30, 2014.
James Eugene Jim Carrey born January 17 1962 is a Canadian-American actor comedian impressionist, screenwriter, and producer. Carrey has received four Golden Globe Award nominations winning two. Known for his highly energetic slapstick performances, he has been described as one of the biggest movie stars in Hollywood.
Carrey first gained recognition in 1990 after landing a recurring role in the sketch comedy In Living Color. His first leading roles in major productions came with Ace Ventura Pet Detective 1994 Dumb and Dumber 1994 The Mask 1994 and Ace Ventura When Nature Calls 1995 as well as a supporting role in Batman Forever 1995. In 1997, he gave a critically acclaimed performance in Liar Liar which earned him a Golden Globe Award nomination for Best Actor. He then starred in The Truman Show 1998 and Man on the Moon 1999 with each garnering him a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor.
In 2000, he gained further recognition for his portrayal of the Grinch in How the Grinch Stole Christmas and then in 2003, for Bruce Almighty. The following year he starred in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind 2004 for which he received another Golden Globe nomination in addition to a BAFTA Award nomination. He then starred in Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events 2004 Fun with Dick and Jane 2005 Yes Man 2008 Horton Hears a Who 2008 and A Christmas Carol 2009. More recently he has starred in Mr. Popper's Penguins 2011 and The Incredible Burt Wonderstone 2013.
In 2013 he appeared in Kick Ass 2 as Colonel Stars and Stripes. Controversially he retracted support for the movie two months prior to its release. He issued a statement via his Twitter account that, in light of the shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary in all good conscience I cannot support that level of violence.
Carrey reprised his role, Lloyd Christmas, in Dumb and Dumber To, which was produced in late 2013 and released in November 2014. James Eugene Carrey was born in Newmarket, Ontario, Canada to Kathleen (née Oram a homemaker, and Percy Carrey 1927 1994 a musician and accountant. He has three older siblings, John, Patricia, and Rita. He was raised Roman Catholic. His mother was of French, Irish, and Scottish descent and his father was of French Canadian ancestry the family's original surname was Carré.
During an interview with James Lipton on Inside the Actors Studio, Carrey stated,
My father was a musician who got a "regular job" to support his children. When he lost his job that's when everything fell apart. We went from lower middle class to poor. We were living out of a van. I quit school at age 15 to begin working to help support my family as a janitor. I'd have a baseball bat on my janitor cart because I was so angry I just wanted to beat the heck out of something.
After his family moved to Scarborough, Ontario he attended Blessed Trinity Catholic School, in North York, for two years, enrolled at Agincourt Collegiate Institute for another year, then briefly attended Northview Heights Secondary School. Carrey never finished high school because he worked full time to help his family survive their economic hardship and also helped care for his mother who battled a severe chronic illness.
Carrey lived in Burlington Ontario, for eight years, and attended Aldershot High School where he once opened for 1980s new wave band Spoons. In a Hamilton Spectator interview February 2007 Carrey said, "If my career in show business hadn't panned out I would probably be working today in Hamilton, Ontario at the Dofasco steel mill." When looking across the Burlington Bay toward Hamilton, he could see the mills and thought, "Those were where the great jobs were. At this point, he already had experience working in a science testing facility in Richmond Hill, Ontario.
While Carrey was struggling to obtain work and make a name for himself, his father tried to help the young comedian put together a stage act, driving him to Toronto to debut at comedy club Yuk Yuk's. Carrey's impersonations bombed and this gave him doubts about his capabilities as a professional entertainer. His family's financial struggles made it difficult for them to support Carrey's ambitions. Eventually, the family's financial problems were resolved and they moved into a new home. With more domestic stability, Carrey returned to the stage with a more polished act. In a short period of time, he went from open-mic nights to regular paid shows, building his reputation in the process. A reviewer in the Toronto Star raved that Carrey was a genuine star coming to life. Carrey was soon noticed by comedian Rodney Dangerfield, who signed the young comic to open his tour performances. Dangerfield eventually brought Carrey to Las Vegas. Carrey soon decided to move to Hollywood, where he began performing at The Comedy Store and, in 1982, appeared on the televised stand up show An Evening at the Improv. The following year he debuted his act on The Tonight Show.
Despite his increasing popularity as a stand-up comic Carrey turned his attention to the film and television industries, auditioning to be a cast member for the 1980 1981 season of NBC's Saturday Night Live. Carrey was not selected for the position, although he did host the show in May 1996, January 2011 and October 2014. He was cast in several low-budget films, including Rubberface 1981 in which he played a struggling young comic, and Copper Mountain 1983 in which he played a sex starved teen. The latter film included his impersonation of Sammy Davis Jr. and was not considered a full length feature film since it ran less than one hour and consisted largely of musical performances by Rita Coolidge and Ronnie Hawkins.
In 1984, Carrey was cast as the lead in the NBC sitcom The Duck Factory, where he played a quirky young artist alongside Jay Tarses. However, the show was cancelled during its first season. Despite the cancellation, the show helped Carrey land roles in several films Once Bitten 1985 Peggy Sue Got Married 1986 The Dead Pool 1988 and Doing Time on Maple Drive 1992. When Carrey returned to stand up he retired his old act vowing that he didn't want to be famous for imitating other people. Some nights it was a melee, literally, where I'd be standing trying to defend myself for what I was doing. People would be screaming at me to do my old act, and getting actually violent and angry at me. While many thought he was ill advised to retire his old act, others were increasingly interested in what Carrey was attempting to do. One of these people was writer director Judd Apatow. The pair struck up a friendship and began writing material together.
Carrey continued to land small roles in film and television productions, which led to a friendship with fellow comedian Damon Wayans, who co-starred with Carrey as an extraterrestrial in 1989's Earth Girls Are Easy. Damon introduced Carrey to his brother Keenen, who was creating a sketch comedy show called In Living Color for the new Fox network. Carrey eventually landed a recurring role in the show which first aired on April 15, 1990. By the third season, Carrey was one of the few remaining original cast members and was ready to move on to bigger things, after agreeing to take on his first lead role in a major Hollywood film.
Carrey did not experience true stardom until he was cast in the lead role of the slapstick comedy Ace Ventura: Pet Detective 1994 which premiered only months before In Living Color ended. Though he agreed to play the title character, Carrey was willing to take the role only if he was allowed to rewrite the script to suit his over the top visions. The film, while dismissed by most critics, was an international hit, and transformed Carrey into a bankable box office star.
That same year, Carrey landed lead roles in The Mask and Dumb and Dumber. The Mask garnered him his first Golden Globe Award for Best Actor nomination, with Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun Times praising him for his "joyful performance. Well received by critics, Dumb and Dumber was a commercial success, grossing over $270 million worldwide and again increasing Carrey's fanbase. In 1995, Carrey co-starred in the Joel Schumacher directed superhero film Batman Forever, in which Batman tries to stop Two Face and the Riddler played by Carrey in their villainous scheme to drain information from all the brains in Gotham City. The feature received reasonable reviews, with most criticism aimed at the movie's "blatant commercialism", as characterized by Peter Travers. In that same year, Carrey reprised his role as Ace Ventura in Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls. Like the original film, it was well received by the public, but heavily criticised by critics. However it was a huge box office success, earning $212 million worldwide in addition to breaking records, with a $40 million opening weekend. Carrey earned $20 million for his next film, The Cable Guy 1996. Directed by Ben Stiller, Carrey played a lonely slightly menacing cable TV installer who infiltrates the life of one of his customers played by Matthew Broderick. The film tested Carrey's boundaries of his tried and true "hapless, hyper, overconfident" characters that he is known for regularly playing. However, it did not fare well with critics, many reacting towards Carrey's change of tone to previous films. Despite the reviews, The Cable Guy grossed $102 million worldwide.
He soon bounced back in 1997 with the critically acclaimed comedy Liar Liar, playing Fletcher Reede, a successful lawyer who has built his career on lying, regularly breaking promises that he makes to his son Max. Max soon makes a birthday wish that for just that one day, his dad would not be able to lie. Carrey was praised for his performance, earning a second Golden Globe Award nomination for Best Actor. Janet Maslin of The New York Times said, "Well into his tumultuous career, Mr. Carrey finally turns up in a straightforward comic vehicle, and the results are much wilder and funnier than this mundane material should have allowed.
The following year he decided to take a pay cut to play the serious role of Truman Burbank in the satirical comedy drama film The Truman Show 1998. The film was highly praised and brought Carrey further international acclaim, leading many to believe he would be nominated for an Oscar. Eventually, he did pick up his first Golden Globe Award for Best Actor in a Motion Picture Drama. The Truman Show was a commercial success also, earning $264 million worldwide against a budget of $60 million. A Film4 critic stated that the film "allows Carrey to edge away from broad comedy", adding that it was "a hilarious and breathtakingly conceived satire. That same year, Carrey appeared as a fictionalized version of himself on the final episode of Garry Shandling's The Larry Sanders Show, in which he deliberately ripped into Shandling's character. In 1999 Carrey had the lead role in Man on the Moon. He portrayed comedian Andy Kaufman to critical acclaim with many believing that Carrey would finally be nominated for Best Actor. He received his second Golden Globe Award for the second consecutive year. Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times wrote of Carrey's performance, "A brilliant, almost terrifying impersonation.
In 2000, Carrey reteamed with the Farrelly Brothers, who had directed him in Dumb and Dumber, in the comedy film Me, Myself & Irene, a film that received mixed reviews but enjoyed box office success. Carrey played the role of state trooper Charlie Baileygates, who has multiple personalities and romances a woman portrayed by Renée Zellweger. That same year, Carrey starred in the second highest grossing Christmas film of all time, How the Grinch Stole Christmas, playing the title character, for which he received both praise and criticism. The film garnered him his third Golden Globe Award nomination in addition to countless other nominations and several wins.
For his next feature film, Carrey starred opposite Jennifer Aniston and Morgan Freeman in Tom Shadyac's international hit comedy Bruce Almighty 2003. Carrey played a TV newsman who unexpectedly receives God's omnipotent abilities when the deity decides to take a vacation. The film received mixed reviews upon release but despite this was a financial success, earning over $484 million worldwide, and going on to become the seventeenth highest grossing live action comedy of all time. The film has since gained a cult following. In 2004 Carrey starred in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. The film received overwhelming acclaim upon release. Critics highly praised Carrey's portrayal of Joel Barish, in addition to the performance of his co-star Kate Winslet, who received an Oscar nomination. According to CNN's reviewer Paul Clinton, Carrey's performance was the actor's "best, most mature and sharply focused performance ever. He received his fourth Golden Globe Award nomination, and was also nominated for his first BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role. Carrey's next appearance was in the 2004 black comedy fantasy film Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events, which was based on the popular children's novels of the same name. The film received a positive reception, with Desson Thomson from The Washington Post saying of Carrey's approach to the character of Count Olaf,
Olaf is a humorless villain in the book. He's not amusing like Carrey at all. To which I would counter: If you can't let Carrey be Carrey, put someone boring and less expensive in the role. In his various disguises he's rubbery, inventive and improvisationally inspired. I particularly liked his passing imitation of a dinosaur.
That same year, Carrey was inducted into the Canadian Walk of Fame. In 2005, Carrey starred in a remake of Fun with Dick and Jane, playing Dick, a husband who becomes a bank robber after he loses his job. The film was dismissed by most critics but became a box office hit.
In 2007, Carrey reunited with Joel Schumacher, director of Batman Forever, for The Number 23, a psychological thriller co starring Virginia Madsen and Danny Huston. In the film, Carrey plays a man who becomes obsessed with the number 23, after finding a book about a man with the same obsession. The film was panned by critics and did not fare well at the box office. The following year Carrey provided his voice for Dr. Seuss' Horton Hears a Who 2008. Carrey voiced the beloved elephant for the CGI animated feature, which received overwhelmingly positive reviews and delivered family crowds en masse. The film was also a box office success, raking in over $290 million worldwide. Later in the year Carrey returned to live action comedy starring opposite Zooey Deschanel and Bradley Cooper in Yes Man 2008. Carrey played down-and-out man Carl Allen who had gone nowhere in life, thanks to always saying no to everything, until he signs up for a self help program that teaches him the power of saying yes. Despite reviews being mixed, Rene Rodriquez of The Miami Herald stated, "Yes Man is fine as far as Jim Carrey comedies go, but it's even better as a love story that just happens to make you laugh. The film had a decent performance at the box office, earning $225 million worldwide.
Since 2009, Carrey's work has included a leading role in Glenn Ficarra and John Requa's I Love You Phillip Morris, premiering in January 2009 at the Sundance Film Festival before receiving a wide release in February 2010. Carrey portrayed Steven Jay Russell, a con artist, imposter, and multiple prison escapee who falls in love with his fellow inmate, Phillip Morris played by Ewan McGregor. The film received largely positive reviews, with Damon Wise of The Times giving the film four stars out of five, stating, "I Love You Phillip Morris is an extraordinary film that serves as a reminder of just how good Carrey can be when he's not tied into a generic Hollywood crowd pleaser. His comic timing remains as exquisite as ever. For the first time in his career Carrey portrayed multiple characters in Disney's 3D animated take on the classic Charles Dickens tale A Christmas Carol 2009 voicing Ebenezer Scrooge and the Ghosts of Christmas Past Present, and Future. Directed by Robert Zemeckis the film also starred Robin Wright Penn, Bob Hoskins Colin Firth, Gary Oldman, and Cary Elwes. The film received reasonable reviews and was a financial success. In 2011, Carrey landed the lead role in Mr. Popper's Penguins, playing Thomas "Tom" Popper Jr. a realtor who becomes the caretaker of a family of penguins. The film received a mixed reception upon release. In 2013 he starred alongside former co star Steve Carell in the Don Scardino directed comedy film Burt Wonderstone 2013. Carrey played Steve Gray, a dangerous street magician who overshadows the formerly successful magician Burt Wonderstone played by Carell. The film was released in March 2013 to mixed reviews and under performed significantly at the box office, grossing just over $27 million on a $30 million budget.
Peter Farrelly said in April 2012 that Carrey and Jeff Daniels would return for a Dumb and Dumber sequel, Dumb and Dumber To, with the Farrelly brothers writing and directing and a planned September 2012 production start. In June, however, Carrey's representative said Carrey had left the project because the comedian felt New Line and Warner Bros. were unenthusiastic toward it. However on October 1 2012 Yahoo's "The Yo Show carried the news item that the script was complete and that the original actors, Carrey and Daniels, would be reprising their roles. The plot involved one of the characters having sired a child and needing to find them in order to obtain a kidney. Dumb and Dumber To was released in November 2014.
In March 2013, Carrey announced that he had written a children's book titled How Roland Rolls, about a scared wave named Roland. He described it as "kind of a metaphysical children's story, which deals with a lot of heavy stuff in a really childish way." Carrey self published the book, which was released in September 2013.
On March 25, 2013, Carrey released a parody music video with Eels through Funny or Die, with Carrey replacing Mark Oliver Everett on vocals. The song and video, titled "Cold Dead Hand" and set as a musical act during the variety program Hee Haw, lampoons American gun culture, and specifically former NRA spokesperson Charlton Heston.
In May 2014 Carrey delivered the commencement address at Maharishi University of Management in Fairfield, Iowa, and received an honorary doctorate for his achievements as a comedian, artist author, and philanthropist. Carrey has ADHD and has also stated that he has battled depression. To deal with his depression Carrey took Prozac, eventually deciding to get off medications. He has stated that he no longer takes medications or stimulants of any kind, not even coffee. In 1983 Carrey dated Linda Rondstadt for 8 months. Carrey has been married twice. His first marriage was to former actress and Comedy Store waitress Melissa Womer whom he married on March 28, 1987. Their daughter Jane Erin Carrey was born September 6, 1987. Jane was a 2012 contestant on American Idol. The two divorced in 1995. A year later Carrey married his Dumb and Dumber co-star Lauren Holly, on September 23, 1996; the marriage lasted less than a year. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Carrey was involved in a series of relationships, including Laurie Holden, January Jones, and Anine Bing. In addition, Carrey had a much publicized yet short lived romance with his Me, Myself and Irene co-star Renée Zellweger, whom he dated, and at one point was engaged to from 1999 to 2000.
Carrey met model and actress Jenny McCarthy in 2005 and made their relationship public in June 2006. In April 2010, the two ended their near five-year relationship. Despite the split and media circulations, McCarthy stated in October 2010 that Jim and I are still good friends.
Carrey received U.S. citizenship in October 2004 and remains a dual citizen of both the United States and his native Canada. Carrey has been a critic of the scientific consensus that no evidence links the childhood MMR vaccination to the development of autism, and wrote an article questioning the merits of vaccination and vaccine research for the Huffington Post. With former partner Jenny McCarthy, Carrey led a "Green Our Vaccines" march in Washington D.C. to advocate for the removal of toxins from children's vaccines out of a belief that children had received "too many vaccines, too soon, many of which are toxic.
Carrey is a follower and an advocate for the law of attraction. In an interview with Oprah Winfrey in 1997 Carrey revealed that as a struggling actor he would use visualization techniques to get work. He also stated that he visualized a $10,000,000 check given to him for "Acting services rendered placed the check in his pocket and seven years later received a check for $10,000,000 for his role in Dumb and Dumber.
Carrey is a transcendental meditation practicioner.
Hugh Michael Jackman born 12 October 1968 is an Australian actor and producer who is involved in film, musical theatre and television.
Jackman has won international recognition for his roles in major films, notably as superhero, period, and romance characters. He is best known for his long running role as Wolverine in the X Men film series, as well as for his leads in Kate & Leopold, Van Helsing, The Prestige, Australia, Real Steel, Les Misérables, and Prisoners. His work in Les Misérables earned him his first Academy Award nomination for Best Actor and his first Golden Globe Award for Best Actor Motion Picture Musical or Comedy in 2013. He is also a singer dancer and actor in stage musicals, and won a Tony Award for his role in The Boy from Oz.
A four time host of the Tony Awards winning an Emmy Award for one of these appearances, Jackman also hosted the 81st Academy Awards on 22 February 2009.Jackman was born in Sydney, New South Wales, the son of Grace McNeil née Greenwood and Christopher John Jackman, a Cambridge trained accountant. His parents were English and had come to Australia in 1967 as part of the "Ten Pound Poms immigration. One of his paternal great grandfathers was Greek. His parents were devout Christians, having been converted by Evangelist Billy Graham after their marriage. Jackman has four older siblings, and was the second of his parents' children to be born in Australia. He also has a younger half-sister, from his mother's remarriage. His parents divorced when he was eight, and Jackman remained in Australia with his father and Jackman's two brothers, while his mother moved back to England with Jackman's two sisters. As a child, Jackman liked the outdoors, spending a lot of time at the beach and on camping trips and vacations all over Australia. He wanted to see the world: "I used to spend nights looking at atlases. I decided I wanted to be a chef on a plane. Because I'd been on a plane and there was food on board, I presumed there was a chef. I thought that would be an ideal job.
Jackman went to primary school at Pymble Public School and later attended the all boys Knox Grammar School on Sydney's Upper North Shore, where he starred in its production of My Fair Lady in 1985, and became the captain class president of the school in 1986. Following graduation, he spent a gap year working at Uppingham School in England. On his return he studied at the University of Technology Sydney graduating in 1991 with a BA in Communications. In his final year of university he took a drama course to make up additional credits. The class did Václav Havel's The Memorandum with Jackman as the lead. He later commented In that week I felt more at home with those people than I did in the entire three years.
After obtaining his BA, Jackman completed the one-year course "The Journey" at the Actors' Centre in Sydney. About studying acting full time, he stated, "It wasn't until I was 22 that I ever thought about my hobby being something I could make a living out of. As a boy, I'd always had an interest in theatre. But the idea at my school was that drama and music were to round out the man. It wasn't what one did for a living. I got over that. I found the courage to stand up and say, 'I want to do it'. After completing "The Journey", he was offered a role on the popular soap opera Neighbours but turned it down to attend the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts of Edith Cowan University in Perth, Western Australia, from which he graduated in 1994.
Jackman has said he "always loved acting but when I started at drama school I was like the dunce of the class. It just wasn't coming right to me. Everyone was cooler, everyone seemed more likely to succeed, everyone seemed more natural at it and in retrospect I think that is good. I think it is good to come from behind as an actor. I think it is good to go into an audition thinking 'Man I've got to be at my best to get this gig.
On the night of his final Academy graduation performance Jackman received a phone call offering him a role on Correlli: "I was technically unemployed for thirteen seconds." Correlli, devised by Australian actress Denise Roberts, was a 10 part drama series on ABC, Jackman's first major professional job, and where he met his future wife Deborra Lee Furness Meeting my wife was the greatest thing to come out of it. The show lasted only one season.
After Correlli Jackman went on the stage in Melbourne. In 1996, Jackman played Gaston in the local Walt Disney production of Beauty and the Beast, and Joe Gillis in Sunset Boulevard. During his stage musical career in Melbourne, he starred in the 1998 Midsumma festival cabaret production Summa Cabaret. He also hosted Melbourne's Carols by Candlelight and Sydney's Carols in the Domain.
Jackman's early film work includes Erskineville Kings and Paperback Hero 1999 and his television work includes Law of the Land, Halifax f.p. Blue Heelers and Banjo Paterson's The Man from Snowy River.
Jackman became known outside Australia in 1998, when he played the leading role of Curly in the Royal National Theatre's acclaimed stage production of Oklahoma in London's West End. The performance earned him an Olivier Award nomination for Best Actor in a Musical. Jackman said "I totally felt like it can't get any better than this. On some level that production will be one of the highlights of my career. He also starred in the 1999 film version of the same stage musical, which has been screened in many countries.
X MenIn 1999, Jackman was cast as Wolverine in Bryan Singer's X Men 2000 replacing Dougray Scott. His co stars included Patrick Stewart, James Marsden, Famke Janssen, and Ian McKellen. According to a CBS interview in November 2006, Jackman's wife Deborra-Lee Furness told him not to take the role, a comment she later told him she was glad he ignored.
Wolverine was tough for Jackman to portray because he had few lines, but a lot of emotion to convey in them. To prepare, he watched Clint Eastwood in the Dirty Harry movies and Mel Gibson in Road Warrior. Here were guys who had relatively little dialogue, like Wolverine had, but you knew and felt everything. I'm not normally one to copy, but I wanted to see how these guys achieved it. Jackman was adamant about doing his own stunts for the movie. We worked a lot on the movement style of Wolverine, and I studied some martial arts. I watched a lot of Mike Tyson fights, especially his early fights. There's something about his style, the animal rage, that seemed right for Wolverine. I kept saying to the writers, 'Don't give me long, choreographed fights for the sake of it. Don't make the fights pretty.
Jackman also had to get used to wearing Wolverine's claws. Every day in my living room, I'd just walk around with those claws, to get used to them. I've got scars on one leg, punctures straight through the cheek, on my forehead. I'm a bit clumsy. I'm lucky I didn't tell them that when I auditioned.
Jackman, at 6 feet 2.5 inches 1.89 m stands a foot taller than Wolverine, who is said in the original comic book to be 5 feet 3 inches 1.60 m. Hence, the filmmakers were frequently forced to shoot Jackman at unusual angles or only from the waist up to make him appear shorter than he actually is, and his co-stars wore platform soles. Jackman was also required to add a great deal of muscle for the role, and in preparing for the fourth film in the series, he bench pressed over 300 pounds.
Jackman reprised his role in 2003's X2 X Men United, 2006's X Men The Last Stand, and the 2009 prequel X-Men Origins Wolverine, although Troye Sivan played the younger version of James Howlett. He also cameoed as Wolverine in 2011's X Men First Class. He returned for the role of Wolverine again in 2013's The Wolverine, a stand-alone sequel taking place after the events of X Men The Last Stand, and reprised the character in the 2014 sequel X Men Days of Future Past.
Jackman starred as Leopold in the 2001 romantic comedy film Kate & Leopold, a role for which he received a Best Actor Golden Globe nomination. Jackman plays a Victorian English duke who accidentally time-travels to 21st-century Manhattan, where he meets Kate Meg Ryan a cynical advertising executive. In 2001, Jackman also starred in the action/drama Swordfish with John Travolta and Halle Berry. This was the second time Jackman worked with Berry, and the two have worked together thrice more in the X Men movies.
He hosted an episode of Saturday Night Live in 2001.
In 2002 Jackman sang the role of Billy Bigelow in the musical Carousel in a special concert performance at Carnegie Hall with the Orchestra of St. Luke's.
In 2004, Jackman won the Tony Award and the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actor in a Musical for his 2003 2004 Broadway portrayal of Australian songwriter and performer Peter Allen in the hit musical The Boy from Oz, which he also performed in Australia in 2006. In addition, Jackman hosted the Tony Awards in 2003, 2004, and 2005, garnering positive reviews. His hosting of the 2004 Tony Awards earned him an Emmy Award for Outstanding Individual Performer in a Variety, Musical or Comedy program.
Jackman co-starred with Daniel Craig on Broadway at the Schoenfeld Theatre in a limited engagement of the play A Steady Rain, which ran from 10 September 2009 to 6 December 2009.
He returned to Broadway in a new show, Hugh Jackman, Back on Broadway at the Broadhurst Theatre, which began performances on 25 October 2011 and concluded on 1 January 2012.
After 2003's X2 X Men United, Jackman played the title role of monster killer Gabriel Van Helsing in the 2004 film Van Helsing. Jackman and the film were noted in Bruce A. McClelland's book Slayers and Their Vampires: A Cultural History of Killing the Dead.
Jackman was one of the choices to play James Bond in 2006's Casino Royale, but eventually lost out to Daniel Craig. Jackman starred in the 2006 film The Prestige, directed by Christopher Nolan and co starring Christian Bale, Michael Caine, and Scarlett Johansson. As Robert Angier, Jackman portrayed a magician who built up a rivalry with contemporary Alfred Borden in attempt to one up each other in the art of deception. Jackman stated that his main reason for doing The Prestige was to work with musician David Bowie, who played scientist Nikola Tesla.Jackman portrayed three different characters in Darren Aronofsky's science fiction film The Fountain Tommy Creo, a neuroscientist, who is torn between his wife, Izzi Rachel Weisz who is dying of a brain tumor, and his work at trying to cure her; Captain Tomas Creo, a Spanish conquistador in 1532 Seville and a future astronaut, Tom, travelling to a golden nebula in an eco spacecraft seeking to be reunited with Izzi. Jackman said The Fountain was his most difficult film thus far due to the physical and emotional demands of the part.
Jackman also starred in Woody Allen's 2006 film Scoop opposite Scarlett Johansson. That year he also reprised the role of Wolverine in x Men The Last Stand. He rounded out 2006 with two animated films Happy Feet, directed by George Miller, in which he voiced the part of Memphis, an emperor penguin; and Flushed Away, where Jackman supplied the voice of a rat named Roddy who ends up being flushed down a family's toilet into the London sewer system. Flushed Away co-starred Kate Winslet and Ian McKellen Jackman's fourth time working with him.
In 2007, Jackman produced and guest-starred in the television musical-dramedy series Viva Laughlin, which was cancelled by CBS after two episodes. Jackman's 2008 movies included Deception which he starred in and produced Uncle Jonny, and Australia.
In 2008, director Baz Luhrmann cast Jackman to replace Russell Crowe as the male lead in his much publicized epic film, Australia, which co starred Nicole Kidman. The movie was released in late November 2008 in Australia and the U.S.
Jackman played a tough, independent cattle drover, who reluctantly helps an English noblewoman in her quest to save both her philandering husband's Australian cattle station and the mixed race Aboriginal child she finds there.
Of the movie, Jackman said, "This is pretty much one of those roles that had me pinching myself all the way through the shoot. I got to shoot a big-budget, shamelessly old-fashioned romantic epic set against one of the most turbulent times in my native country's history, while, at the same time, celebrating that country's natural beauty, its people, its cultures. I'll die a happy man knowing I've got this film on my CV.
2009 presentJackman has reprised his role as the Wolverine in X Men spin off films. Jackman starred in X Men Origins: Wolverine which opened in 2009. Jackman starred again as Wolverine in 2013 in The Wolverine. Jackman made a cameo appearance as Wolverine in X Men First Class in 2012.
Jackman had a one man show at the Curran Theatre in San Francisco from 3 15 May 2011. The production was a mixture of his favourite Broadway and Hollywood musical numbers, backed by a 17 piece orchestra, from shows including Oklahoma and The Boy from Oz. The show had a run-time of approximately 100 minutes, and also included slide shows of Jackman's youth, family, and work, as well as some one-on-one interaction with the audience. Jackman was backed by fellow musical theatre veterans Merle Dandridge and Angel Reda.
In a November 2012 release Jackman voiced the role of E.Aster Bunnymund the Easter Bunny in the animated film Rise of the Guardians.
Jackman starred as Jean Valjean in the film Les Misérables, an adaptation of the musical. The film opened on 25 December 2012. For the role he lost 15 pounds and later had to regain 30 pounds to mirror his character's newfound success. He won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor Motion Picture Musical or Comedy in January 2013 for this performance.
Jackman appeared alongside Kate Winslet in Movie 43, an ensemble comedy, in January 2013.
Jackman along with actress Kristen Wiig was featured on "You've Got The Look", a song by comedy hip hop group The Lonely Island on their third album, The Wack Album, released in June 2013.
Director Lee Daniels has confirmed Jackman has joined the cast of his upcoming film Selma, a film about Martin Luther King Jr. and Lyndon Baines Johnson and the civil rights marches. Shooting of the movie has suffered repeated delays.
Jackman will feature in the film The Greatest Showman on Earth. The part of Jenny Lind is being scripted for Anne Hathaway. Jackman and Hathaway teamed together for the Oscars ceremony in 2009, and played opposite each other in Les Misérables.
Jackman will play the villain Blackbeard in Joe Wright's 2015 film, Pan which will revolve around the back-stories of J.M. Barrie's characters Peter Pan and Captain Hook. Pan will center on how Pan and the man who becomes Captain Hook start out as friends with Hook working as a member of the crew on Blackbeard's pirate ship.
Jackman is set to return to Broadway in the new play, The River, which is scheduled to run at the Circle in the Square Theatre from October 2014 to January 2015.
In 2005, Jackman joined with longtime assistant John Palermo to form a production company, Seed Productions, whose first project was Viva Laughlin in 2007. Jackman's wife Deborra Lee Furness is also involved in the company, and Palermo had three rings made with a "unity" inscription for himself, Furness, and Jackman. Jackman said I'm very lucky in the partners I work with in my life, Deb and John Palermo. It really works. We all have different strengths. I love it. It's very exciting.
The Fox-based Seed label has grown in size to include execs Amanda Schweitzer, Kathryn Tamblyn, Allan Mandelbaum and Joe Marino, with Alana Free operating the Sydney-based production office whose goal is to mount modest budget films to harness local talent in Jackman's home country.As a philanthropist, Jackman is a longtime proponent of microcredit the extension of very small loans to prospective entrepreneurs in impoverished countries. He is a vocal supporter of Muhammad Yunus, microcredit pioneer and the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize winner.
Jackman is a global advisor of the Global Poverty Project, for which he narrated a documentary and he and the project's founder Hugh Evans visited the UN for the cause in 2009. Jackman hosted a preview of the Global Poverty Project Presentation in New York together with Donna Karan, Lisa Fox and his wife Deborra Lee. He is also a World Vision ambassador and participated in the climate week NYC ceremony on 21 September 2009.
Jackman supports The Art of Elysium and the MPTV Fund Foundation and he and his wife Deborra Lee Furness are patrons of the Bone Marrow Institute in Australia. Jackman also narrated the 2008 documentary about global warming, The Burning Season.
Jackman also uses his Twitter account for charity. On 14 April 2009, Jackman posted on his Twitter page that he would donate $100,000 to one individual's favourite non-profit organisation. On 21 April 2009 he revealed his decision to donate $50,000 to Charity Water and $50,000 to Operation of Hope.
Hugh Jackman and Daniel Craig made a unique place for themselves in the history of Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS fundraising 8 December 2009, when it was announced that they had raised $1,549,953 in the 21st annual Gypsy of the Year competition, from six weeks of curtain appeals at their hit Broadway drama, A Steady Rain. Jackman continued his support of Broadway Cares in 2011, raising nearly $1 million during his run of Hugh Jackman back on Broadway Jackman has shown keen interest in sports. In high school he played rugby union and cricket, took part in high jumping and was on the swimming team. He enjoys basketball and kayaking. He has expressed an interest in football, committing his support to Norwich City FC. In the United States, Jackman supports the Philadelphia Union of Major League Soccer, attending a game at PPL Park in June 2010. On 22 June 2011, Jackman again attended a home Union match against Sporting KC, sitting in front of the Sons of Ben supporters section, nicknamed The River End.
Jackman is a longtime fan and supporter of the Manly Warringah Sea Eagles, a National Rugby League NRL club based in Sydney's north. He sang the Australian national anthem at the 1999 NRL Grand Final.
Jackman also guest starred on 19 September 2011 edition of WWE Monday Night Raw, assisting Zack Ryder in a win over WWE United States Champion Dolph Ziggler. Jackman helped "Long Island Iced Z" get the 3 count in a nontitle match by punching the champion in the jaw whilst the referee was not looking.
Jackman plays the piano does yoga and has been a member of the School of Practical Philosophy since 1992.
Jackman has been an avid practitioner of Transcendental Meditation since the age of twenty. Nothing has ever opened my eyes like Transcendental Meditation has. It makes me calm and happy, and, well, it gives me some peace and quiet in what's a pretty chaotic life!". He now helps the David Lynch Foundation to "bring meditation to everyone from PTSD sufferers to inner city kids.
Jackman married Deborra Lee Furness on 11 April 1996 at St. John's in Toorak, Victoria, a suburb of Melbourne. They met on the set of Australian TV show Correlli. Jackman personally designed an engagement ring for Furness, and their wedding rings bore the Sanskrit inscription "Om paramar mainamar", translated as "we dedicate our union to a greater source". Furness had two miscarriages following which she and Jackman adopted two children, Oscar Maximillian and Ava Eliot.
In November 2013, Jackman announced he had basal cell carcinoma removed from his nose. He had a second carcinoma removed from his nose in May 2014, telling Associated Press that he expects to have future recurrences. This resulted in Jackman attending the various worldwide premieres of X Men Days of Future Past with a bandage on his nose, and urging his followers on photo-sharing platform Instagram to "wear sunscreen.
Thomas Tom Cruise born Thomas Cruise Mapother IV July 3 1962 is an American actor and filmmaker. He has been nominated for three Academy Awards and has won three Golden Globe Awards. He started his career at age 19 in the 1981 film Endless Love. After portraying supporting roles in Taps 1981 and The Outsiders 1983 his first leading role was in Risky Business released in August 1983. Cruise became a full-fledged movie star after starring as Pete "Maverick" Mitchell in Top Gun 1986. He has since 1996 been well known for his role as secret agent Ethan Hunt in the Mission: Impossible film series.
One of the biggest movie stars in Hollywood Cruise has starred in many successful films, including The Color of Money 1986, Cocktail 1988 Rain Man 1988 Born on the Fourth of July 1989 Far and Away 1992 A Few Good Men 1992 The Firm 1993 Interview with the Vampire: The Vampire Chronicles 1994 Jerry Maguire 1996 Eyes Wide Shut 1999 Magnolia1999 Vanilla Sky 2001 Minority Report 2002, The Last Samurai 2003 Collateral 2004 War of the Worlds 2005 Lions for Lambs 2007 Valkyrie 2008 Knight and Day 2010 Jack Reacher 2012 Oblivion 2013, and Edge of Tomorrow 2014. In 2012, Cruise was Hollywood's highest-paid actor.Fifteen of his films grossed over $100 million domestically; twenty-one have grossed in excess of $200 million worldwide.
Cruise is known for his support for the Church of Scientology and its affiliated social programs.Cruise was born as Thomas Cruise Mapother IV in Syracuse, New York, the son of Mary Lee née Pfeiffer a special education teacher, and Thomas Cruise Mapother III 1934–84 an electrical engineer. Cruise has three sisters, Lee Anne, Marian, and Cass. Cruise's surname originates from his great-grandfather, born Thomas Cruise O'Mara, who was renamed "Thomas Cruise Mapother. Cruise is of Irish German, and English ancestry. One of his paternal great-great-great-grandfathers, Patrick Russell Cruise, was born in north County Dublin, in 1799; he married Teresa Johnson in Warrenstown House, County Meath, in 1825. They left Ireland for America that same year and settled in New York.
He grew up in near poverty, and had a Catholic upbringing. The family was dominated by his abusive father, whom Cruise has described as "a merchant of chaos.
He was beaten by his father, who Cruise has said was a bully and coward.
He was the kind of person where, if something goes wrong, they kick you. It was a great lesson in my life—how he'd lull you in, make you feel safe and then, bang! For me, it was like, 'There's something wrong with this guy. Don't trust him. Be careful around him.
Cruise's family spent part of his childhood in Canada. They moved to the Ottawa suburb of Beacon Hill in late 1971 so that Cruise's father could take a position as a defense consultant with the Canadian Armed Forces. There, Cruise attended the just opened Robert Hopk0ins Public School for much of grade four as well as grade five. In grade four, Cruise first became involved in drama under the tutelage of George Steinburg. Cruise and six other boys put on an improvised play to music calle IT at the Carlton Elementary School drama festival. Drama organizer Val Wright, who was in the audience that night, reflected that "the movement and improvisation were excellent. It was a classic ensemble piece. Cruise also enjoyed sports at the school including playing floor hockey, though he was known more for his aggression than his talent. For grade six Cruise went to Henry Munro Middle School. However, in the spring of that year Cruise's mother left his father, taking Cruise and his sisters back to the US. His father died of cancer.
He briefly attended a Franciscan seminary in Cincinnati on a church scholarship and aspired to become a Catholic priest. In his senior year, he played football for the varsity team as a linebacker, but he was cut from the squad after getting caught drinking beer before a game. In total, Cruise attended 15 schools in 14 years, including stints in at least two suburban New Jersey towns, including Glen Ridge.
Cruise first appeared in a bit part in the 1981 film Endless Love, followed by a major supporting role as a crazed military academy student in Taps later that year. In 1983, Cruise was part of the ensemble cast of The Outsiders. That same year he appeared in All the Right Moves and Risky Business, which has been described as "A Generation X classic, and a career-maker for Tom Cruise and which, along with 1986's Top Gun, cemented his status as a superstar. Cruise also played the male lead Jack O the Green in Legend released 1986.Cruise followed up Top Gun with The Color of Money, which came out the same year, and which paired him with Paul Newman. 1988 saw him star in Cocktail, which earned him a nomination for the Razzie Award for Worst Actor. Later that year he starred with Dustin Hoffman in Rain Man, which won the Academy Award for Best Film and Cruise the Kansas City Film Critics Circle Award for Best Supporting Actor. Cruise portrayed real-life paralyzed Vietnam War veteran Ron Kovic in 1989's Born on the Fourth of July which earned him a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor Motion Picture Drama, the Chicago Film Critics Association Award for Best Actor the People's Choice Award for Favorite Motion Picture Actor, a nomination for BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role, and Cruise's first Best Actor Academy Award nomination.
Cruise's next films were Days of Thunder 1990 and Far and Away 1992 both of which co-starred then-wife Nicole Kidman as his love interest. In 1994, Cruise starred along with Brad Pitt, Antonio Banderas and Christian Slater in Neil Jordan's Interview with the Vampire, a gothic drama/horror film that was based on Anne Rice's best-selling novel. The film was well received, although Rice was initially quite outspoken in her criticism of Cruise having been cast in the film, as Julian Sands was her first choice. Upon seeing the film however, she paid $7,740 for a two-page ad in Daily Variety praising his performance and apologizing for her previous doubts about him.
In 1996, Cruise appeared as superspy Ethan Hunt in the reboot of Mission: Impossible, which he produced. It was a box office success, although it received criticism regarding the Jim Phelps character being a villain despite being a protagonist of the original television series. In 1996, he took on the title role in Jerry Maguire for which he earned a Golden Globe and his second nomination for an Academy Award. In 1999, Cruise costarred with Kidman in the erotic Stanley Kubrick film Eyes Wide Shut, and took a rare supporting role as a motivational speaker Frank T.J. Mackey in Magnolia, for which he received another Golden Globe and nomination for an Academy Award.In 2000, Cruise returned as Ethan Hunt in the second installment of the Mission Impossible films, releasing Mission: Impossible II. The film was directed by Hong Kong director John Woo and branded with his gun fu style, and it continued the series' blockbuster success at the box office, taking in almost $547M in worldwide figures, like its predecessor, being the third highest grossing film of the year, despite being a success it along with its predecessor received a mixed reception. Cruise received an MTV Movie Award as Best Male Performance for this film. His next five films were major critical and commercial successes. The following year Cruise starred in the romantic thriller Vanilla Sky 2001 with Cameron Diaz and Penélope Cruz. In 2002, Cruise starred in the dystopian science fiction thriller, Minority Report which was directed by Steven Spielberg and based on the science fiction short story by Philip K. Dick.
In 2003, he starred in the Edward Zwick's historical drama The Last Samurai, for which he received a Golden Globe nomination as best actor. In 2005, Cruise worked again with Steven Spielberg in War of the Worlds, a loose adaptation of the H. G. Wells novel of the same name, which became the fourth highest grossing film of the year with US$591.4 million worldwide. Also in 2005, he won the People's Choice Award for Favorite Male Movie Star, and the MTV Generation Award. Cruise was nominated for seven Saturn Awards between 2002 and 2009, winning once. Nine of the ten films he starred in during the decade made over $100 million at the box office.In 2006, he returned to his role as Ethan Hunt in the third installment of the Mission Impossible film series, Mission: Impossible III. The film was more positively received by critics than the previous films in the series, it grossed nearly $400 million at the box office. In 2007, Cruise took a rare supporting role for the second time in Lions for Lambs, which was a commercial disappointment. This was followed by an unrecognizable appearance as "Les Grossman" in the 2008 comedy Tropic Thunder with Ben Stiller, Jack Black, and Robert Downey, Jr. This performance earned Cruise a Golden Globe nomination. Cruise played the central role in the historical thriller Valkyrie released on December 25, 2008 to box office success.
In March 2010, Cruise completed filming the action-comedy Knight and Day, in which he re-teamed with former costar Cameron Diaz; the film was released on June 23, 2010. On February 9, 2010, Cruise confirmed that he would star in Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol, the fourth installment in the Mission:Impossible series. The film was released in December 2011 to high critical acclaim[31] and box office success. Unadjusted for ticket price inflation, it is Cruise's biggest commercial success to date.
On May 6, 2011, Cruise was awarded a humanitarian award from the Simon Wiesenthal Centre and Museum of Tolerance for his work as a dedicated philanthropist. In mid-2011, Cruise started shooting the movie Rock of Ages in which he played the character Stacee Jaxx. The film was released in June 2012.
Cruise starred as Jack Reacher, an adaptation of British author Lee Child's 2005 novel One Shot. The film was released on December 21, 2012 It met with positive reviews from critics and was a box office success grossing $216,568,266 worldwide. In 2013, he starred in the science fiction film Oblivion based on director Joseph Kosinski graphic novel of the same name. The film met with mixed reviews and grossed $285,600,588 worldwide. It also starred Morgan Freeman and Olga Kurylenko.
As of 2014 Cruise's films have grossed about $7.9
Cruise is set to return as Ethan Hunt and produce the fifth installment of the Mission: Impossible series. along with Simon Pegg as Benji and Jeremy Renner as William Brandt, which will be directed by his frequent collaborator Christopher McQuarrie.
Cruise partnered with his former talent agent Paula Wagner to form Cruise/Wagner Productions in 1993 and the company has since co-produced several of Cruise's films, the first being Mission: Impossible in 1996 which was also Cruise's first project as a producer.
Cruise is noted as having negotiated some of the most lucrative film deals in Hollywood, and was described in 2005 by Hollywood economist Edward Jay Epstein as "one of the most powerful – and richest – forces in Hollywood. Epstein argues that Cruise is one of the few producers the others being George Lucas, Steven Spielberg and Jerry Bruckheimer who are regarded as able to guarantee the success of a billion-dollar film franchise. Epstein also contends that the public obsession with Cruise's tabloid controversies obscures full appreciation of Cruise's exceptional commercial prowess.
Cruise/Wagner Productions, Cruise's film production company, is said to be developing a screenplay based on Erik Larson's New York Times bestseller, The Devil in the White City about a real life serial killer, H. H. Holmes, at Chicago's World's Columbian Exposition. Kathryn Bigelow is attached to the project to produce and helm. Meanwhile, Leonardo DiCaprio's production company, Appian Way, is also developing a film about Holmes and the World's Fair, in which DiCaprio will star.
Breakup with Paramount
On August 22, 2006, Paramount Pictures announced it was ending its 14-year relationship with Cruise. In the Wall Street Journal, chairman of Viacom Paramount's parent company Sumner Redstone cited the economic damage to Cruise's value as an actor and producer from his controversial public behavior and views. Cruise/Wagner Productions responded that Paramount's announcement was a face-saving move after the production company had successfully sought alternative financing from private equity firms. Industry analysts such as Edward Jay Epstein commented that the real reason for the split was most likely Paramount's discontent over Cruise/Wagner's exceptionally large share of DVD sales from the Mission: Impossible franchise.
In November 2006, Cruise and Paula Wagner announced that they had taken over United Artists film studio. Cruise acts as a producer and star in films for United Artists, while Wagner serves as UA's chief executive. Production began in 2007 of Valkyrie, a thriller based on the July 20, 1944 assassination attempt against Adolf Hitler. The film was acquired in March 2007 by United Artists. On March 21, 2007 Cruise signed on to play Claus von Stauffenberg, the protagonist. This project marks the second production to be greenlighted since Cruise and Wagner took control of United Artists. The first was its inaugural film, Lions for Lambs, directed by Robert Redford and starring Redford, Meryl Streep and Cruise. Lambs was released on November 9, 2007 opening to unimpressive box office revenue and critical reception. In August 2008, Wagner stepped down from her position at United Artists; she retains her stake in UA, which combined with Cruise's share amounts to 30 percent of the studio.Cruise has been married three times and has three children two adopted and one biological.
Cruise had a relationship with Risky Business co-star Rebecca De Mornay from 1983 to 1985. Singer and actress Cher says that she dated Cruise in 1985.
Cruise married actress Mimi Rogers on May 9, 1987. The marriage lasted two years, and their divorce was finalized on February 4, 1990. Rogers introduced Cruise to Scientology.
Cruise met his second wife, actress Nicole Kidman, on the set of their film Days of Thunder in 1989. The couple married on December 24, 1990. Cruise and Kidman adopted two children, Isabella and Connor Antony. In February 2001 Cruise filed for divorce from Kidman while she was unknowingly pregnant. The pregnancy ended with a miscarriage. In 2007 Kidman clarified rumours of a miscarriage early in her marriage to Cruise, saying in an interview, It was wrongly reported," and explaining that she had actually had an ectopic pregnancy. Before her next marriage, to Keith Urban, Kidman spoke of how much she still loved Cruise, saying in 2006: "He was huge; still is. To me, he was just Tom, but to everybody else, he is huge. But he was lovely to me. And I loved him. I still love him.Cruise was next romantically linked with Penélope Cruz, his co-star in Vanilla Sky. The relationship ended in 2004. An article in the October 2012 issue of Vanity Fair states that several sources have said that after the breakup with Cruz, the Church of Scientology launched a secret project to find Cruise a new girlfriend. According to those sources, a series of "auditions" of Scientologist actresses resulted in a short-lived relationship with British-Iranian actress Nazanin Boniadi, who subsequently left Scientology. The Church and Cruise's lawyers issued strongly worded denials and threatened to sue, accusing Vanity Fair of "shoddy journalism" and "religious bigotry. Journalist Roger Friedman later reported that he received an email from director and ex-Scientologist Paul Haggis confirming the story.
In April 2005, Cruise began dating actress Katie Holmes. On April 27 that year, Cruise and Holmes – dubbed "TomKat" by the media – made their first public appearance together in Rome. A month later, Cruise declared his love for Holmes on The Oprah Winfrey Show, famously jumping up and down on Winfrey's couch during the show. On October 6, 2005, Cruise and Holmes announced they were expecting a child their daughter, Suri, was born in 2006. On November 18, 2006, Holmes and Cruise were married at the 15th-century Odescalchi Castle in Bracciano, Italy, in a Scientology ceremony attended by many Hollywood stars. The actors' publicist said the couple had "officialized their marriage in Los Angeles the day before the Italian ceremony. There has been widespread speculation that the marriage was arranged by the Church of Scientology. David Miscavige, the head of the Church of Scientology, served as Cruise's best man. On June 29, 2012, it was announced that Holmes had filed for divorce from Cruise after five and a half years of marriage. On July 9, 2012, it was announced that the couple had signed a divorce settlement worked out by their lawyers. Because New York law requires that all divorce documents remain sealed, the exact terms of the settlement are not publicly available.
Cruise is also the first cousin of actor William Mapother Cruise's given name is Thomas Cruise Mapother IV who has appeared in five movies alongside him.
PopularityIn 1990, 1991 and 1997, People magazine rated him among the 50 most beautiful people in the world. In 1995, Empire magazine ranked him among the 100 sexiest stars in film history. Two years later, it ranked him among the top 5 film stars of all time. In 2002 and 2003, he was rated by Premiere among the top 20 in its annual Power 100 list.
In 2006, Premiere ranked Cruise as Hollywood's most powerful actor as Cruise came in at number 13 on the magazine's 2006 Power List, being the highest ranked actor. The same year, Forbes magazine ranked him as the world's most powerful celebrity.
In August 2006, Paramount cited Cruise's "recent conduct" as the reason they did not renew their production contract with him. In addition, Marketing Evaluations reported that Cruise's Q score a measure of the popularity of celebrities had fallen 40 percent.
October 10, 2006 was declared "Tom Cruise Day" in Japan; the Japan Memorial Day Association said that he was awarded with a special day because he has made more trips to Japan than any other Hollywood star.
Litigation
During Cruise's marriage to Nicole Kidman, the couple endured public speculation about their sex life and rumors that Cruise was gay. In 1998, he successfully sued the Daily Express, a British tabloid which alleged that his marriage to Kidman was a sham designed to cover up his homosexuality. In May 2001 he filed a lawsuit against gay porn actor Chad Slater. Slater had allegedly told the celebrity magazine Actustar that he had had an affair with Cruise. Cruise denied this,and in August 2001, Slater was ordered to pay $10 million to Cruise in damages after Slater declared he could not afford to defend himself against the suit and would therefore default. Cruise also sued Bold Magazine publisher Michael Davis, who alleged but never confirmed that he had video that would prove Cruise was gay. The suit was dropped in exchange for a public statement by Davis that the video was not of Cruise, and that Cruise was heterosexual.
After The Beast?'?s publication of their 50 Most Loathsome People of 2004, which included Cruise, Cruise's lawyer Bertram Fields threatened to sue. Seeing the opportunity for nationwide exposure, The Beast actively encouraged the lawsuit. No lawsuit was ever filed and Cruise was included more prominently in the 2005 list. In 2006, Cruise sued cybersquatter Jeff Burgar to obtain control of the TomCruise.com domain name. When owned by Burgar, the domain redirected to information about Cruise on Celebrity1000.com. The decision to turn TomCruise.com over to Cruise was handed down by the World Intellectual Property Organization WIPO on July 5, 2006.
In October 2012, Cruise filed a lawsuit against In Touch and Life & Style for defamation.
Scientology
Cruise is an outspoken advocate for the Church of Scientology and its associated social programs. He became involved with Scientology in 1990 through his first wife, Mimi Rogers. He has said that Scientology, specifically the L. Ron Hubbard Study Tech, helped him overcome dyslexia. In addition to promoting various programs that introduce people to Scientology, Cruise has campaigned for Scientology to be recognized as a religion in Europe. In 2005, the Paris city council revealed that Cruise had lobbied officials Nicolas Sarkozy and Jean-Claude Gaudin, described him as a spokesman and militant for Scientology, and barred any further dealings with him. Cruise co-founded and raised donations for Downtown Medical to offer New York City 9/11 rescue workers detoxification therapy based on the works of L. Ron Hubbard. This drew criticism from the medical profession as well as firefighters. For these activities and others, David Miscavige, the leader of Scientology, created the Scientology's Freedom Medal of Valor and awarded it to Cruise in late 2004.
In January 2004, Tom Cruise said: "I think psychiatry should be outlawed. A controversy erupted in 2005 after he openly criticized actress Brooke Shields for using the drug Paxil paroxetine an anti-depressant to which Shields attributes her recovery from postpartum depression after the birth of her first daughter in 2003. Cruise asserted that there is no such thing as a chemical imbalance, and that psychiatry is a form of pseudoscience. Shields responded that Cruise "should stick to saving the world from aliens and let women who are experiencing postpartum depression decide what treatment options are best for them. This led to a heated argument between Matt Lauer and Cruise on NBC's Today on June 24, 2005. Medical authorities view Cruise's comments as furthering the social stigma of mental illness. Shields herself called Cruise's comments "a disservice to mothers everywhere. In late August 2006, Cruise apologized in person to Shields for his comments. Scientology is well known for its opposition to mainstream psychiatry and the medication it implements.
On January 15, 2008, a video produced by the Church of Scientology featuring an interview with Cruise was posted on YouTube, showing Cruise discussing what being a Scientologist means to him. The Church of Scientology said the video had been "pirated and edited", and was taken from a three-hour video produced for members of Scientology YouTube removed the Cruise video from their site under threat of litigation. After YouTube investigated this claim, they found that the video did not breach copyright law, as it is covered by the fair use clause. It was subsequently reinstated back on the site, and as of January 2014, the video has achieved 9 million views. YouTube has declined to remove it again, due to the popularity of the video, and subsequent changes to copyright policy of the website.
In March 2004 his publicist of 14 years, Pat Kingsley, resigned. Cruise replaced her with his sister, fellow Scientologist Lee Anne DeVette, who served in that role until November 2005. DeVette was replaced with Paul Bloch from the publicity firm Rogers and Cowan. Such restructuring is seen as a move to curtail publicity of his views on Scientology, as well as the controversy surrounding his relationship with Katie Holmes.
In 2013 Cruise admitted that ex-wife Katie Holmes divorced him in part to protect the couple's daughter Suri from Scientology. He also admitted that Suri is no longer a practicing member of the church.
Nicolas Kim Coppola born January 7 1964 known professionally as Nicolas Cage, is an American actor and filmmaker. He has performed in leading roles in a variety of films, ranging from romantic comedies and dramas to science fiction and action films. In the early years of his career, Cage starred in films such as Valley Girl 1983 Racing with the Moon 1984 Birdy 1984 Peggy Sue Got Married 1986 Raising Arizona 1987 Moonstruck 1987 Vampire's Kiss 1989 Wild at Heart 1990 Honeymoon in Vegas 1992 and Red Rock West 1993.
Cage received an Academy Award, a Golden Globe, and Screen Actors Guild Award for his performance as an alcoholic Hollywood writer in Leaving Las Vegas 1995 before coming to the attention of wider audiences with mainstream films such as The Rock 1996 Face Off 1997 Con Air 1997 City of Angels 1998 and National Treasure 2004. He earned his second Academy Award nomination for his performance as Charlie and Donald Kaufman in Adaptation 2002. In 2002, he directed the film Sonny, for which he was nominated for Grand Special Prize at Deauville Film Festival. Cage owns the production company Saturn Films and has produced films such as Shadow of the Vampire 2000 and The Life of David Gale 2003.
Though his performances in The Weather Man 2005 Lord of War 2005 The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans 2009 and Kick Ass 2010 earned critical acclaim, and films such as Ghost Rider 2007 and Knowing 2009 were box office successes, Cage has been strongly criticized in recent years for his choice of roles, some of which have been universally panned. He starred in The Croods, The Frozen Ground, and Joe, which all received acclaim.Cage was born in Long Beach, California, the son of August Floyd Coppola, a professor of literature, and Joy Vogelsang a dancer and choreographer. He was raised in a Catholic family. His father was of Italian descent and his mother is of German and Polish descent. His paternal grandparents were composer Carmine Coppola and actress Italia Pennino, and his paternal great-grandparents were immigrants from Bernalda, Basilicata. Through his father, he is the nephew of director Francis Ford Coppola and of actress Talia Shire, and the cousin of directors Roman Coppola and Sofia Coppola, film producer Gian Carlo Coppola, and actors Robert Carmine and Jason Schwartzman.
Cage's two brothers are New York radio personality Marc "The Cope" Coppola and director Christopher Coppola. He attended Beverly Hills High School which is known for its many alumni who became entertainers. He aspired to act from an early age and also attended UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television. His first non-cinematic acting experience was in a school production of Golden Boy. He cites James Dean as the key inspiration for his career, saying I started acting because I wanted to be James Dean. I saw him in Rebel Without a Cause, East of Eden. Nothing affected me no rock song, no classical music the way Dean affected me in Eden. It blew my mind. I was like, 'That's what I want to do.
To avoid the appearance of nepotism as the nephew of Francis Ford Coppola, he changed his name early in his career to Nicolas Cage, inspired in part by the Marvel Comics superhero Luke Cage.
Since his minor role in the film Fast Times at Ridgemont High, with Sean Penn, Cage has appeared in a wide range of films, both mainstream and offbeat. He auditioned for the role of Dallas Winston in his uncle's film The Outsiders, based on S.E. Hinton's novel, but lost to Matt Dillon. He was also in Coppola's films Rumble Fish and Peggy Sue Got Married.
Other Cage roles included appearances in the acclaimed 1987 romantic comedy film Moonstruck, also starring Cher the Coen Brothers cult-classic comedy Raising Arizona David Lynch's 1990 film Wild at Heart a lead role in Martin Scorsese's 1999 New York City paramedic drama Bringing Out the Dead and Ridley Scott's 2003 drama film Matchstick Men, in which he played an agoraphobic, mysophobic, obsessive-compulsive con artist with a tic disorder. Cage has been nominated twice for an Academy Award, winning once for his performance as a suicidal alcoholic in Leaving Las Vegas. His other nomination was for his portrayal of real-life screenwriter Charlie Kaufman and Kaufman's fictional twin Donald in Adaptation. Despite these successes, most of his lower profile films have performed poorly at the box office compared to his mainstream action adventure roles. The suspense thriller 8mm 1999 is considered a cult film. He took the lead role in the 2001 film Captain Corelli's Mandolin and learned to play the mandolin from scratch for the part. He made his directorial debut with 2002's Sonny. In 2005, two films he headlined, Lord of War and The Weather Man, failed to find a significant audience despite nationwide releases and good reviews for his performances. Poor reviews for The Wicker Man resulted in low box office sales. The much criticized Ghost Rider 2007 based on the Marvel Comics character, fared better, earning more than $45 million the top earner during its opening weekend and over $208 million worldwide through the weekend ending on March 25, 2007. Also in 2007, he starred in Next which shared the concept of a glimpse into an alternate timeline with Cage's film The Family Man 2000.
Most of Cage's movies that have achieved financial success were in the action adventure genre. In his second highest grossing film to date, National Treasure, he plays an eccentric historian who goes on a dangerous adventure to find treasure hidden by the Founding Fathers of the United States. Other action hits include The Rock, in which Cage plays a young FBI chemical weapons expert who infiltrates Alcatraz Island in hopes of neutralizing a terrorist threat Face Off, a John Woo film where he plays both a hero and a villain and World Trade Center, director Oliver Stone's film regarding the September 11, 2001 attacks. He had a small but notable role as the Chinese criminal mastermind Dr. Fu Manchu in Rob Zombie's fake trailer Werewolf Women of the S.S. from the B-movie double feature Grindhouse.
In November 2007, Cage was spotted backstage at a Ring of Honor wrestling show in New York City researching his role for The Wrestler. The role was ultimately played by Mickey Rourke, who received an Academy Award nomination for his performance. Wrestler Director Darren Aronofsky, in an interview with slashfilm.com, said of Cage's decision to leave the film that Nic was a complete gentleman, and he understood that my heart was with Mickey and he stepped aside. I have so much respect for Nic Cage as an actor and I think it really could have worked with Nic but you know, Nic was incredibly supportive of Mickey and he is old friends with Mickey and really wanted to help with this opportunity, so he pulled himself out of the race. In 2008, Cage appeared as Joe, a contract killer who undergoes a change of heart while on a work outing in Bangkok, in the film Bangkok Dangerous. The film is shot by the Pang Brothers and has a distinct South-East Asian flavor. In 2009, Cage starred in science fiction thriller Knowing, directed by Alex Proyas. In the film, he plays an MIT professor who examines the contents of a time capsule unearthed at his son's elementary school. Startling predictions found inside the capsule that have already come true lead him to believe the world is going to end at the close of the week, and that he and his son are somehow involved in the destruction. The film received mainly negative reviews but was the box office winner on its opening weekend. Also in 2009, Cage starred in the film The Bad Lieutenant Port of Call New Orleans, directed by acclaimed German director Werner Herzog. He portrayed a corrupt police officer with gambling, drug and alcohol addictions. The film was very well received by critics, holding a rating of 87% positive reviews on review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes. Cage received lauds for his performance, with Michael Phillips of the Chicago Tribune writing "Herzog has found his ideal interpreter, a performer whose truth lies deep in the artifice of performance: ladies and gentlemen, Nicolas Cage, at his finest. This film reunited Cage with Eva Mendes, who played his love interest in Ghost Rider. In 2010, Cage starred in the period piece Season of the Witch, playing a 14th century knight transporting a girl accused of causing the Black Plague to a monastery, and The Sorcerer's Apprentice in which he played the sorcerer.
In 2012, Cage reprised his role in Ghost Rider's sequel Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance. He voiced the character Grug Crood in the animated film The Croods, which was released in 2013. The Croods received positive reviews from critics and was a box office success grossing $585 million against a budget of $135 million.
Cage made his directorial debut with Sonny, a low budget drama starring James Franco as a male prostitute whose mother Brenda Blethyn serves as his pimp. Cage had a small role in the film, which received poor reviews and a short run in a limited number of theatres. Cage's producing career includes Shadow of the Vampire, the first effort from Saturn Films.
In early December 2006, Cage announced at the Bahamas International Film Festival that he planned to curtail his future acting endeavors to pursue other interests. On The Dresden Files for the Sci Fi Channel, Cage is listed as the executive producer.
Cage, an avid comic book fan, auctioned a collection of 400 vintage comics through Heritage Auctions for over $1.6 million in 2002. In 2007, he created a comic book with his son Weston, called Voodoo Child, which was published by Virgin Comics. Cage is a fan and collector of painter and underground comic artist Robert Williams. He has written introductions for Juxtapoz magazine and purchased the painting Death On The Boards.
In February 2011, Cage said that, at a certain point in his career, he realized that he had developed his own method of acting, which he described as "Nouveau Shamanic." He noted, "at some point I'll have to write a book" about it.Cage's acting has been praised by film critic Roger Ebert, who wrote in his "Great Movies" essay, about the film Adaptation, that: "There are often lists of the great living male movie stars: De Niro, Nicholson and Pacino, usually. How often do you see the name of Nicolas Cage He should always be up there. He's daring and fearless in his choice of roles, and unafraid to crawl out on a limb, saw it off and remain suspended in air. No one else can project inner trembling so effectively. he always seems so earnest. However improbable his character, he never winks at the audience. He is committed to the character with every atom and plays him as if he were him. In response to mixed reviews of Knowing and their focus on criticizing Cage, Ebert defended both Cage as an actor and the film which in contrast to other critics he gave four out of four stars.
Lord of War co star Ethan Hawke said of Cage: "He's the only actor since Marlon Brando that's actually done anything new with the art of acting; he's successfully taken us away from an obsession with naturalism into a kind of presentation style of acting that I imagine was popular with the old troubadours. While stating that Cage had hurt his career by working on too many poor projects he's put a little too much water in his beer Hawke added If I could erase his bottom half bad movies, and only keep his top half movies, he would blow everyone else out of the water.
At the 1996 Academy Awards, Cage won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance in Leaving Las Vegas. After receiving the award, he went on to star in some high budget action movies, which received criticism by actors such as Stephen Baldwin, Nick Nolte, and Sean Penn, who said to the New York Times that Cage is "no longer an actor" and is "more like a performer. However, in his Oscar acceptance speech for Mystic River, Penn referred to Cage's performance in the critically acclaimed film Matchstick Men as being among the best performances of the year. In May 2001, Cage was awarded an Honorary Doctorate in Fine Arts by California State University, Fullerton. He spoke at the commencement ceremony. In 1988, Cage began dating actress Christina Fulton, who later bore their son, Weston Coppola Cage born December 26, 1990. Weston was the lead singer of the black metal band Eyes of Noctum, but broke up in 2012 Arsh Anubis, his new band of the same genre, was formed in 2011. Weston also appeared in Cage's film Lord of War as Vladimir, a young Ukrainian mechanic who quickly disarms a Mil Mi 24 helicopter. Weston and his wife Danielle have a son, Lucian Augustus Coppola Cage, born July 1, 2014.
Cage has been married three times. His first wife was actress Patricia Arquette married in April 1995, divorce finalized in 2001.
Cage's second marriage was to singer songwriter Lisa Marie Presley, daughter of Elvis Presley. Cage is an Elvis fan and used the star as the base of his performance in Wild at Heart. Presley and Cage married on August 10, 2002 and filed for divorce on November 25, 2002 which was finalized on May 16, 2004. The divorce proceeding was longer than the marriage.
Cage met his third and current wife Alice Kim, a former waitress who previously worked at the Los Angeles restaurant Kabuki and at the Los Angeles based Korean nightclub, Le Privé. She bore their son, Kal El, after Superman's birth name on October 3, 2005. Cage was once considered for the role of Superman in a film to be directed by Tim Burton. Alice had a minor role in the 2007 film Next, which Cage produced. They were married at a private ranch in Northern California on July 30, 2004.
Cage grew up in a family of Catholic background but does not talk about religion publicly and refuses to answer religion connected questions in his interviews. When asked about the movie Knowing being a religion themed film or not, Cage replied: "Any of my personal beliefs or opinions runs the risk of impinging on your own relationship with the movie. I feel movies are best left enigmatic, left raising more questions than answers. I don't want to ever preach. So from the movie far more interesting than I could ever offer.
During his visit to University of California, Santa Cruz he stated he is not a politically active actor and that he can do it in his work as he learned more about nuclear power from the movie The China Syndrome. Cage has donated about $5,000 to the Democratic Party since 1994.
Cage has been called one of the most generous stars in Hollywood. He donated $2 million to Amnesty International for to use to offer rehabilitation shelters, medical services and psychological and reintegration services to some of the 300,000 children forced to fight in conflicts across the world. He has also donated one million dollars to the victims of Hurricane Katrina. He became the first artist to support ArtWorks, an artist engagement program to raise awareness of fundamental rights at work, including freedom from slavery and from child labor. Cage has also honored with Humanitarian award from United Nations for his works and appointed as an UN ambassador for Global Justice. He led a campaign around the film Lord of War to raise awareness about international Arms Control, supported "Heal the Bay", the United Negro College Fund efforts, and the Royal United Hospital's Forever Friends Appeal to build intensive care units for babies.
Nicolas Cage is one of Hollywood's highest-paid actors, earning $40 million in 2009 according to Forbes.
Cage had a Malibu home where he and Kim lived, but sold the property in 2005 for $10 million. In 2004 he bought a property on Paradise Island, Bahamas. In May 2006, he bought a 40 acre 160,000 m2 island in the Exuma archipelago, some 85 miles 137 km southeast of Nassau and close to a similar island owned by Faith Hill and Tim McGraw.
He bought the medieval castle Schloss Neidstein in the Oberpfalz region in Germany in 2006 and sold it in 2009 for $2.5 million. His grandmother was German, living in Cochem an der Mosel. In August 2007 Cage purchased "Grey Craig a 24,000 square foot 2,200 m2 brick and stone country manor in Middletown Rhode Island. With an estate occupying 26 acres 110,000 m2 the home has 12 bedrooms and 10 full bathrooms and overlooks the Atlantic Ocean. It borders the Norman Bird Sanctuary to the west. The sale ranked among the state of Rhode Island's most expensive residential purchases until eclipsed that same year 2007 by the $17.15 million sale of the Miramar mansion on Bellevue Avenue in Newport.
Also in 2007, the actor purchased Midford Castle in Somerset, England. Shortly after selling his German castle, Cage also put homes in Rhode Island, Louisiana, Nevada, and California, as well as a $7 million island in the Bahamas, up for sale.
On July 14, 2009, the Internal Revenue Service filed documents in New Orleans in connection with a federal tax lien against property owned by Cage in Louisiana, concerning unpaid federal taxes. The IRS alleges that Cage failed to pay over $6.2 million in federal income tax for the year 2007. In addition, the Internal Revenue Service has another lien for more than $350,000 in unpaid taxes dating from 2002 to 2004. Cage filed a $20 million lawsuit on October 16, 2009, against his business manager, Samuel J. Levin, alleging negligence and fraud. The lawsuit states that Levin "had failed to pay taxes when they were due and had placed in speculative and risky real estate INVESTMENTS 'resulting in the actor suffering catastrophic losses. Cage is also facing separate lawsuits from East West Bank and Red Curb INVESTMENTS for unpaid, multimillion dollar loans.
Samuel Levin filed a counter complaint and responded to the lawsuit in a filing stating that he warned Cage that he was living beyond his means and urged him to spend less. Levin's filing states that "instead of listening to Levin, cross defendant Cage Coppola spent most of his free time shopping for high ticket purchases, and wound up with 15 personal residences", Levin's complaint continued Likewise, Levin advised Coppola against buying a Gulfstream jet, against buying and owning a flotilla of yachts, against buying and owning a squadron of Rolls Royces, against buying millions of dollars in jewelry and art.
In his filing Levin says that in 2007 Cage's "shopping spree entailed the purchase of three additional residences at a total cost of more than $33 million the purchase of 22 automobiles including 9 Rolls Royces 12 purchases of expensive jewelry and 47 purchases of artwork and exotic items. One of those exotic items was a dinosaur skull of a Tarbosaurus for which Nicolas Cage paid $276,000 in an auction after winning a bidding contest against Leonardo DiCaprio.
According to Cage, he owned the "Most Haunted House in America a home located in the French Quarter of New Orleans, Louisiana. Known as "The LaLaurie House" after its former owner Delphine LaLaurie, the house was foreclosed and sold at auction on November 12, 2009 along with another New Orleans property for a total of $5.5 million, in the wake of Cage's financial problems.
His Bel Air home, which had six loans totaling $18 million on it, failed to sell at an April 2010 foreclosure auction despite an opening offer of $10.4 million, substantially less than the $35 million that Cage had originally tried to sell it for. The home, built in 1940 for $110,000 had been owned by Dean Martin and singer Tom Jones. The home eventually sold in November 2010 for $10.5 million. Another home in Nevada also faces foreclosure auction.
In November 2011, Cage also sold his Action Comics 1 in an online auction for a record-breaking $2.16 million the previous record being $1.5 million to assist paying his tax liens and other debts. Cage purchased the comic in 1997 for $110,000.
In December 2009, Christina Fulton sued Cage for $13 million and for the house in which she was living. The suit was in response to an order that she leave the dwelling the order resulted from Cage's financial difficulties.
On April 15, 2011, at 11:30 pm, Cage was arrested in New Orleans' French Quarter district for suspicion of domestic abuse battery, disturbing the peace and public intoxication, after a police officer was flagged down by onlookers after Cage allegedly grabbed his wife's upper arm while appearing to be under the influence of alcohol. Cage was held in police custody until a bail of $11,000 was posted by Duane Dog Chapman. He was later ordered to appear in court on May 31, 2011. On May 5, 2011, it was announced that the charges against Cage had been dropped.
Sandra Annette Bullock blk born July 26, 1964 is an American actress and film producer. She is one of Hollywood's highest-paid actresses and is the recipient of one Academy Award from two nominations, and one Golden Globe Award from five nominations.
Bullock made her acting debut with a minor role in the 1987 thriller Hangmen. Her breakthrough role was in the 1994 action film Speed, after which she starred in several successful films including While You Were Sleeping 1995 A Time to Kill 1996 and Hope Floats 1998. Bullock achieved further success in the 2000s and 2010s with starring roles in Miss Congeniality 2000 Two Weeks Notice 2002, Crash 2004, The Proposal 2009, and The Heat 2013. She was awarded the Academy Award for Best Actress and the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Drama for playing Leigh Anne Tuohy in The Blind Side 2009. Bullock's greatest commercial success is the science fiction film Gravity 2013
In addition to acting, Bullock is the founder of the production company Fortis Films. She was married to Jesse G. James from 2005 to 2010.Bullock was born in Arlington, Virginia, a suburb of Washington, D.C. Her father, John W. Bullock born 1925, was a United States Army employee and part-time voice coach; her mother, Helga Mathilde Meyer 1942–2000, was an opera singer and voice teacher. Bullock's father was from Birmingham, Alabama, and had English, Irish, German, and French ancestry, while Bullock's mother was German. Bullock's maternal grandfather was a rocket scientist from Nuremberg, Germany. Bullock's father, who was in charge of the Army's Military Postal Service in Europe, was stationed in Nuremberg when he met his wife. They married in Germany and moved to Arlington, where John worked with the Army Materiel Command, before becoming a contractor for The Pentagon. She has a younger sister, Gesine Bullock-Prado, who was formerly the vice-president of Bullock's production company Fortis Films.
Bullock was raised in Nuremberg, Germany for twelve years and grew up speaking German. She attended the humanistic Waldorf School. As a child, Bullock frequently accompanied her mother on European opera tours. Bullock studied ballet and vocal arts as a child, taking small parts in her mother's opera productions. She sang in the opera's children's choir at the Staatstheater Nürnberg. The scar above her left eye was caused when she fell into a creek as a child. Bullock attended Washington-Lee High School, where she was a cheerleader and performed in high school theater productions. After graduating in 1982, she attended East Carolina University in Greenville, North Carolina, where she received a degree in drama in 1986. While at ECU, she performed in multiple theater productions, including "Peter Pan" and "Three Sisters. She then moved to Manhattan and supported herself as a bartender, cocktail waitress, and coat checker while auditioning for roles.
Untilthe age of eighteen, Bullock held American/German dual citizenship. In 2009, she reapplied for German citizenship.While in New York, Bullock took acting classes with Sanford Meisner. She appeared in several student films, and later landed a role in an Off-Broadway play No Time Flat. Director Alan J. Levi was impressed by Bullock's performance and offered her a part in the TV movie Bionic Showdown: The Six Million Dollar Man and the Bionic Woman 1989. This led to her being cast in a series of small roles in several independent films as well as in the lead role of the short-lived NBC television version of the film Working Girl 1990. She went on to appear in several films, such as Love Potion No. 9 1992, The Thing Called Love 1993 and Fire on the Amazon 1993.
A prominent supporting role in the science-fiction/action film Demolition Man 1993 was followed by her breakthrough performance in Speed the following year. Speed was a huge hit that took in $350 million at the box office worldwide, making it her second most successful picture to date.
A string of successes during the mid-1990s included While You Were Sleeping 1995, for which she received her first Golden Globe Award nomination for Best Actress – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy, The Net 1995 and A Time to Kill 1996. Bullock received $11 million for Speed 2: Cruise Control 1997, which she agreed to star in for financial backing for her own project, Hope Floats 1998, and has revealed she regrets making the sequel.
She was selected as one of People magazine's 50 Most Beautiful People in the World in 1996 and 1999, and was also ranked #58 in Empire magazine's Top 100 Movie Stars of All Time list.In 2000, Bullock starred in Miss Congeniality, a financial success that took in $212 million at the box office worldwide, and received another Golden Globe Award nomination for Best Actress – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy. She was presented with the 2002 Raúl Juliá Award for Excellence for her efforts, as the executive producer of the sitcom George Lopez, in helping expand career openings for Hispanic talent in the media and entertainment industry. She also made several appearances on the show as Accident Amy, an accident-prone employee at the factory Lopez's character manages. The same year, she starred opposite Hugh Grant in Two Weeks Notice 2002.
In 2004, Bullock had a supporting role in the film Crash, which won the Academy Award for Best Picture. She received positive reviews for her performance, with some critics suggesting that it was the best performance of her career. She later received a $17.5-million-salary for Miss Congeniality 2: Armed & Fabulous 2005. The same year, she was a co-recipient of the Women in Film Crystal Award.
Although Bullock was reunited with her Speed co-star Keanu Reeves in the romantic drama The Lake House, their film characters are separated throughout the film, so Bullock and Reeves were only on set together for two weeks during filming. The same year, Bullock appeared in Infamous, playing author Harper Lee. Bullock also starred in Premonition with Julian McMahon, which was released in March 2007. In 2008, Bullock was announced as "the face" of prestigious cosmetic brand Artistry.The year 2009 proved to be especially good for Bullock, giving the actress two record highs in her career, as earlier in the year she released The Proposal, with co-star Ryan Reynolds, a huge hit that took in $317 million at the box office worldwide, making it her third most successful picture to date. She received her third Golden Globe Award nomination for Best Actress role for Motion Picture Musical or Comedy.In November 2009, Bullock starred in The Blind Side, which opened at #2 behind New Moon with $34.2 million, making it her second highest opening weekend ever. The Blind Side is unique in that it had a 17.6% increase at the box office its second weekend, and it took the top spot of the box office in its third weekend. The film cost $29 million to make according to the Box Office Mojo. It grossed over $309 million, making it her domestic highest grossing film, her fourth highest grossing film worldwide, and the first one in history to pass the $200 million mark with only one top-billed female star.
Bullock had initially turned down the role of Leigh Anne Tuohy three times due to a discomfort with portraying a devout Christian. She was awarded the Academy Award for Best Actress, Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Motion Picture Drama, Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role and Broadcast Film Critics Association Award for Best Actress. The Blind Side also received an Academy Award for Best Picture nomination.
Winning the Oscar also gave Bullock another unique distinction—since she won two "Razzies" the day before, for her performance in All About Steve 2009, she is the only performer ever to have been named both Best" and "Worst" for the same year.
In 2011, Bullock starred in the drama Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close alongside Tom Hanks, a film adaptation based on the novel of the same name. Despite mixed reviews, the film was nominated for numerous awards, including an Academy Award for Best Picture nomination. Bullock was nominated for Best Supporting Actress by Georgia Film Critics Association and Best Actress Drama by Teen Choice Awards.She starred in the 2013 comedy film The Heat, alongside Melissa McCarthy. It received positive reviews from critics,and took in $230 million at the box office worldwide. Bullock also starred in the science fiction film Gravity opposite George Clooney. The premiere was in August, at the 70th Venice Film Festival, and the film was released on October 4, 2013 to coincide with the beginning of World Space Week. The film was originally scheduled to be released on November 21, 2012, before being re-scheduled for a 2013 release in order to complete extensive post-production effects work. Gravity received universal acclaim among critics and a standing ovation in Venice. The movie was called "marvelous, the most realistic and the most beautifully choreographed movie ever set in space. Bullock's performance was praised with some critics saying that Gravity is the best work of her career, and many calling her out as a major frontrunner for the Academy Award for Best Actress. Variety wrote that "Bullock inhabits the role with grave dignity and hints at Stone's past scars with sensitivity and tact, and she holds the screen effortlessly once Gravity becomes a veritable one-woman show the actress remains fully present emotionally, projecting a very appealing combo of vulnerability, intelligence and determination that not only wins us over immediately, but sustains attention all the way through the cathartic closing reels. As of February 25, 2014, Gravity, took in $715 million at the box office worldwide, making it Bullock's most successful picture to date. For her role as Dr. Ryan Stone, Bullock was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress, Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Motion Picture Drama, BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role, Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role and Broadcast Film Critics Association Award for Best Actress. By August 2014, Bullock was the highest earning actress in the movie businessBy 2009, Bullock's films had grossed over $3.1 billion worldwide. According to The Numbers, her total domestic gross stands at $1.7 billion, placing her among the Top 100 Stars at the Box Office.
Since her debut as an actress, Bullock has been dubbed in the media as "America’s sweetheart," due to her nature which has been described as "friendly and direct and so unpretentious.
On March 24, 2005, Bullock received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6801 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood.
Whereas critics praised her screen persona, some have been less receptive towards her films. At the 2009 release of The Proposal, Mark Kermode said she has made only three "good" films in her career—Speed, While You Were Sleeping, and Crash, and added that "she's funny, she's gorgeous, it's impossible not to love her and yet she makes rotten film after rotten film after rotten film. As of December 2009, Bullock has appeared on three Entertainment Weekly covers.
She was selected by People magazine as its "Woman of the Year" for 2010 and ranked #12 on People?'?s Most Beautiful 2011 list. In 2010, Time magazine included Bullock in its annual TIME 100 as one of the "Most Influential People in the World.
In 2013, The Hollywood Reporter named Bullock among the most powerful women in entertainment. Bullock joined Hollywood legends at the TCL Chinese Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard by attaching her hand and footprints in cement in the forecourt of the theater in September 2013. In November 2013 it was announced that Bullock won Entertainment Weekly's "Entertainer of the Year," mostly due to the success of her roles in The Heat and Gravity, which Entertainment Weekly believed would earn her an Oscar nomination. Bullock shares the Entertainment Weekly "Entertainer of the Year" title with other distinguished people in the industry such as the 'masterminds' behind the television show Breaking Bad, Matthew McConaughey, Jennifer Lawrence, "Grumpy Cat," among several others.
In 2014, Bullock ranked No. 2 on Forbes?'?s most powerful actresses and was honored with the Decade of Hotness Award by Spike Guys' Choice Awards.
Business ventures
Bullock runs her own production company, Fortis Films. Bullock was an executive producer of the George Lopez sitcom, which garnered a lucrative syndication deal that banked her some $10 million co-produced with Robert Borden Bullock tried to produce a film based on F.X. Toole's short story Million-Dollar Baby but could not interest the studios in a female boxing drama. The story was eventually adapted and directed by Clint Eastwood as the Oscar-winning film, Million Dollar Baby 2004. Fortis Films also produced All About Steve which was released in September 2009. Her father, John Bullock, is the company's CEO and her sister, Gesine Bullock-Prado, is the former president.
In November 2006 Bullock founded an Austin, Texas restaurant, Bess Bistro, located on West 6th Street. She later opened another business, Walton's Fancy and Staple, across the street in a building she extensively renovated. Walton's is a bakery, upscale restaurant and floral shop that also offers services including event planning.
Bullock was once engaged to actor Tate Donovan, whom she met while filming Love Potion No. 9; their relationship lasted three years. She previously dated football player Troy Aikman, and actors Matthew McConaughey and Ryan Gosling.
Bullock married motorcycle builder and Monster Garage host Jesse James on July 16, 2005. They first met when Bullock arranged for her ten-year-old godson to meet James as a Christmas present. In November 2009, Bullock and James entered into a custody battle with James' second ex-wife, former pornographic actress Janine Lindemulder, with whom James had a child. Bullock and James subsequently won full legal custody of James' five-year-old daughter.
In March 2010, a scandal arose when several women claimed to have had affairs with James during his marriage to Bullock. Bullock cancelled European promotional appearances for The Blind Side citing "unforeseen personal reasons. On March 18, 2010, James responded to the rumors of infidelity by issuing a public apology to Bullock. He stated, The vast majority of the allegations reported are untrue and unfounded" and "Beyond that, I will not dignify these private matters with any further public comment. James declared that "There is only one person to blame for this whole situation, and that is me", and asked that his wife and children one day "find it in their hearts to forgive me" for their current "pain and embarrassment James' publicist subsequently announced on March 30, 2010, that James had checked into a rehab facility to deal with personal issues" and "save his marriage to Bullock. However on April 28, 2010, it was reported that Bullock had filed for divorce on April 23 in Austin. Their divorce was finalized on June 28, 2010, with "conflict of personalities" cited as the reasonBullock announced on April 28, 2010, that she had proceeded with plans to adopt a son born in January 2010 in New Orleans. Bullock and James had begun an initial adoption process four months earlier. Bullock's son began living with them in January 2010, but they chose to keep the news private until after the Oscars in March 2010. However, given the couple's separation and then divorce, Bullock continued the adoption of her son Louis Bardo Bullock, as a single parent.On December 20, 2000, Bullock, another passenger, and the two crew survived the crash of a chartered business jet during an attempted night landing at Jackson Hole Airport. The pilots were unable to activate the runway lights due to having out-of-date approach plates, but continued the landing. The aircraft landed in the airport's graded safety area between the runway and parallel taxiway and hit a snowbank. The accident caused a separation of the nose cone and landing gear, partial separation of the right wing, and a bend in the left wing.
On April 18, 2008, while Bullock was in Massachusetts shooting the film The Proposal, she and her husband were in an SUV that was hit head-on driver's side offset at moderate speed by a drunken driver. Vehicle damage was not major and there were no injuries
In October 2004, Bullock won a multimillion-dollar judgment against Benny Daneshjou, the builder of her Lake Austin, Texas home; the jury ruled the house was uninhabitable. It has since been torn down and
On April 22, 2007, Marcia Diana Valentine was found lying outside James and Bullock's Southern California home in Orange County. When James confronted the woman, she ran to her car, got behind the wheel, and tried to run over James. The woman is said to be an obsessed fan of Sandra Bullock. The woman was charged with one felony count each of aggravated assault and stalking. Bullock obtained a restraining order to bar Valentine from contacting or coming near her home, family or work for three years. Valentine pleaded not guilty to charges of aggravated assault and stalking. Valentine was subsequently convicted of stalking and was sentenced to three years of probation
Bullock was also stalked by Thomas James Weldon, commencing in 2002, across several states. In 2003, Bullock obtained a restraining order against Weldon, which was renewed again in 2006. After the renewed restraining order expired, and Weldon was released from a mental institution, he again traveled across several states to find Bullock, and she then obtained another restraining order.
Bullock has been a public supporter of the American Red Cross, having donated $1 million to the organization at least four times. Her first public donation of that amount was to the Red Cross's Liberty Disaster Relief Fund. Three years later, she sent money in response to the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunamis. In 2010, she donated $1 million to relief efforts in Haiti following the Haiti earthquake, and again donated the same amount following the 2011 Japan Earthquake.
Along with other stars, Bullock did a public service announcement urging people to sign a petition for clean-up efforts of the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Bullock backs the Texas non-profit organization The Kindred Life Foundation, Inc. In late 2008, she joined other top celebrities in supporting the work of CEO and Founder Amos Ramirez. She shared this at a gala that raised money for the organization, "Amos has led many efforts across our nation that have helped families that are in need. Our country needs more organizations that are committed to the service that Kindred Life is."
In 012, Bullock was inducted into the Warren Easton Hall of Fame for her donations to charities and in 2013 was honored with the Favorite Humanitarian Award at the 2013 People's Choice Awards for her contributions to New Orleans Warren Easton Charter High School, which was severely damaged after Hurricane Katrina in 2005.