View allAll Photos Tagged actor
French postcard by Edycard, no. 29. Photo: Tom Cruise in Top Gun (Tony Scott, 1986).
American actor and producer Tom Cruise (1962) became with his charismatic smile the most successful member of Hollywood's Brat Pack, the golden boys and girls of the 1980s. Top Gun (1986) made him an action star, but with his roles in The Color of Money (1986), Rain Man (1988) and Born on the Fourth of July (1989) he proved himself to be an all-round star and excellent actor. During the 1990s, he continued to combine action blockbusters like Mission Impossibe (1996) with highly acclaimed dramas like A Few Good Men (1992), Eyes Wide Shut (1999) and Magnolia (1999). He received more praise for his roles in Minority Report (2000) and Collateral (2002) and was for years one of the highest paid actors in the world. Although he continued to score major box office hits with the Mission Impossible franchise, his later work was overshadwowed by his outspoken attitude about Scientology which alienated him from many of his viewers.
Tom Cruise was born Thomas Cruise Mapother IV in 1962 in Syracuse, NY. He is the only son of Mary Lee (Pfeiffer), a special education teacher, and Thomas Cruise Mapother III, an electrical engineer. He has three sisters: Marian, Lee Anne De Vette and Cass. In 1974, when Cruise was 12, his parents divorced. Young Tom spent his boyhood always on the move, and by the time he was 14 he had attended 15 different schools in the U.S. and Canada. He finally settled in Glen Ridge, New Jersey, with his mother and her new husband. Deeply religious, he enrolled in a Franciscan seminary with the ambition to join the priesthood. He dropped out after one year. At high-school, he was a wrestler until he was sidelined by a knee injury. Soon taking up acting, he found that the activity served a dual purpose: performing satiated his need for attention, while the memorisation aspect of acting helped him come to grips with his dyslexia. Moving to New York in 1980, he studied drama at the prestigious Neighborhood Playhouse, in conjunction with the Actors Studio, New School University, New York. He signed with CAA (Creative Artists Agency) and began acting in films. His film debut was a small part in Endless Love (Franco Zeffirelli, 1981), starring Brooke Shields. It was followed by a major supporting role as a crazed military academy student in Taps (Harold Becker, 1981), starring George C. Scott and Timothy Hutton. In 1983, Cruise was part of the ensemble cast of The Outsiders (Francis Ford Coppola, 1983). The Hollywood press corps began touting Cruise as one of the 'Brat Pack', a group of twenty-something actors who seemed on the verge of taking over the movie industry in the early 1980s. Cruise's first big hit was the coming-of-age comedy Risky Business (Paul Brickman, 1983), in which he entered film-trivia infamy with the scene wherein he celebrates his parents' absence by dancing around the living room in his underwear. From the outset, he exhibited an undeniable box office appeal to both male and female audiences. Cruise played the male lead in the dark fantasy Legend (Ridley Scott, 1985) and the action film Top Gun (Tony Scott, 1986) with Kelly McGillis and Val Kilmer. Top Gun (1986) established Cruise as an action star. However, he refused to be pigeonholed, and followed it up with a solid characterszation of a fledgling pool shark in The Color of Money (Martin Scorsese, 1986), for which co-star Paul Newman earned an Academy Award. In 1988, he played the brother of an autistic savant played by Dustin Hoffman in the drama Rain Man (Barry Levinson, 1988). However, Cruise had not yet totally convinced critics he was more than a pretty face while he also starred in Cocktail (Roger Donaldson, 1988), which earned him a nomination for the Razzie Award for Worst Actor. His chance came when he played paraplegic Vietnam vet Ron Kovic in Born on the Fourth of July (Oliver Stone, 1989). For his role, he won a Golden Globe Award and received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actor.
In 1990 Tom Cruise renounced his devout Catholic beliefs and embraced The Church Of Scientology claiming that Scientology teachings had cured him of the dyslexia that had plagued him all of his life. He was introduced to Scientology by his ex-wife Mimi Rogers. Though Cruise's bankability faltered a bit with the expensive disappointment Far and Away (Ron Howard, 1990) with his-then wife Nicole Kidman, A Few Good Men (Rob Reiner, 1992) brought him back into the game. By 1994, the star was undercutting his own leading man image with the role of the slick, dastardly vampire Lestat in the long-delayed film adaptation of the Anne Rice novel Interview with the Vampire (Neil Jordan, 1994), opposite Brad Pitt and Antonio Banderas. Although the author was vehemently opposed to Cruise's casting, Rice famously reversed her decision upon seeing the actor's performance, and publicly praised Cruise's portrayal. In 1996, Cruise scored financial success with the reboot of Mission: Impossible (Brian De Palma, 1996), but it was with his multilayered performance in Jerry Maguire (Cameron Crowe, 1996), that Cruise proved once again why he is considered a major Hollywood player. For Jerry Maguire, he won another Golden Globe and received his second Oscar nomination. According to IMDb, Cruise is the first actor in history to star in five consecutive films that grossed $100 million in the United States: A Few Good Men (1992), the thriller The Firm (Sydney Pollack, 1993), Interview with the Vampire: The Vampire Chronicles (1994), Mission: Impossible (1996) and Jerry Maguire (1996). 1999 saw Cruise reunited onscreen with Kidman in a project of a very different sort, Eyes Wide Shut (Stanley Kubrick, 1990). Hal Erickson at AllMovie: "The film, which was the director's last, had been the subject of controversy, rumour, and speculation since it began filming. It opened to curious critics and audiences alike across the nation, and was met with a violently mixed response. However, it allowed Cruise to once again take part in film history, further solidifying his position as one of Hollywood's most well-placed movers and shakers. Cruise's enviable position was again solidified later in 1999, when he earned a third Golden Globe and a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role as a loathsome 'sexual prowess' guru in Magnolia (Paul Thomas Anderson, 1999)."
In 2000, Tom Cruise scored again when he returned as international agent Ethan Hunt in Mission: Impossible II (John Woo, 2000), which proved to be one of the summer blockbusters. Like its predecessor, it was the highest-grossing film of the year, and had a mixed critical reception. He then reteamed with Jerry Maguire director Cameron Crowe for a remake of the Spanish film Abre los Ojos/Open Your Eyes (Alejandro Amenábar, 1997) titled Vanilla Sky (Cameron Crowe, 2001) with Cameron Diaz and Penelope Cruz. Though Vanilla Sky's sometimes surreal trappings found the film receiving a mixed reception at the box office, the same could not be said for the following year's massively successful Sci-Fi chase film Minority Report (Steven Spielberg, 2001), or of the historical epic The Last Samurai (Edward Zwick, 2003). For his next film, Cruise picked a role unlike any he'd ever played; starring as a sociopathic hitman in the psychological thriller Collateral (Michael Mann, 2004). He received major praise for his departure from the good-guy characters he'd built his career on, and for doing so convincingly. He teamed up with Spielberg again for the second time in three years with an epic adaptation of the H.G. Wells alien invasion story War of the Worlds (Steven Spielberg, 2005). The summer blockbuster was in some ways overshadowed, however, by a cloud of negative publicity. It began, when Cruise became suddenly vocal about his beliefs in Scientology, the religion created by science fiction author L. Ron Hubbard. Cruise publicly denounced actress Brooke Shields for taking medication to combat her postpartum depression, going so far as to call the psychological science a "Nazi science" in an Entertainment Weekly interview. In 2005, he was interviewed by Matt Lauer for The Today Show during which time he appeared to be distractingly argumentative in his insistence that psychiatry is a "pseudoscience," and in a Der Spiegel interview, he was quoted as saying that Scientology has the only successful drug rehabilitation program in the world. This behaviour caused a stirring of public opinion about Cruise, as did his relationship with 27-year-old actress Katie Holmes. The two announced their engagement in the spring of 2005, and Cruise's enthousiasm for his new romantic interest created more curiosity about his mental stability. He appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show, where he jumped up and down on the couch, professing his love for the newly-Scientologist Holmes. The actor's new public image alienated many of his viewers. As he geared up for the spring release of Mission: Impossible III (J.J. Abrams, 2006), his ability to sell a film based almost purely on his own likability was in question for the first time in 20 years. Despite this, the film was more positively received by critics than the previous films in the series, and grossed nearly $400 million at the box office. Cruise moved on to making headlines on the business front, when he and corporate partner Paula Wagner in 2006 officially "took over" the United Artists studio, which was all but completely defunct. One of the first films to be produced by the new United Artists was the tense political thriller Lions for Lambs (Robert Redford, 2007), with Redford, Cruise and Meryl Streep. The film took an earnest and unflinching look at the politics behind the Iraq war but was a commercial disappointment. This was followed by the World War II thriller Valkyrie (Bryan Singer, 2008) with kenneth Branagh and Carice van Houten.
Tom Cruise would find a solid footing as the 2010s progressed, with blockbusters like Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (Brad Bird, 2011) and Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation (Christopher McQuarrie, 2015). He is known for doing many of his own stunts in these films, even exceptionally dangerous ones. The Mission Impossible franchise earned a total of 3 billion dollars worldwide. Cruise reteamed with Cameron Diaz in the action-comedy Knight and Day (James Mangold, 2010). He starred as Jack Reacher in the film adaptation of British author Lee Child's 2005 novel One Shot (Christopher McQuarrie, 2012). He also starred in big budget fantasy projects like Oblivion (Joseph Kosinski, 2013) and Edge of Tomorrow (Doug Liman, 2014). Tom Cruised was married three times. His first wife was actress Mimi Rogers, with whom he was married from 1987 till their divorce in 1990. His second marriage with Nicole Kidman from 1990 till 2001. They adopted two children Isabella Jane Cruise (1992) and Connor Antony Cruise (1995). he lived together with Vanilla Sky (2001) co-star Penélope Cruz from 2001 - 2004. His 2006 marriage to Katie Holmes ended in a divorce in 2012. They have one daughter, Surie Cruise (2006). Recently, Cruise returned on the screen as Ethan Hunt in the sixth installment of the Mission Impossible series, Mission: Impossible – Fallout (Christopher McQuarrie, 2018). In 2020, he will also return as Pete "Maverick" Mitchell in Top Gun: Maverick (Joseph Kosinski, 2020), in which Val Kilmer will also reprise his role from the first film.
Sources: Hal Erickson (AllMovie), Wikipedia and IMDb.
And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
French postcard by E.D.U.G., presented by Les Carbones Korès Carboplane, no. 351. Photo: Gérard Neuvecelle.
Handsome Swedish singer, actor and model Bob Asklöf (1942-2011) was a yé-yé idol in France during the early 1960s. He also worked as an actor for film, stage and TV and in the 1970s he appeared nude in several French erotic films.
Bob Holger Asklöf or Asklof was born in Motala, Sweden in 1942. From a young age on, he was always singing. At 16, he left school and went to live in Stockholm. There he had singing and acting lessons. He was big, blonde and handsome and had an extraordinary voice. With the singing group The Glenners he went on tour. At 19, he was spotted during a gig in Tel Aviv by Juliette Greco, who invited him to come to Paris in December 1962. He became the winner of a contest organized by the record company Pathé-Marconi and the magazine Cinémonde. His first hit in France was Vous souvenez-vous? (Do you remember?, 1963), and he became one of the yé-yé idols. Between 1963 and 1965, he recorded six ep’s and two albums. One of his hits was Bons baisers de Russie, the French version of the title song of the film From Russia with Love (Terence Young, 1963). His version can be heard under the end titles in the French language version of the film. In 1965, he participated at the festival de la Rose d'or d'Antibes (the Golden Rose festival of Antibes) and performed in France, Belgium and Switzerland. Asklöf also sang in English, in German and Swedish. In between, he worked as a model for ads as for Sgigrand Covett clothes in 1964. In 1965 and 1966, he recorded some songs in Sweden and made his film debut there as the young male lead in the Swedish-Danish erotic drama Ett sommaräventyr/Anna, My Darling (Håkan Ersgård, 1965). Back in France, he played small parts in the films La Bande à Bonnot/Bonnot's Gang (Philippe Fourastié, 1968) with Jacques Brel, and the Hollywood production The Sergeant (John Flynn, 1969), which was filmed in France. The Sergeant is an interesting drama starring Rod Steiger and John Philip Law about repressed homosexuality in the army. Asklöf had another part in Tout peut arriver/Don't Be Blue (1969), the first film by director Philippe Labro, and he played the lead as a G.I. in Vietnam in the short film Rosee du Matin (Jean Dasque, 1971), which was shown in the Quinzaine des Realisateurs section at the Cannes Film Festival in 1971. He played a hitman in Comptes à rebours/Countdown (Roger Pigaut, 1971) starring Serge Reggiani, and a killer in the adventure film Boulevard du Rhum/Rum Runners (Robert Enrico, 1971) with Lino Ventura and Brigitte Bardot.
Bob Asklöf’s acting career in France took a surprising direction during the 1970s. In 1973 the former teen idol played the leading part in Les tentations de Marianne/Marianne’s Temptations (Francis Leroi, 1973). At IMDb, Timothy Tangs notes: “Marianne’s Temptations is that rare bird - a Marxist sexploitation movie. Originally part of a Godard-like post-68 revolutionary film collective, cash-strapped Francis Leroi decided to exploit the current French vogue for arty skinflicks to fund the struggle. Casting a papal niece in the lead, the film made a fortune, and paved the way for Emmanuelle.“ Asklöf also had a role in Anna Karina's first attempt at writing and directing a film, Vivre ensemble/Living together (Anna Karina, 1973). Asklöf was now much in demand for the sexploitation wave that splashed the European cinema and starred in soft core sex films like Quand les filles se déchaînent/Hot and Naked (Guy Maria, 1974), Les filles expertes/Expert Girls (Guy Maria, 1974) and Dora... la frénésie du plaisir/Dora ... the frenzy of pleasure (Willy Rozier, 1976) in which he was often shown full frontal nude. His nom de plume in these films was Bob Holger. He kept appearing in small parts in mainstream films like the comedy C'est pas parce qu'on a rien à dire qu'il faut fermer sa gueule.../It is not because we have nothing to say that we must keep our mouth shut ... (Jacques Besnard, 1975) with Bernard Blier. He also had a part in an episode of the popular TV series Les enquêtes du commissaire Maigret/The Investigations of Inspector Maigret (Jean Kerchbron, 1977) featuring Jean Richard as Maigret. Asklöf appeared as a Nazi officer in Train spécial pour SS/Helltrain (Alain Payet, 1977). IMDb resumes the story as “The SS puts a slutty nightclub singer in charge of a train car full of prostitutes whose "services" are reserved solely for Adolf Hitler.” This kind of Nazisploitation films were a bizarre and nasty subgenre of the soft core sex films of the 1970s. Big Willy and The Samurai at The Gentlemen’s blog to Midnite Cinema explain the subgenre: “These films typically showcase tons of skin (male and female) and sex, gruesome tortures, bloody violence, and humiliation. They are alternately set in brothels, prison camps, or a combination of the two.” Asklöf also worked with director Serge Korber films like Pornotissimo (1977). Korber mixed mainstream with adult films - credited as John Thomas. One of Asklöf’s better sex films was Goodbye Emmanuelle (François Letterier, 1977) starring Sylvia Kristel. This third Emmanuelle episode tried to deal realistically with real-life, and potentially depressing issues like jealousy and abuse of women. A reviewer at IMDb writes that in a way, Goodbye Emmanuelle marked the end of the free love era of the 1960s and 1970s. It also marked the end of Asklöf’s sex film career. In 1977 he returned to Sweden, where he appeared in only one more film. He played ‘Gorilla’ in the thriller Flygnivå 450/Flight Level 450 (Torbjörn Axelman, 1980) with Thomas Hellberg. It was not a success. He also did some stage work, including a play about Edith Piaf, in which he interpreted her lover, boxer Marcel Cerdan. In the 1980s, he left the acting profession to devote himself to his passion for painting and he had several exhibitions in Sweden. He also wrote poems and stories, which were never published. After a long illness, Bob Asklöf died of cancer in 2011 in Bromma, Stockholm, Sweden.
Sources: Official Bob Asklof blog, The Gentlemen’s blog to Midnite Cinema French Films, Wikipedia (French), and IMDb.
My Facebook Page | My Twitter Page | My Google+ | My New Site | My 500px
***My best shots transformed into wonderful wallpapers for all your devices: download them now for free!***
I met Liv Ullmann at Stavanger Theater, where she made her debute in 1957, and took pictures of her for the local newspaper, Stavanger Aftenblad, in 1979.
Jeg møtte Liv Ullmann på Stavanger teater, hvor hun hadde sin debut, og tok bilder av henne for den lokale avisen, Stavanger Aftenblad, i 1979.
Actor Elijah Wood at a "Hero Hangout" held in the Lyceum Theatre, as part of last year's Edinburgh International Film Festival.
You can see more pics of him, at this link:
British postcard by Athena International, no. 0334340, BAT, no. 10. Photo: TM / DC Comics Inc. Photo: Michael Keaton and Jack Nicholson in Batman (Tim Burton, 1989).
Jack Nicholson (1937) is an American actor and filmmaker who has performed for over sixty years. His rise in Hollywood was far from meteoric, and for years, he sustained his career with guest spots in television series and a number of Roger Corman films. He is now known for playing a wide range of starring or supporting roles, including satirical comedy, romance, and dark portrayals of anti-heroes and villainous characters. In many of his films, he has played someone who rebels against the social structure. Nicholson's 12 Oscar nominations make him the most nominated male actor ever. He won the Oscars for Best Actor twice – for One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975), and As Good as It Gets (1997), and the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for Terms of Endearment (1983).
Jack Nicholson was born in 1937 as John Joseph Nicholson in Neptune City, New Jersey. He was the son of a showgirl, June Frances Nicholson (stage name June Nilson). She married Italian-American showman Donald Furcillo (stage name Donald Rose) in 1936, before realising that he was already married. Biographer Patrick McGilligan stated in his book Jack's Life that Latvian-born Eddie King, June's manager, may have been Nicholson's biological father, rather than Furcillo. Other sources suggest June Nicholson was unsure of who the father was. As June was only seventeen years old and unmarried, her parents agreed to raise Nicholson as their own child without revealing his true parentage, and June would act as his sister. In 1974, Time magazine researchers learned, and informed Nicholson, that his 'sister', June, was actually his mother, and his other 'sister', Lorraine, was really his aunt. By this time, both his mother and grandmother had died (in 1963 and 1970, respectively). On finding out, Nicholson said it was "a pretty dramatic event, but it wasn't what I'd call traumatizing ... I was pretty well psychologically formed". Before starting high school, his family moved to an apartment in Spring Lake, New Jersey. When Jack was ready for high school, the family moved once more, to old-money Spring Lake, New Jersey's so-called Irish Riviera, where Ethel May set up her beauty parlor. 'Nick', as he was known to his high school friends, attended nearby Manasquan High School, where he was voted 'Class Clown' by the Class of 1954. In 1957, Nicholson joined the California Air National Guard. After completing the Air Force's basic training, Nicholson performed weekend drills and two-week annual training as a fire fighter. Nicholson first came to Hollywood in 1954, when he was seventeen, to visit his sister. He took a job as an office worker for animators William Hanna and Joseph Barbera at the MGM cartoon studio. He trained to be an actor with a group called the Players Ring Theater, after which time he found small parts performing on the stage and in TV soap operas. He made his film debut in a low-budget teen drama The Cry Baby Killer (Justus Addiss, 1958), playing the title role. For the following decade, Nicholson was a frequent collaborator with the film's producer, Roger Corman. Corman directed Nicholson on several occasions, most notably in The Little Shop of Horrors (Roger Corman, 1960), as masochistic dental patient and undertaker Wilbur Force, and also in The Raven (Roger Corman, 1963), The Terror (Roger Corman, 1963) as a French officer seduced by an evil ghost, and The St. Valentine's Day Massacre (Roger Corman, 1967). Nicholson also frequently worked with director Monte Hellman on low-budget Westerns, including the cult successes Ride in the Whirlwind (Monte Hellman, 1966) with Cameron Mitchell, and The Shooting (Monte Hellman, 1966) opposite Millie Perkins. Nicholson also appeared in episodes of TV series like Dr. Kildare (1966) and The Andy Griffith Show (1966-1967). However, Nicholson seemed resigned to a career behind the camera as a writer/director. His first real taste of writing success was the screenplay for the counterculture film The Trip (Roger Corman, 1967), which starred Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper. Nicholson also co-wrote, with Bob Rafelson, Head (Bob Rafelson, 1968), which starred The Monkees. He also arranged the film's soundtrack. Nicholson's first turn in the director's chair was for Drive, He Said (1971).
Jack Nicholson had his acting break when a spot opened up in Easy Rider (Dennis Hopper, 1969). Nicholson played liquor-soaked lawyer George Hanson, for which he received his first Oscar nomination. The film cost only $400,000 to make, and became a blockbuster, grossing $40 million. Overnight, Nicholson became a hero of the counter-culture movement. Nicholson was cast by Stanley Kubrick, who was impressed with his role in Easy Rider, in the part of Napoleon in a film about his life, and although production on the film commenced, the project fizzled out, partly due to a change in ownership at MGM. Nicholson starred in Five Easy Pieces (Bob Rafelson, 1970) alongside Karen Black. Bobby Dupea, an oil rig worker, became his persona-defining role. Nicholson and Black were nominated for Academy Awards for their performances. Critics began speculating whether he might become another Marlon Brando or James Dean. His career and income skyrocketed. Nicholson starred in Carnal Knowledge (Mike Nichols, 1971), which co-starred Art Garfunkel, Ann-Margret, and Candice Bergen. Other roles included Billy "Bad Ass" Buddusky in The Last Detail (Hal Ashby, 1973). For his role, Nicholson won the Best Actor award at the Cannes Film Festival, and he was nominated for his third Oscar and a Golden Globe. In 1974, Nicholson starred in Roman Polanski's majestic Film Noir Chinatown, opposite Faye Dunaway. For his role as private detective Jake Gittes, he was again nominated for Academy Award for Best Actor. The role was a major transition from the exploitation films of the previous decade. One of Nicholson's greatest successes came with his role as Randle P. McMurphy in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (Miloš Forman, 1975). It was an adaptation of Ken Kesey's novel and co-produced by Michael Douglas. Nicholson plays an anti-authoritarian patient at a mental hospital where he becomes an inspiring leader for the other patients. The film swept the Academy Awards with nine nominations, and won the top five, including Nicholson's first for Best Actor. Also that year, Nicholson starred in Michelangelo Antonioni's The Passenger (1975), which co-starred Maria Schneider. The film received good reviews and revived Antonioni's reputation as one of the cinema's great directors. He took a small role in The Last Tycoon (Elia Kazan, 1976), opposite Robert De Niro. He took a less sympathetic role in Arthur Penn's Western The Missouri Breaks (1976), specifically to work with Marlon Brando.
Although Jack Nicholson did not win an Oscar for Stanley Kubrick's adaptation of Stephen King's The Shining (1980), it remains one of his more significant roles. Nicholson improvised his now-famous "Here's Johnny!" line, along with the scene in which he's sitting at the typewriter and unleashes his anger upon his wife after she discovers he has gone insane when she looks at his writing ("all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy" typed endlessly). In 1982, he starred as an immigration enforcement agent in The Border (Tony Richardson, 1982, co-starring Warren Oates. Nicholson won his second Oscar, an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, for his role of retired astronaut Garrett Breedlove in Terms of Endearment (James L. Brooks, 1983), starring Shirley MacLaine and Debra Winger. He and MacLaine played many of their scenes in different ways, constantly testing and making adjustments. Nicholson continued to work prolifically in the 1980s, starring in such films as The Postman Always Rings Twice (Bob Rafelson, 1981), Reds (Warren Beatty, 1981), where Nicholson portrays the writer Eugene O'Neill with a quiet intensity, Prizzi's Honor (John Huston, 1985), The Witches of Eastwick (George Miller, 1987), Broadcast News (James L. Brooks, 1987), and Ironweed (Hector Babenco, 1987) with Meryl Streep. Three Oscar nominations also followed, for Reds, Prizzi's Honor, and Ironweed. In Batman (Tim Burton, 1989), Nicholson played the psychotic murderer and villain, the Joker. Batman creator Bob Kane personally recommended him for the role. The film was an international smash hit, and a lucrative percentage deal earned him a percentage of the box office gross estimated at $60 million to $90 million. For his role as hot-headed Col. Nathan R. Jessup in A Few Good Men (Rob Reiner, 1992), a film about a murder in a U.S. Marine Corps unit, Nicholson received yet another Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor. In 1996, Nicholson collaborated once more with Batman director Tim Burton on Mars Attacks!, pulling double duty as two contrasting characters, President James Dale and Las Vegas property developer Art Land. At first, studio executives at Warner Bros. disliked the idea of killing off Nicholson's character, so Burton created two characters and killed them both off. Not all of Nicholson's performances have been well received. He was nominated for Razzie Awards as worst actor for Man Trouble (Bob Rafelson, 1992) and Hoffa (Danny DeVito, 1992). However, Nicholson's performance in Hoffa also earned him a Golden Globe nomination. Nicholson went on to win his next Academy Award for Best Actor in the romantic comedy, As Good as It Gets (1997), his third film directed by James L. Brooks. He played Melvin Udall, a "wickedly funny", mean-spirited, obsessive-compulsive novelist. His Oscar was matched with the Academy Award for Best Actress for Helen Hunt, who played a Manhattan wisecracking, single-mother waitress drawn into a love/hate friendship with Udall, a frequent diner in the restaurant. The film was a tremendous box office success, grossing $314 million, which made it Nicholson's second-best-grossing film of his career, after Batman.
In About Schmidt (Alexander Payne, 2002), Nicholson portrayed a retired Omaha, Nebraska, actuary who questions his own life following his wife's death. His quietly restrained performance earned him another Oscar Nomination. In Anger Management (Peter Segal, 2003), he played an aggressive therapist assigned to help an over pacifist man (Adam Sandler). In 2003, Nicholson also starred in Something's Gotta Give (Nancy Meyers, 2003), as an aging playboy who falls for the mother (Diane Keaton) of his young girlfriend. In late 2006, Nicholson marked his return to the dark side as Frank Costello, a nefarious Boston Irish Mob boss, based on Whitey Bulger who was still on the run at that time, presiding over Matt Damon and Leonardo DiCaprio in Martin Scorsese's Oscar-winning film The Departed, a remake of Andrew Lau's Infernal Affairs. The role earned Nicholson worldwide critical praise, along with various award wins and nominations, including a Golden Globe nomination. In 2007, Nicholson co-starred with Morgan Freeman in The Bucket List (Rob Reiner, 2007) Nicholson and Freeman portrayed dying men who fulfill their list of goals. Nicholson reunited with James L. Brooks, director of Terms of Endearment, Broadcast News, and As Good as It Gets, for a supporting role as Paul Rudd's character's father in How Do You Know (2012). It had been widely reported in subsequent years that Nicholson had retired from acting because of memory loss, but in a September 2013 Vanity Fair article, Nicholson clarified that he did not consider himself retired, merely that he was now less driven to "be out there any more". In 2015, Nicholson made a special appearance as a presenter on SNL 40, the 40th anniversary special of Saturday Night Live. After the death of boxer Muhammad Ali in 2016, Nicholson appeared on HBO's The Fight Game with Jim Lampley for an exclusive interview about his friendship with Ali. In 2017, it was reported that Nicholson would be starring in an English-language remake of Toni Erdmann opposite Kristen Wiig, but Nicholson dropped out of the project. does not consider himself to be retired. He has also directed three films, including The Two Jakes (1990), the sequel to Chinatown. Nicholson is one of three male actors to win three Academy Awards. He also has won six Golden Globe Awards. He has had a number of high-profile relationships and was married to Sandra Knight from 1962 until their divorce in 1968. Nicholson has five children. His eldest daughter is Jennifer Nicholson (1963), from his marriage to actress Sandra Knight. He has a son, Caleb James Goddard (1970) with Susan Anspach, and a daughter, Honey Hollman (1981) with Danish supermodel, Winnie Hollman. With Rebecca Broussard, he has two children, Lorraine Nicholson (1990) and Ray Nicholson (1992). Nicholson's longest relationship was the 17 years he spent with actress Anjelica Huston; this ended when Broussard become pregnant with his child. Jack Nicholson is the only actor to ever play the Devil, the Joker, and a werewolf.
Sources: Pedro Borges (IMDb), Wikipedia, and IMDb.
Please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
French postcard by Editions Cinémagazine, no. 217. Photo: United Artists.
English gentleman-actor Ronald Colman (1891 - 1958) was a top box office draw in Hollywood films throughout the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s. ‘The Man with the velvet voice’ was nominated for four Academy Awards. In 1948 he finally won the Oscar for his splendid portrayal of a tormented actor in A Double Life (1947).
Ronald Charles Colman was born in 1891 in Richmond, England. He was the fifth of six children of silk importer Charles Colman and his wife Marjory Read Fraser. Ronald was educated at a boarding school in Littlehampton, where he discovered he enjoyed acting. When Ronald was 16 his father died of pneumonia, putting an end to the boy's plans to attend Cambridge and become an engineer. He went to work as a shipping clerk at the British Steamship Company. He also became a well-known amateur actor and was a member of the West Middlesex Dramatic Society (1908-1909). In 1909, he joined the London Scottish Regiment, a territorial army force, and he was sent to France at the outbreak of World War I. Colman took part in the First Battle of Ypres and was severely wounded at the battle at Messines in Belgium. The shrapnel wounds he took to his legs invalided him out of active service. In May 1915, decorated, discharged and depressed, he returned home with a limp that he would attempt to hide throughout the rest of his acting career. He tried to enter the consular service, but a chance encounter got him a small role in the London play The Maharanee of Arakan (1916). He dropped other plans and concentrated on the theatre. Producers soon noted the young actor with his striking good looks, rich voice and rare dignity, and Colman was rewarded with a succession of increasingly prominent parts. He worked with stage greats Gladys Cooper and Gerald du Maurier. He made extra money appearing in films like the two-reel silent comedy The Live Wire (Cecil Hepworth, 1917). The set was an old house with a negligible budget, and Colman doubled as the leading character and prop man. The film was never released though. Other silent British films were The Snow of the Desert (Walter West, 1919) with Violet Hopson and Stewart Rome, and The Black Spider (William Humphrey, 1920) with Mary Clare. The negatives of all of Colman's early British films have probably been destroyed during the 1941 London Blitz. After a brief courtship, he married actress Thelma Raye in 1919. The marriage was in trouble almost from the beginning. The two separated in 1923 but were not divorced until 1934.
In 1920 Ronald Colman set out for New York in hopes of finding greater fortune there than in war-depressed England. His American film debut was in the tawdry melodrama Handcuffs or Kisses? (George Archainbaud, 1920). He toured with Robert Warwick in 'The Dauntless Three', and subsequently toured with Fay Bainter in 'East is West'. After two years of impoverishment, he was cast in the Broadway hit play 'La Tendresse' (1922). Director Henry King spotted him and cast him as Lillian Gish's leading man in The White Sister (Henry King, 1923), filmed in Italy. The romantic tear-jerker was wildly popular and Colman was quickly proclaimed a new film star. This success led to a contract with prominent independent film producer Samuel Goldwyn, and in the following ten years, he became a very popular silent film star in both romantic and adventure films. Among his most successful films for Goldwyn were The Dark Angel (George Fitzmaurice, 1925) with Hungarian actress Vilma Bánky, Stella Dallas (Henry King, 1926), the Oscar Wilde adaptation Lady Windermere's Fan (Ernst Lubitsch, 1925) and The Winning of Barbara Worth (Henry King, 1926) with Gary Cooper. Colman's dark hair and eyes and his athletic and riding ability led reviewers to describe him as a ‘Valentino type’. He was often cast in similar, exotic roles. The film that cemented this position as a top star was Beau Geste (Herbert Brenon, 1926), Paramount's biggest hit of 1926. It was the rousing tale of three brothers (Colman, Neil Hamilton and Ralph Forbes), who join the Foreign Legion to escape the law. Beau Geste was full of mystery, desert action, intrigue and above all, brotherly loyalty. Colman's gentlemanly courage and quiet strength were showcased to perfection in the role of the oldest brother, Beau. The film is still referred to as possibly the greatest Foreign Legion film ever produced. Towards the end of the silent era, Colman was teamed again with Vilma Bánky under Samuel Goldwyn. The two would make a total of five films together and their popularity rivalled that of Greta Garbo and John Gilbert.
Although Ronald Colman was a huge success in silent films, with the coming of sound, his extraordinarily beautiful speaking voice made him even more important to the film industry. His first major talkie success was in 1930 when he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor for two roles - Condemned (Wesley Ruggles, 1929) with Lily Damita, and Bulldog Drummond (F. Richard Jones, 1929) with Joan Bennett. Thereafter he played a number of sophisticated, noble characters with enormous aplomb such as Clive of India (Richard Boleslawski, 1935) with Colin Clive, but he also swashbuckled expertly when called to do so in films like The Prisoner of Zenda (John Cromwell, 1937) with Madeleine Carroll. A falling out with Goldwyn in 1934 prompted Colman to avoid long-term contracts for the rest of his career. He became one of just a handful of top stars to successfully freelance, picking and choosing his assignments and studios. His notable films included the Charles Dickens adaptation A Tale of Two Cities (Jack Conway, 1935), the poetic classic Lost Horizon (Frank Capra, 1937), and If I Were King (Frank Lloyd, 1938) with Basil Rathbone as vagabond poet Francois Villon. During the war, he made two of his very best films - Talk of the Town (George Stevens, 1942) with Cary Grant and Jean Arthur, and the romantic tearjerker Random Harvest (Mervyn LeRoy, 1942), as an amnesiac victim, co-starring with the luminous Greer Garson. For his role in A Double Life (George Cukor, 1947), an actor playing Othello who comes to identify with the character, he won both the Golden Globe for Best Actor in 1947 and the Best Actor Oscar in 1948. Colman made many guest appearances on The Jack Benny Program on the radio, alongside his second wife, British stage and screen actress Benita Hume. Their comedy work as Benny's next-door neighbours led to their own radio comedy The Halls of Ivy from 1950 to 1952, and then on television from 1954 to 1955. Incidentally, he appeared in films, such as the romantic comedy Champagne for Caesar (Richard Whorf, 1950), and his final film The Story of Mankind (Irwin Allen, 1957) with Hedy Lamarr. Hal Erickson at AllMovie: "a laughably wretched extravaganza from which Colman managed to emerge with his dignity and reputation intact." Ronald Colman died in 1958, aged 67, from a lung infection in Santa Barbara, California. He was survived by Benita Hume, and their daughter Juliet Benita Colman (1944). In 1975, Juliet published the biography 'Ronald Colman: A Very Private Person'.
Sources: Hal Erickson (AllMovie), Jim Beaver (IMDb), Julie Stowe (The Ronald Colman Pages), Encyclopaedia Britannica, Wikipedia and IMDb.
And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
British postcard. in the Picturegoer Series, London Films, no. 1049. Photo: London Films. Publicity still for Sanders of the River (Zoltan Korda, 1935).
Paul Robeson (1898-1976) was a handsome, eloquent, and highly charismatic actor and singer, who became one of the foremost interpreters of Eugene O'Neill's plays and one of the most treasured names in song during the first half of the twentieth century. With his powerful bass singing voice, Robeson made an evergreen of the song 'Old Man River'. He starred in The Emperor Jones (1933), the first film to feature an African American in a starring role. At the height of his popularity in the 1930s, Robeson became a major box office attraction in British films. In the USA, he courted disdain and public controversy for most of his career as a staunch Cold War-era advocate for human rights, as well as his very vocal support for Joseph Stalin and the Soviet invasion of Hungary in 1956. While the backlash of his civil rights activities and left-wing ideology left him embittered and practically ruined his career, he remains today a durable symbol of racial pride and consciousness.
Paul LeRoy Bustill Robeson was born in Princeton, New Jersey, in 1898. His siblings were William, Benjamin, Reeve, and Marian Robeson. Their father, William Drew Robeson, was a humble Presbyterian minister and former slave. In 1900, a disagreement between William and white financial supporters of the Witherspoon church arose with apparent racial undertones. William, who had the support of his entirely black congregation, resigned in 1901. The loss of his position forced him to work menial jobs. The young, impressionable Paul grew up singing spirituals in his father's church. He was only six when he and his four siblings, William, Benjamin, Reeve, Marian, lost their mother, Maria Louisa Bustill, a schoolteacher. She was nearly blind and died in a stove fire accident at home. His father then raised the family singlehandedly. Paul was a natural athlete and the tall, strapping high school fullback had no trouble earning a scholarship to prestigious Rutgers University in 1915. At the age of 17, he became only the third member of his race to be admitted at the time. He excelled in football, baseball, basketball, and track, and field, and was the class valedictorian. In his speech, he was already preaching idealism. Paul subsequently played professional football to earn money while attending Columbia University's law school, and also took part in amateur dramatics. During this time he met and married Eslanda Cardozo Goode in 1921. She eventually became his personal assistant. Following graduation, he obtained work at a New York law firm, but quit when a stenographer refused to copy a memo, telling him, "I never take diction from a n*****." His wife persuaded him to play Simon in Ridgely Torrence's 'Simon the Cyrenian' at the Harlem YMCA in 1921. This was followed by his Broadway debut the following year as Jim in Mary Hoyt Wiborg's play 'Taboo', a drama set in Africa, which also went to London. As a result, he was asked to join the Provincetown Players, a Greenwich Village theatre group that included in its membership playwright Eugene O'Neill. Gary Brumburgh at IMDb: "O'Neill personally asked Paul to star in his plays 'All God's Chillun Got Wings' and 'The Emperor Jones' in 1924. The reaction from both critics and audiences alike was electrifying...an actor was born." In 1925, he sang the first concert recital consisting solely of black spirituals, at the Greenwich Village Theatre in New York. That year, he also made his film debut starring in Body and Soul (Oscar Micheaux, 1925). Gary Brumburgh: "a rather murky melodrama that nevertheless was ahead of its time in its depictions of black characters. Although Robeson played a scurrilous, corrupt clergyman who takes advantage of his own people, his dynamic personality managed to shine through." Radio and recordings helped spread his name across foreign waters. His resonant bass was a major highlight in the London production of Jerome Kern's and Oscar Hammerstein II's 'Show Boat'. The role of Joe, the deckhand, was written for him, but because of schedule conflicts and Florenz Ziegfeld Jr.'s delay in putting on the show, he had been unable to star in the first stage production but played the role in London five months later. His rendition of "Ol' Man River" became the benchmark for all future performers of the song. In 1928, he made the second-ever recording of 'Ol' Man River'. (Bing Crosby did the first). Show Boat continued for 350 performances. At the time no U.S. company would hire Robeson and so, he remained in London to play the role of William Shakespeare's 'Othello' in 1930. Paul caused a slight stir by co-starring opposite a white actress, Peggy Ashcroft, who played Desdemona. After his wife Essie discovered Robeson had been having an affair with Ashcroft, she decided to seek a divorce and they split up. Around this time Robeson starred in the film Borderline (Kenneth MacPherson, 1930), a silent film that dealt strongly with racial themes. Stephen Bourne at BFI Screen-on-Line: "Black characters in American cinema of the period rarely moved beyond Al Jolson in blackface, or the dim-witted buffoons played by comedy actors like Stepin Fetchit. For the ambitious Robeson, there were hardly any opportunities to play challenging roles." In 1931, he returned to the stage in the O'Neill play 'The Hairy Ape'. The following year he appeared in a Broadway revival of 'Show Boat' again as Joe, to critical and popular acclaim. In the same production, Helen Morgan repeated her original 1927 performance as the half-caste role of Julie, but the white actress Tess Gardella played the role of Queenie in her customary blackface opposite Robeson. In 1932, Ashcroft and Robeson's relationship ended. Robeson and Essie reconciled, although their relationship was scarred permanently.
Throughout the 1930s, Paul Robeson spent most of his time singing and performing in England. He also was given the opportunity to recapture two of his greatest stage successes on film: The Emperor Jones (Dudley Murphy, 1933) and Show Boat (James Whale, 1936), with Irene Dunne, Helen Morgan, and Hattie McDaniel. His performance of 'Old Man River' in this film version of Show Boat became legendary, both for its quality and for Robeson’s purposeful changing of the lyrics "I'm tired of livin' and 'feared of dyin’" to the more activist "I must keep fightin' until I'm dying". In Britain, he played Bosambo in Sanders of the River (Zoltan Korda, 1935), which he felt would render a realistic view of colonial African culture. It made Robeson an international film star. Stephen Bourne: "When Robeson became a major star in British films in the mid-1930s, he negotiated for roles that projected a positive image of a black man, roles that broke away from one-dimensional and offensive racial stereotypes. But he often found himself in conflict with an industry that glorified the British Empire and colonialism. This was certainly the case with his first commercial film, Sanders of the River (d. Zoltan Korda, 1935), one of a cycle of imperial adventures produced by Alexander Korda for London Films."Robeson also appeared in such British films as Song of Freedom (J. Elder Wills, 1936), King Solomon's Mines (Robert Stevenson, Geoffrey Barkas, 1937), Jericho (Thornton Freeland, 1937), and The Proud Valley (Pen Tennyson, 1940), set in a Welsh coal-mining town. After returning to America, Robeson played a sharecropper in a segment of the Hollywood movie Tales of Manhattan (Julien Duvivier, 1942) but, after the film was released, he was criticised for perpetuating a racist stereotype. Robeson agreed with his critics and volunteered to join protestors outside cinemas where the film was being shown. He said he wouldn't make any more films until there were better roles for blacks. During the 1930s he gravitated strongly towards economics and politics with a burgeoning interest in social activism. In 1934 he made the first of several trips to the Soviet Union and outwardly extolled the Soviet way of life and his belief that it lacked racial bias, despite the Holodomor and the later Rootless Cosmopolitan Campaign. He was a popular figure in Wales where he became personally involved in their civil rights affairs, notably the Welsh miners. Developing a marked leftist ideology, he continued to criticize the blatant discrimination he found so prevalent in America. In 1939, he premiered Earl Robinson’s multi-ethnic cantata 'Ballad for Americans' on CBS radio, which he would eventually perform in twenty-five languages. In addition to his creative work, Robeson used his personal prominence to push for social and political reform. He supported the Spanish partisans against Franco’s fascist Nationalists in the Spanish Civil War, raised funds for refugees from Hitler’s Germany well before such activities were fashionable, and organized a coalition that challenged President Truman to support an anti-lynching law in 1945. The 1940s was a mixture of performance triumphs and poignant, political upheavals. While his title run in the musical drama 'John Henry' (1940), was short-lived, he earned widespread acclaim for his Broadway 'Othello' in 1943 opposite José Ferrer as Iago and Uta Hagen as Desdemona. This production is still the longest-running non-musical production of a Shakespeare play ever to be staged in the United States, due almost entirely to Robeson's enormous popularity. He appeared in a World War II-era U.S. Government War Department propaganda film, Easy to Get, aimed at combating the spread of venereal diseases among black soldiers. In the film, Robeson appears at the end in his capacity as a celebrity football star and singer to advise viewers to stay "clean". By this time, however, Robeson was being reviled by much of white America for his outspoken civil rights speeches against segregation and lynchings, particularly in the South. A founder of the Progressive Party, an independent political party, his outdoor concerts sometimes ignited violence and he was now a full-blown target for "Red Menace" agitators. In 1946, he denied under oath being a member of the Communist Party but steadfastly refused to refute the accusations under subsequent probes. His continued support for the Soviet Union became even more controversial after Stalin publicly turned against Israel in November 1948. As a result, his passport was withdrawn and he became engaged in legal battles for nearly a decade in order to retrieve it. Adding fuel to the fire was his only son's (Paul Jr.) marriage to a white woman in 1949 and his being awarded the Stalin Peace Prize in 1952. He was unable to receive it until 1958 when his passport was returned to him.
Paul Robeson was essentially blacklisted, and tainted press statements continued to hound him. He began performing less and less in America. Despite his growing scorn towards America, he never gave up his American citizenship although the anguish of it all led to a couple of suicide attempts, nervous breakdowns, and a dependency on drugs. Europe was a different story. The people continued to hold him in high regard as an artist above reproach. He had a command of about 20 languages and wound up giving his last acting performance in Tony Richardson's production of 'Othello' at Stratford-on-Avon in 1959. Although he did give a few interviews on television, he never played any dramatic or musical roles in that medium. In 1960, in what was his final concert performance in Great Britain, Robeson sang to raise money for the Movement for Colonial Freedom at the Royal Festival Hall. In October 1960, Robeson embarked on a two-month concert tour of Australia and New Zealand with Essie. While in Sydney, he became the first major artist to perform at the construction site of the future Sydney Opera House. Back in London, Robeson expressed a desire to return to the United States and participate in the civil rights movement, while his wife argued that he would be unsafe there and "unable to make any money" due to government harassment. His health suddenly took a turn for the worse and he finally returned to the United States in 1963. His poet/wife Eslanda Robeson died of cancer two years later. Double pneumonia and a kidney blockage in 1965 nearly killed Robeson too. Robeson moved in with his son's family in New York City. He remained in poor health for pretty much the rest of his life. His last years were spent in Harlem at his sister's house in near-total isolation, denying all interviews and public correspondence. At a Carnegie Hall tribute to mark his 75th birthday in 1973, he was unable to attend, but a taped message from him was played that said: "Though I have not been able to be active for several years, I want you to know that I am the same Paul, dedicated as ever to the worldwide cause of humanity for freedom, peace, and brotherhood." In 1976, Paul Robeson died at age 77 of complications from a stroke. He was interred in the Ferncliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, New York. Among his many honours: he was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1995; he received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1998; was honored with a postage stamp during the 'Black Heritage' series, and both a Cultural Center at Penn State University and a high school in Brooklyn bear his name. In 1995 his autobiography 'Here I Stand' was published in England in 1958. His son, Paul Robeson Jr., also chronicled a book about his father, 'Undiscovered Paul Robeson: An Artist's Journey' in 2001. When appearing before HUAC, the Committee asked him why he didn't relocate to Russia. He replied: "Because my father was a slave, and my people died to build this country, and I am going to stay right here and have a part of it just like you."
Sources: Gary Brumburgh (IMDb), Stephen Bourne (BFI Screen-on-Line), Ronnie D. Lankford, Jr. (AllMusic), Find A Grave, Wikipedia, and IMDb.
And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
Dutch postcard by Boomerang. Photo: Amblin Entertainment / Columbia Pictures. Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith in Men in Black II (Barry Sonnenfeld, 2002). Caption: Back in black.
American actor Tommy Lee Jones (1946), known for his deadpan delivery, played hard-edged but sarcastic law enforcement and military officers in such blockbusters as the thriller The Fugitive (1993) opposite Harrison Ford and the Men in Black series with Will Smith. He received four Oscar nominations, for JFK (1991), The Fugitive (1993), In the Valley of Elah (2007) and Lincoln (2012), and won the award for The Fugitive. Other acclaimed films in which he appeared include Coal Miner's Daughter (1980), and No Country for Old Men (2007).
Tommy Lee Jones was born in 1946 in San Saba, Texas. He was the son of Lucille Marie (Scott), a police officer and beauty shop owner, and Clyde C. Jones, who worked on oil fields. Tommy himself worked in underwater construction and on an oil rig. He attended St. Mark's School of Texas, a prestigious prep school for boys in Dallas, on a scholarship. On another scholarship, he attended Harvard University, where he roomed with future U.S. Vice President Al Gore. Though several of his less-knowledgeable fans have tended to dismiss Jones as a roughhewn redneck, the actor was equally at home on the polo fields (he's a champion player) as the oil fields. He received a B.A. in English literature and graduated cum laude from Harvard in 1969. Following college, he moved to New York and began his stage career on Broadway in 'A Patriot for Me' with Maximilian Schell, which closed after 49 performances. In 1970, he appeared in his first film, Love Story (Arthur Hiller, 1970), listed way, way down the cast list as one of Ryan O'Neal's fraternity buddies. Interestingly enough, while Jones was at Harvard, he and roommate Gore provided the models for author Erich Segal while he was writing the character of Oliver, the book's (and film's) protagonist. While living in New York, he continued to appear in various plays, both on- and off-Broadway: 'Fortune and Men's Eyes' (1969), Abe Burrows' 'Four on a Garden' (1971), 'Blue Boys' (1972), and 'Ulysses in Nighttown (1974). Between 1971 and 1975 he portrayed Dr. Mark Toland on the ABC soap opera, One Life to Live. Jones got his first film lead in the obscure Canadian film Eliza's Horoscope (Gordon Sheppard, 1975). With his first wife, Kate Lardner, granddaughter of short-story writer/columnist Ring Lardner, and her two children from a previous marriage, he moved to Los Angeles. Jones gained national attention in 1977 when he was cast in the title role in the TV miniseries The Amazing Howard Hughes (William A. Graham, 1977). His resemblance to the American aviation pioneer and filmmaker - both vocally and visually - was positively uncanny. In the cinema, he played an escaped convict hunted in the exploitation crime thriller Jackson County Jail (Michael Miller, 1976), a Vietnam veteran in the thriller Rolling Thunder (John Flynn, 1977), based on a story by Paul Schrader, an automobile mogul in the Harold Robbins drama The Betsy (Daniel Petrie, 1978) with Laurence Olivier, and opposite Faye Dunaway in the thriller Eyes of Laura Mars (Irvin Kershner, 1978), written by John Carpenter. In 1980, Jones earned his first Golden Globe nomination for his portrayal of country singer Loretta Lynn's husband, Doolittle "Mooney" Lynn, in Coal Miner's Daughter (Michael Apted, 1980), starring Sissy Spacek. While working on the film Back Roads (Martin Ritt, 1981), he met and fell in love with Kimberlea Cloughley, whom he later married. Jones won further acclaim and an Emmy for his startling performance as murderer Gary Gilmore in The Executioner's Song (Lawrence Schiller, 1982), based on the book by Norman Mailer. Maria Vitale at IMDb: "More roles in television, on stage, and in films garnered him a reputation as a strong, explosive, thoughtful actor who could handle supporting as well as leading roles." Jones spent the rest of the 1980s working in both television and film, doing his most notable work on such TV miniseries as Lonesome Dove (Simon Wincer, 1989), for which he earned another Emmy nomination.
It was not until the early 1990s that Tommy Lee Jones became a substantial figure in Hollywood, a position catalyzed by a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nomination for his role in Oliver Stone's epic political thriller JFK (1991) which examines the events leading to the assassination of John F. Kennedy in 1963 and the alleged cover-up through the eyes of former New Orleans district attorney Jim Garrison (Kevin Costner). In 1993, Jones won both that award and a Golden Globe for his driven, starkly funny portrayal of U.S. Marshal Sam Gerard in The Fugitive (Andrew Davis, 1993), starring Harrison Ford. His subsequent work during the decade was prolific and enormously varied. In 1994 alone, he could be seen as an insane prison warden in Natural Born Killers (Oliver Stone, 1994); titular baseball hero Ty Cobb in Cobb (Ron Shelton, 1994); a troubled army captain in Blue Sky (Tony Richardson, 1994); a wily federal attorney in the John Grisham adaptation The Client (Joel Schumacher, 1994); and a psychotic bomber in Blown Away (Stephen Hopkins, 1994) opposite Jeff Bridges. Jones was also attached to a number of big-budget action films, hamming it up as the crazed Two-Face in Batman Forever (Joel Schumacher, 1995); donning sunglasses and an attitude to play special agent K in Men in Black (Barry Sonnenfeld, 1997); and reprising his Fugitive role for the film's sequel, U.S. Marshals (Stuart Baird, 1998). The following year, he continued this trend, playing Ashley Judd's parole officer in the psychological thriller Double Jeopardy. The late 1990s and millennial turnover found Jones' popularity soaring, and the distinguished actor continued to develop a successful comic screen persona in such films as Space Cowboys (Clint Eastwood, 2000) and Men in Black II (Barry Sonnenfeld, 2002), in addition to maintaining his dramatic clout with roles in such thrillers as Rules of Engagement (William Friedkin, 2000) and The Hunted (William Friedkin, 2003).
2005 brought a comedic turn for Tommy Lee Jones who starred in the madcap comedy Man of the House (Stephen Herek, 2005) as a grizzled police officer who has to protect a house full of cheerleaders who witnessed a murder. Jones also took a stab at directing that year, helming and starring in the Neo-Western The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada (Tommy Lee Jones, 2005). His performance won him the Best Actor Award at the 2005 Cannes Film Festival. Jones appeared in the film adaptation of A Prairie Home Companion (Robert Altman, 2006), based on Garrison Keillor's long-running radio show. Hal Erickson at AllMovie: "The film's legendary director, much-loved source material, and all-star cast made the film a safe bet for the actor, who hadn't done much in the way of musical comedy. Jones played the consummate corporate bad guy with his trademark grit." He headlined the Iraq war drama In the Valley of Elah (Paul Haggis, 2007). His work as the veteran father of a son who died in the war earned him strong reviews and an Oscar nomination for Best Actor. However, more people saw Jones' other film from that year, the Coen brothers adaptation of No Country for Old Men (Joel and Ethan Coen, 2007). His work as a middle-aged Texas sheriff haunted by the acts of the evil man he hunts earned him a Screen Actors Guild nomination for Best Supporting Actor. The actor co-starred with Stanley Tucci and Neal McDonough in the blockbuster Captain America: The First Avenger (Joe Johnston, 2011) opposite Chris Evans, and reprised his role as a secret agent in Men in Black 3 (Barry Sonnenfeld, 2011). In 2012 he played a Congressman fighting to help Abraham Lincoln (Daniel Day-Lewis) end slavery in Lincoln (Steven Spielberg, 2012), a role that led to an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor. He most recently appeared in the Science-Fiction film Ad Astra (James Gray, 2019) starring Brad Pitt, and in the comedy The Comeback Trail (George Gallo, 2020) with Robert De Niro. Tommy Lee Jones and Kimberlea Cloughley have two children, Austin Leonard Jones (1982), and Victoria Jones (1991). After his divorce from Cloughley in 1996, he married Dawn Jones in 2001.
Sources: Hal Erickson (AllMovie), Maria Vitale (IMDb), Wikipedia, and IMDb.
And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
Vintage British postcard. Rotary Photo, E.C. 11642 Q. Photo by Foulsham & Banfield, London.
Tall and handsome Bertram Wallis (1874-1952) was a renowned English actor and singer. He was a glamorous matinée idol in popular plays and musical comedies in the early 20th century. Between the two wars he also appeared in several films.
Bertram Wallis was a huge man who stood more than 2 meters tall. He was born in 1874 in London. He won a scholarship to study voice at the Royal Academy of Music, and his first professional engagements were in George Alexander's production of William Shakespeare’s As You Like It (1896) and in Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing (1898). In the early years of the 20th century, Wallis had his first successes on the musical stage, including in A Country Girl. He had the rare talent of being able to sing beautifully and also act superbly. He then travelled to New York to play in several Broadway productions, including A Madcap Princess (1904), Princess Beggar (1907), and Miss Hook of Holland (1907-1908).
Bertram Wallis returned to London and established his career in the operetta King of Cadonia (1908) at the Prince of Wales theatre in the West End. From this point on , he reigned as one of the Edwardian age’s most glamorous matinée idols and one of its biggest male postcard-sellers. He starred in a number of successful London musicals, often with Isabel Jay or José Collins, including Dear Little Denmark (1909) The Balkan Princess (1910), The Count of Luxembourg (1911), The Happy Day (1916), the hit revue Zig Zag! (1917), A Southern Maid (1920), Madame Pompadour (1923), Blue Eyes (1928), and So This is Love (1929). Between 1917 and 1945 Bertram Wallis also appeared in eight films: The Cost of a Kiss (1917, Adrian Brunel), Victory and Peace (1918, Herbert Brenon), The Wandering Jew (1933, Maurice Elvey) starring Conrad Veidt, the short film A Dream of Love (1938, James A. FitzPatrick), Chips (1938, Edward Godal), A People Eternal (1939, Maurice Elvey, Henry Lynn) again starring Conrad Veidt, The Shipbuilders (1944, John Baxter) with Clive Brook, and Twilight Hour (1945, Paul L. Stein). After WWII Bertram Wallis retired and died aged 78 in 1952 at his home in Kent.
Sources: David Slattery-Christy, Anything But Merry!: The Life and Times of Lily Elsie; Wikipedia; Richard Traubner, Operetta: A Theatrical History, and IMDb.
Félix Corcuera, Actor. Fotografía realizada durante las sesiones de rodaje del spot de la App OkTicket. Asturias.
Fotografía: www.miguelprado.com
Sophie Bouchard as Belle and Noah Hackett as Maurice her father in Ignite Theatre's production of Beauty and the Beast at the Chilliwack Cultural Centre. BC CA
Modelo: Alfredo Zapata, actor
Si te gusta esta imagen puedes seguirme en www.facebook.com/photodrama.es
Since today's Movie Saturday, here's my top ten actors! I'm also going to include the film (or 1 TV show in this case) where this actor shined the most along side their name, check it out!
1. Paul Rudd (Ant-Man)
2. John C. Reilly (Check it Out! With Dr. Steve Brule) (yeah it's a TV show, but I love him in this role so much!)
3. Chris Pratt (Guardians of the Galaxy)
4. Will Ferrell (Anchorman)
5. John Goodman (The Big Lebowski)
6. Michael Shannon (Midnight Special)
7. Jeff Bridges (The Big Lebowski)
8. Samuel L. Jackson (Pulp Fiction)
9. Sylvester Stallone (Rocky)
10. Michael Keaton (Birdman)
This photo features what I suspect is the full cast of a production of The Womanless Wedding. An interesting wiki page on these plays can be found here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Womanless_wedding
I recently bought at auction an archive a prints and glass negatives made by a photographer, C.S. Bryant, who was active in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. His main line of business was traditional portraiture and most prints comprised in the archive are typical cabinet photos of men, women, babies, and families.