Carrie Fisher

type: Profile

biography: Carrie Frances Fisher (October 21, 1956 – December 27, 2016) was an American actress, novelist, screenwriter, and lecturer. Daughter of the famous actors Debbie Reynolds and Eddie Fisher, she gained fame for her portrayal of Princess Leia Organa in the original Star Wars trilogy. Her novel Postcards from the Edge was also a bestseller, for which she wrote a screenplay to the film of the same name.

place_of_birth: Beverly Hills, Los Angeles, California, USA

known_for_department: Acting


Andrew Stanton

biography:
Andrew Ayers Stanton (born December 3, 1965) is an American filmmaker, animator, and voice actor. He is best known as the director and co-writer of the Pixar animated films Finding Nemo (2003), WALL-E (2008), Finding Dory (2016), and Toy Story 5 (2026). He also directed and co-wrote the live-action film John Carter (2012) for Walt Disney Pictures and directed the live-action film In the Blink of an Eye (2026) for Searchlight Pictures. For Pixar, Stanton was additionally the co-director and co-writer of A Bug's Life (1998), the co-writer of the first four Toy Story films (1995–2019) and Monsters, Inc. (2001), and occasional voice actor for various films, most notably Crush the Turtle from Finding Nemo.

Finding Nemo and WALL-E earned Stanton two Academy Awards for Best Animated Feature. He was also nominated for three Academy Awards for Best Original Screenplay, for Finding Nemo, WALL-E, and Toy Story (1995), and for an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for Toy Story 3 (2010). WALL-E has also been inducted into the National Film Registry. Stanton has also directed episodes of various television series since 2017, including episodes of 3 Body Problem, Better Call Saul, Legion and Stranger Things.

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place_of_birth: Boston, Massachusetts, USA

known_for_department: Writing


Allison Janney

biography:
Allison Brooks Janney (born November 19, 1959) is an American actress. In a career spanning three decades, she is known for her performances across multiple genres of screen and stage. Janney has received various accolades, including an Academy Award, a British Academy Film Award, a Golden Globe Award, and seven Primetime Emmy Awards, in addition to nominations for two Tony Awards.

Born in Boston and raised in Dayton, Ohio, Janney received a scholarship to study at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art following her graduation from Kenyon College. After years of minor and uncredited film and television appearances, Janney's breakthrough came with the role of C. J. Cregg in the NBC political drama The West Wing (1999–2006), for which she received four Primetime Emmy Awards. In 2014, she won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series for her role as Margaret Scully on the Showtime period drama Masters of Sex. For her portrayal of Bonnie Plunkett, a cynical recovering addict on the CBS sitcom Mom (2013–2021), Janney received six Primetime Emmy Award nominations and won twice for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series.

Janney made her professional stage debut with the Off-Broadway production Ladies (1989), and followed with numerous bit parts in various similar productions, before making her Broadway debut with the 1996 revival of Present Laughter. She won two Drama Desk Awards and has been nominated for two Tony Awards: for Best Actress in a Play for her performance in the Broadway revival of A View from the Bridge (1997), and for Best Actress in a Musical for her role in the original Broadway production of the musical 9 to 5 (2009).

Her film roles include Private Parts (1997), Primary Colors (1998), 10 Things I Hate About You (1999), Drop Dead Gorgeous (1999), American Beauty (1999), Nurse Betty (2000), The Hours (2002), Hairspray (2007), Juno (2007), The Help (2011), The Way, Way Back (2013), Tammy (2014), The Rewrite (2014), Spy (2015), Tallulah (2016), The Girl on the Train (2016), Bad Education (2019) and Bombshell (2019). She voiced roles in Finding Nemo (2003), Over the Hedge (2006), Minions (2015), and The Addams Family (2019). For her performance in the black comedy I, Tonya (2017), Janney won an Academy Award, a BAFTA Award, and a Golden Globe Award, all for Best Supporting Actress.


Barry Humphries

biography:
John Barry Humphries, AO, CBE (17 February 1934 - 22 April 2023) was an Australian comedian, satirist, dadaist, artist, author and character actor, perhaps best known for his on-stage and television alter egos Dame Edna Everage, a Melbourne housewife and "gigastar", and Sir Les Patterson, Australia's foul-mouthed cultural attaché to the Court of St. James's.

He was a film producer and script writer, a star of London's West End musical theatre, an award-winning writer and an accomplished landscape painter. For his delivery of dadaist and absurdist humour to millions, biographer Anne Pender described Humphries in 2010 as not only the most significant theatrical figure of our time … [but] the most significant comedian to emerge since Charlie Chaplin. Humphries' characters, especially Dame Edna Everage, have brought him international renown, and he had appeared in numerous films, stage productions and television shows. Originally conceived as a dowdy Moonee Ponds housewife who caricatured Australian suburban complacency and insularity, Edna had evolved over four decades to become a satire of stardom, the gaudily dressed, acid-tongued, egomaniacal, internationally feted Housewife Gigastar, Dame Edna Everage. Humphries' other major satirical character creation was the archetypal Australian bloke Barry McKenzie, who originated as the hero of a comic strip about Australians in London (with drawings by Nicholas Garland) which was first published in Private Eye magazine.

The stories about "Bazza" (Humphries' nickname, as well as an Australian term of endearment for the name Barry) gave wide circulation to Australian slang, particularly jokes about drinking and its consequences (much of which was invented by Humphries), and the character went on to feature in two Australian films, in which he was portrayed by Barry Crocker. Humphries' other satirical characters include the "priapic and inebriated cultural attaché" Sir Les Patterson, who has "continued to bring worldwide discredit upon Australian arts and culture, while contributing as much to the Australian vernacular as he has borrowed from it", gentle, grandfatherly "returned gentleman" Sandy Stone, iconoclastic 1960s underground film-maker Martin Agrippa, Paddington socialist academic Neil Singleton, sleazy trade union official Lance Boyle, high-pressure art salesman Morrie O'Connor and failed tycoon Owen Steele.

Humphries died following complications from hip surgery at St Vincent's Hospital in Sydney on 22 April 2023.

place_of_birth: Camberwell, Melbourne, Australia


Robert Zemeckis

biography:
Robert Lee Zemeckis (born May 14, 1952) is an American filmmaker known for directing and producing a range of successful and influential movies. He often blends cutting-edge visual effects with storytelling. He has received several accolades, including an Academy Award and a Golden Globe Award, as well as nominations for five British Academy Film Awards and a Daytime Emmy Award.

Zemeckis started his career directing the comedy films I Wanna Hold Your Hand (1978), Used Cars (1980), and Romancing the Stone (1984). He gained prominence directing the science-fiction comedy Back to the Future trilogy (1985–1990), the fantasy comedy Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988), and the comedy-drama Forrest Gump (1994), the latter of which won Academy Awards for Best Picture and Best Director.

He has also directed the satirical black comedy Death Becomes Her (1992), the science fiction film Contact (1997), and the drama films Cast Away (2000), Flight (2012), The Walk (2015), and Allied (2016). His exploration of motion capture techniques can be seen in the animated films The Polar Express (2004) and A Christmas Carol (2009), as well as the action fantasy drama Beowulf (2007) and the drama Welcome to Marwen (2018). He has collaborated with film composer Alan Silvestri since 1984 and directed Tom Hanks in five films.

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place_of_birth: Chicago, Illinois, USA

known_for_department: Directing


Mykelti Williamson

biography: Michael T. 'Mykelti' Williamson (born March 4, 1957) is an American actor best known for his role as Benjamin Buford 'Bubba' Blue in the 1994 film Forrest Gump, as Detective Bobby 'Fearless' Smith in the critically acclaimed but commercially unsuccessful crime drama Boomtown, and recently for appearing as the head of CTU for season 8 of the hit TV series 24.

place_of_birth: St. Louis, Missouri, USA


Sean Bean

biography:
Shaun Mark Bean (born 17 April 1959) is an English actor. After graduating from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, Bean made his professional debut in a theatre production of Romeo and Juliet in 1983. Retaining his Yorkshire accent, he first found mainstream success for his portrayal of Richard Sharpe in the ITV series Sharpe, which originally ran from 1993 to 1997.

Bean's film roles include Patriot Games (1992), GoldenEye (1995), Ronin (1998), Don't Say a Word (2001), The Lord of the Rings trilogy (2001–2003), Equilibrium (2002), National Treasure (2004), Troy (2004), Flightplan (2005), North Country (2005), The Island (2005), Silent Hill (2006), Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief (2010), Black Death (2010), Jupiter Ascending (2015), and The Martian (2015).

His television roles include the BBC anthology series Accused, Broken, Game of Thrones, and the ITV historical drama series Henry VIII and Legends. As a voice actor, Bean has been featured in the video games The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, Sid Meier's Civilization VI, and the feature films Wolfwalkers and Mummies among others. Bean has also been the main voice over for O2 and their adverts for over 20 years having originally taken the job in 2002.

In 2022, Bean won the British Academy Television Award as Leading Actor in Time, a BBC One drama.

place_of_birth: Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England, UK


Catherine Deneuve

biography: Catherine Fabienne Dorléac (born 22 October 1943), known professionally as Catherine Deneuve, is a French actress as well as an occasional singer, model, and producer, considered one of the greatest European actresses. She gained recognition for her portrayal of icy, aloof, and mysterious beauties for various directors, including Jacques Demy, Luis Buñuel, François Truffaut, and Roman Polanski. In 1985, she succeeded Mireille Mathieu as the official face of Marianne, France's national symbol of liberty. A 14-time César Award nominee, she won for her performances in Truffaut's The Last Metro (1980), for which she also won the David di Donatello for Best Foreign Actress, and Régis Wargnier's Indochine (1992).

place_of_birth: Paris, France


Luc Besson

biography:
Luc Besson is a French film director, writer, and producer known for making highly visual thriller and action films.  Besson has been nominated for, and won, numerous awards and honors from the foreign press, and is often credited as inventing the so-called "Cinema du look" movement in French film.

Born in Paris, Besson spent his childhood traveling Europe with his parents and developing an enthusiasm for ocean diving, before an accident would push him toward the world of cinema. After taking odd jobs in the Parisian film scene of the time, Besson began writing stories that would eventually evolve into some of his greatest film successes: The Fifth Element and Le Grand Bleu.

In 1980 he founded his own production company, Les Films du Loup later Les Films du Dauphin, and later still EuropaCorp film company with his longtime collaborator, Pierre-Ange Le Poga. Besson's work stretches over twenty-six years and encompasses at least fifty-films.


Milla Jovovich

biography:
Milla Jovovich (born December 17, 1975) is an American actress, supermodel, musician, and fashion designer of Serbian and Russian descent. She was born in Kyiv, Ukrainian SSR, USSR. In essence, she began in a number of science fiction and action films, for which the music channel VH1 called her "the reigning royal of strikes."

She has appeared on the cover of more than a hundred magazines, and has also starred in films such as The Fifth Element (1997), Ultraviolet (2006), and the 'Resident Evil' franchise. Jovovich began modeling at eleven, when Richard Avedon featured her in Revlon's "Most Unforgettable Women in the World" advertisements, and she continued her career with other campaigns for L'Oréal cosmetics, Banana Republic, Christian Dior, Donna Karan, and Versace.

In 1988, she had her first professional acting role in the television film The Night Train to Kathmandu, and later that year she appeared in her first feature film, Two Moon Junction. Following more small television appearances such as the "Fair Exchange" (1989) and a 1989 role as a French girl (she was 14 at the time then) on a Married with Children episode and film roles, she gained notoriety with the romance film Return to the Blue Lagoon (1991). She appeared in 1993's Dazed and Confused alongside Ben Affleck and Matthew McConaughey. Jovovich then acted alongside Bruce Willis in the science fiction film The Fifth Element (1997), and later played the title role in The Messenger: The Story of Joan of Arc (1999). In 2002, she starred in the video game adaptation Resident Evil, which spawned five sequels: Resident Evil: Apocalypse (2004), Resident Evil: Extinction (2007), Resident Evil: Afterlife (2010), Resident Evil: Retribution (2012) and Resident Evil: The Final Chapter (2016).

In addition to her modelling and acting career, Jovovich released a music album, The Divine Comedy in 1994. She continues to release demos for other songs on her official website and contributes to film soundtracks as well; Jovovich has yet to release another album. In 2003, she and model Carmen Hawk created the clothing line Jovovich-Hawk, which ceased operations in early 2008. In its third season prior to its demise, the pieces could be found at Fred Segal in Los Angeles, Harvey Nichols, and over 50 stores around the world.

place_of_birth: Kyiv, Ukrainian SSR, USSR [now Ukraine]


Isabel Coixet

biography: Isabel Coixet Castillo (Catalan: [izəˈβɛl kuˈʃɛt]; born 9 April 1960; Sant Adrià del Besòs) is a Spanish filmmaker. She is one of the most prolific film directors of contemporary Spain, having directed twelve feature-length films since the beginning of her film career in 1988, in addition to documentary films, shorts, and commercials. Her films depart from the traditional national cinema of Spain, and help to “untangle films from their national context ... clearing the path for thinking about national film from different perspectives.” The recurring themes of “emotions, feelings, and existential conflict” coupled with her distinct visual style secure the “multifaceted (she directs, writes, produces, shoots, and acts)” filmmaker's status as a “Catalan auteur.”

place_of_birth: Sant Adrià de Besòs, Barcelona, Spain


Debbie Harry

biography: Deborah Ann Harry (born Angela Trimble; July 1, 1945) is an American singer, songwriter and actress, best known as the lead vocalist of the band Blondie.

place_of_birth: Miami, Florida, USA


Mark Ruffalo

biography:
Mark Alan Ruffalo (/ˈrʌfəloʊ/; born November 22, 1967) is an American actor and producer who began his career in the late 1980s and first gained recognition for his work in Kenneth Lonergan's play This Is Our Youth (1996) and drama film You Can Count on Me (2000). He went on to star in the romantic comedies 13 Going on 30 (2004) and Just like Heaven (2005), and the thrillers In the Cut (2003), Zodiac (2007), and Shutter Island (2010). He received a Tony Award nomination for his supporting role in the Broadway revival of Awake and Sing! in 2006. Ruffalo has gained international recognition for playing Bruce Banner/Hulk in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, beginning with The Avengers (2012).

Ruffalo earned a record-tying four nominations for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for playing a sperm donor in The Kids Are All Right (2010), Dave Schultz in Foxcatcher (2014), Michael Rezendes in Spotlight (2015), and a debauched lawyer in Poor Things (2023). He won a Screen Actors Guild Award for Best Actor for playing a gay activist in the television drama film The Normal Heart (2015) and a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor for his dual role as identical twins in the miniseries I Know This Much Is True (2020).

Description above from the Wikipedia article Mark Ruffalo, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

place_of_birth: Kenosha, Wisconsin, USA


Viggo Mortensen

biography: Viggo Peter Mortensen, Jr. (born October 20, 1958) is an American actor, writer, director, producer, musician, and multimedia artist. Born and raised in the state of New York to a Danish father and American mother, he also lived in Argentina during his childhood. He is the recipient of various accolades including a Screen Actors Guild Award and has been nominated for three Academy Awards, three BAFTA Awards, and four Golden Globe Awards.

place_of_birth: Watertown, New York, USA


Christopher Lee

biography: Christopher Lee (May 5, 1922 – June 7, 2015) was an English actor and musician. Lee initially portrayed villains and became famous for his role as Count Dracula in a string of Hammer Horror films. Other notable roles include Lord Summerisle in The Wicker Man (1973), Francisco Scaramanga in The Man with the Golden Gun (1974), Count Dooku in Star Wars episodes II and III (2002, 2005) and Saruman in The Lord of the Rings film trilogy (2001–2003). Lee considers his most important role to have been his portrayal of Pakistan's founder Muhammad Ali Jinnah in the biopic Jinnah (1998). He is well known for his deep, commanding voice. Lee has performed roles in 266 films since 1948 making him the Guinness book world record holder for most film acting roles ever. He was knighted in 2009 and received the BAFTA Fellowship in 2011.

place_of_birth: Westminster, London, England, UK


Orlando Bloom

biography:
Orlando Jonathan Blanchard Copeland Bloom (born 13 January 1977) is an English actor. He made his breakthrough as the character Legolas in The Lord of the Rings film series (2001–03). He reprised his role in The Hobbit film series (2013–14). Considered by some to be the Errol Flynn of his time, he gained further notice appearing in epic fantasy, historical, and adventure films, notably as Will Turner in the Pirates of the Caribbean film series (2003–07, 2017), Paris in Troy (2004), Balian de Ibelin in the Kingdom of Heaven (2005), and the Duke of Buckingham in The Three Musketeers(2011).

Bloom appeared in Hollywood films such as the war film Black Hawk Down (2001), the Australian Western Ned Kelly (2003), the romantic comedy Elizabethtown (2005), and New York, I Love You(2007). In 2020, he gained acclaim for the Afghanistan War drama film The Outpost (2020). He also starred in the Amazon Prime Video series Carnival Row (2019–2023).

He debuted professionally in In Celebration at the Duke of York's Theatre in the West End in 2007. He starred in an adaptation of William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet in 2013. He returned to the theatre in a West End revival of Tracy Letts' Killer Joe in 2018. In 2009, Bloom was named a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador. In 2015, he received the BAFTA Britannia Humanitarian Award.

place_of_birth: Canterbury, Kent, England, UK


Keira Knightley

biography:
Keira Christina Knightley (born 26 March 1985) is an English actress. She has starred in both independent films and big-budget blockbusters and is particularly noted for her roles in period dramas. Her accolades include two Empire Awards and nominations for two Academy Awards, three British Academy Film Awards, three Golden Globe Awards, one Screen Actors Guild Award and one Laurence Olivier Award. Knightley was appointed an OBE in the 2018 Birthday Honours for services to drama and charity.

Born in London to actors Will Knightley and Sharman Macdonald, Knightley obtained an agent at age six and initially worked commercials and television films. She appeared as Sabé, Padmé Amidala's handmaiden, in the science fiction blockbuster Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace (1999). Knightley had a break-through role portraying a tomboy footballer in the sports film Bend It Like Beckham (2002). She achieved global stardom with her portrayal of Elizabeth Swann in the fantasy swashbuckler series Pirates of the Caribbean. In the same year, she appeared in the Christmas romantic comedy Love Actually (2003) and was labelled a promising teen star.

For her portrayal of Elizabeth Bennet in the period romance Pride & Prejudice (2005), Knightley was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress. At age 20, she became the third-youngest Best Actress nominee at the time. Knightley starred in a series of further period pieces, portraying a complex love interest in Atonement (2007), tastemaker Georgiana Cavendish in The Duchess (2008), and the titular socialite in Anna Karenina (2012). She then forayed into contemporary dramas, appearing as an aspiring musician in Begin Again (2013) and a medical student in Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit (2014). Knightley returned to historical films by playing cryptoanalyst Joan Clarke in The Imitation Game (2014), earning her a second round of Academy Award and BAFTA nominations, and starred as the eponymous belle époque writer in Colette (2018) to critical acclaim.

On stage, Knightley has appeared in two West End productions: The Misanthrope in 2009, which earned her an Olivier Award nomination, and The Children's Hour in 2011. She also starred as the eponymous heroine in the 2015 Broadway production of Thérèse Raquin. Knightley is known for her outspoken stance on social issues, and has worked extensively with Amnesty International, Oxfam, and Comic Relief. She is married to musician James Righton, with whom she has two daughters.

place_of_birth: Teddington, London, England, UK


Jake Gyllenhaal

biography:
Jake Gyllenhaal (born December 19, 1980) is an American actor and producer. Born into the Gyllenhaal family, he is the son of director Stephen Gyllenhaal and screenwriter Naomi Foner; his older sister is actress Maggie Gyllenhaal.

He began acting as a child, making his acting debut in City Slickers (1991), followed by roles in his father's films A Dangerous Woman (1993) and Homegrown (1998). His breakthrough roles were as Homer Hickam in October Sky (1999) and as a psychologically troubled teenager in Donnie Darko (2001).  In 2004, Gyllenhaal starred in the science fiction disaster film The Day After Tomorrow. In 2005, he played Jack Twist in Ang Lee's romantic drama Brokeback Mountain, for which Gyllenhaal won a BAFTA Award and was nominated for an Academy Award. His career progressed with starring roles in the thriller Zodiac (2007), the romantic comedy Love & Other Drugs (2010), and the science fiction film Source Code (2011). Further acclaim came with his roles in Denis Villeneuve's thrillers Prisoners (2013) and Enemy (2013), and he received nominations for the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role for his performances as a manipulative journalist in Nightcrawler (2014) and a troubled writer in Nocturnal Animals (2016).  His highest-grossing release came with the Marvel Cinematic Universe superhero film Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019), in which he portrayed Quentin Beck / Mysterio. Gyllenhaal has also performed on stage, starring in Broadway productions of the musical Sunday in the Park with George as well as the plays Constellations and Sea Wall/A Life, the lattermost of which earned him a Tony Award nomination. Aside from acting, he is vocal about political and social issues.

Description above from the Wikipedia article Jake Gyllenhaal, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

place_of_birth: Los Angeles, California, USA


Peter Sarsgaard

biography:
John Peter Sarsgaard (born March 7, 1971) is an American actor. His first feature role was in Dead Man Walking in 1995. He then appeared in the 1998 independent films Another Day in Paradise and Desert Blue. That same year, Sarsgaard received a substantial role in The Man in the Iron Mask (1998), playing Raoul, the ill-fated son of Athos. Sarsgaard later achieved critical recognition when he was cast in Boys Don't Cry (1999) as John Lotter. He landed his first leading role in the 2001 film The Center of the World. The following year, he played supporting roles in Empire, The Salton Sea, and K-19: The Widowmaker.

For his portrayal of Charles Lane in Shattered Glass, Sarsgaard won the National Society of Film Critics Award for Best Supporting Actor and was nominated for the 2004 Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor. Sarsgaard has appeared in an eclectic range of films, including the 2004 comedy-drama Garden State, the biographical film Kinsey (2004), the drama The Dying Gaul (2005), and big-budget films such as Flightplan (2005), Jarhead (2005), The Skeleton Key (2005), Orphan (2009), An Education (2009), Knight and Day (2010), Green Lantern (2011), Lovelace (2013), Kelly Reichardt's Night Moves (2013), Blue Jasmine (2013), Black Mass (2015), and The Magnificent Seven (2016). Sarsgaard also appeared in the American TV series The Killing (2013) as a man on death row perhaps wrongfully convicted for the brutal murder of his wife—a performance which he says included "some of the best acting I have ever done in my life." In 2021, he had a recurring role on the Hulu miniseries Dopesick.

Sarsgaard has appeared in Off-Broadway productions including Kingdom of Earth, Laura Dennis, Burn This, and Uncle Vanya. In September 2008, he made his Broadway debut as Boris Alexeyevich Trigorin in The Seagull. He is married to actress Maggie Gyllenhaal.

place_of_birth: Belleville, Illinois, USA


Lior Ashkenazi

biography:
Lior Ashkenazi (born in Ramat Gan, 1969), is an award-winning Israeli screen and stage actor.

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place_of_birth: Ramat Gan, Israel


Nancy Cartwright

biography: Nancy Campbell Cartwright (born October 25, 1957) is an American film and television actress, comedian and voice artist. She is best known for her long-running role as Bart Simpson on The Simpsons. She is also the aunt of pop star Sabrina Carpenter.

place_of_birth: Dayton, Ohio, USA


Charlie Kaufman

biography: Charles Stuart Kaufman (born November 19, 1958) is an American filmmaker and novelist. He wrote the films Being John Malkovich (1999), Adaptation (2002), and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004). He both wrote and directed the films Synecdoche, New York (2008), Anomalisa (2015), and I'm Thinking of Ending Things (2020). In 2020, Kaufman made his literary debut with the release of his first novel, Antkind. One of the most celebrated screenwriters of his era, Kaufman has received an Academy Award, three BAFTA Awards, two Independent Spirit Awards, and a Writers Guild of America Award. Film critic Roger Ebert called Synecdoche, New York "the best movie of the decade" in 2009. Three of Kaufman's scripts appear in the Writers Guild of America's list of the 101 greatest movie screenplays ever written.

place_of_birth: New York City, New York, USA


Jim Carrey

biography:
James Eugene Carrey (/ˈkæri/; born January 17, 1962) is a Canadian and American actor and comedian. Known primarily for his energetic slapstick performances, he has received two Golden Globe Awards, in addition to nominations for BAFTA Awards and Screen Actors Guild Awards.

After spending the 1980s honing his comedy act and playing supporting roles in films, Carrey gained recognition when he was cast in the Fox sketch comedy series In Living Color (1990–1994). He broke out as a film star after starring in a string of box office hits, such as Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, The Mask, Dumb and Dumber (all 1994), Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls, and Batman Forever(both 1995). The success of these five films led to Carrey being the first comic actor to receive an upfront $20 million salary for performing in films, beginning with The Cable Guy (1996).

Carrey continued to have success as a leading actor in comedies such as Liar Liar (1997), How the Grinch Stole Christmas (2000), Bruce Almighty (2003), Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events (2004), and Yes Man (2008). Since the 2010s, Carrey appeared in fewer films, with notable works including Dumb and Dumber To (2014) and his role as Doctor Eggman in the Sonic the Hedgehog film series (2020–present).

Although typecast mainly as a comedic actor, Carrey had success in dramatic roles. His critically acclaimed performances include the title role in The Truman Show (1998) and Andy Kaufman in Man on the Moon (1999), for which he won Golden Globe Awards. He starred in the romantic drama film Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004), for which he was nominated for a BAFTA Award and another Golden Globe. Carrey also starred in the Showtime tragicomedy series Kidding (2018–2020), for which he received his seventh Golden Globe nomination.

Description above from the Wikipedia article Jim Carrey, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

place_of_birth: Newmarket, Ontario, Canada


Tom Wilkinson

biography:
Thomas Geoffrey Wilkinson (February 5, 1948 – December 30, 2023) was an English actor. Known for his roles on stage and screen, he received numerous accolades including a BAFTA Award, a Golden Globe Award, and a Primetime Emmy Award as well as nominations for two Academy Awards and two Laurence Olivier Awards. In 2005, he was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE).

Wilkinson trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art before making his West End debut portraying Horatio in Hamlet (1980) for which he received a nomination for the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role. He returned to the West End playing Dr. Stockmann in the Henrik Ibsen play An Enemy of the People (1988) receiving a Laurence Olivier Award for Actor of the Year in a Revival nomination.

Wilkinson received the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for The Full Monty (1997) as well as two Academy Award nominations, one for Best Actor for In the Bedroom (2001) and Best Supporting Actor for Michael Clayton (2007). He became known as a character actor, acting in numerous films such as In the Name of the Father (1993), Sense and Sensibility (1995), Shakespeare in Love (1998), The Patriot (2000), Girl with a Pearl Earring (2003), Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004), Batman Begins (2005), Valkyrie (2008), The Ghost Writer (2010), The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (2011), Belle (2013), Selma (2014), The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014), and Denial (2016).

In 2009 he won a Golden Globe Award and a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Miniseries or a Movie for playing Benjamin Franklin in the HBO limited series John Adams (2008). His other Emmy-nominated roles were as Roy/Ruth Applewood in the HBO film Normal (2003), James Baker in the HBO film Recount (2008), and Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. in the limited series The Kennedys (2011).

place_of_birth: Leeds, England, UK


William Hurt

biography: William McChord Hurt (March 20, 1950 – March 13, 2022) was an American stage, film and television actor, trained at the Juilliard School, Manhattan, New York, USA. For his leading role in the feature film "Kiss of the Spider Woman", he received an Academy Award in 1986, followed by 3 more nominations for roles in the movies "Children of a Lesser God", "Broadcast News", and "A History of Violence".

place_of_birth: Washington, District of Columbia, USA


Ed Harris

biography:
Edward Allen Harris (born November 28, 1950) is an American actor and director. His performances in Apollo 13 (1995), The Truman Show (1998), Pollock (2000), and The Hours (2002) earned him critical acclaim and Academy Award nominations.

Harris has appeared in numerous leading and supporting roles, including in Creepshow (1982), The Right Stuff (1983), Under Fire (1983), Places in the Heart (1984), The Abyss (1989), Glengarry Glen Ross (1992), The Firm (1993), Nixon (1995), The Rock (1996), Stepmom (1998), A Beautiful Mind (2001), Enemy at the Gates (2001), Radio (2003), A History of Violence (2005), Gone Baby Gone (2007), National Treasure: Book of Secrets (2007), Snowpiercer (2013), Mother! (2017), The Lost Daughter (2021), and Top Gun: Maverick (2022). In addition to directing Pollock, Harris directed the Western film Appaloosa (2008).

In television, Harris is notable for his roles as Miles Roby in the miniseries Empire Falls (2005) and as United States Senator John McCain in the television movie Game Change (2012); the latter earned him the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Series, Miniseries or Television Film. He starred as the Man in Black in the HBO science fiction-Western series Westworld (2016–2022), for which he earned a nomination for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series.

place_of_birth: Englewood, New Jersey, USA


Aidan Devine

biography:
Aidan Devine is a Canadian film actor. He was born in England and immigrated with his family to Canada at the age of 15. He studied at Dawson College's Dome Theatre in Montreal, Quebec and began his acting career in Montreal. He would later relocate to Toronto. His 1993 breakout role came in Denys Arcand's, Love and Human Remains. Since then he has worked steadily in Canadian and American television and cinema capturing two Gemini Awards; a best actor award in 1997 for his performance as Ted Lindsay in Net Worth and in 1998, a best supporting actor Gemini for his performance as airframe engineer, Jim Chamberlin in The Arrow. He has been nominated three other times.

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place_of_birth: Hitchin, Hertfordshire, England, UK


Margaret Tyzack

biography: Margaret Tyzack was born on September 9, 1931 in Plaistow, London, England, UK. She was an actress, known for 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), A Clockwork Orange (1971) and Match Point (2005). She was previously married to Alan R. Stephenson. She died on June 25, 2011 in Blackheath, London, England, UK.

place_of_birth: Essex, England


Gael García Bernal

biography:
Gael García Bernal is a Mexican actor and filmmaker. He is known for his performances in the films Amores perros (2000), Y tu mamá también (2001), Bad Education (2004), The Motorcycle Diaries (2004), Babel (2006), Coco (2017), Old (2021), and Cassandro (2023). He has also played music conductor Rodrigo de Souza in the television drama series Mozart in the Jungle (2014–2018) and starred in the Disney+ special Werewolf by Night (2022).

García Bernal was nominated for a BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role for his portrayal of a young Che Guevara in The Motorcycle Diaries in 2005, and in 2016 won his first Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Television Series Musical or Comedy for Mozart in the Jungle. He and fellow actor Diego Luna founded the production company Canana Films in Mexico City. In 2016, Time magazine named him in the annual Time 100 Most Influential People list. In 2020, The New York Times ranked him No. 25 in its list of the 25 Greatest Actors of the 21st Century.

place_of_birth: Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico


Brad Pitt

biography:
William Bradley Pitt (born December 18, 1963) is an American actor and film producer. In a film career spanning more than thirty years, Pitt has received numerous accolades, including two Academy Awards, two British Academy Film Awards, two Golden Globe Awards, two Primetime Emmy Awards and one Volpi Cup. His films as a leading actor have grossed over $7.5 billion worldwide.

Pitt first gained recognition as a cowboy hitchhiker in the Ridley Scott road film Thelma & Louise (1991). Pitt emerged as a star taking on starring roles in films such as the drama A River Runs Through It (1992), the western Legends of the Fall (1994), the horror film Interview with the Vampire (1994), the crime thriller Seven (1995), the cult film Fight Club (1999), and the crime comedy Snatch (2000). He cemented his leading man status by starring in blockbusters such as Steven Soderbergh's Ocean's film trilogy (2001–2007), Troy (2004), Mr. & Mrs. Smith (2005), World War Z (2013), Bullet Train (2022) and F1 (2025).

Pitt earned Academy Award nominations for his performances in the science fiction drama 12 Monkeys (1995), the fantasy romance The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008) and the sports drama Moneyball (2011). For his portrayal of a stuntman in Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019), he won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. He also starred in acclaimed films such as Babel(2006), The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007), Burn After Reading (2008), Inglourious Basterds (2009), The Tree of Life (2011), Fury (2014), The Big Short (2015), Ad Astra (2019) and Babylon (2022).

In 2001, Pitt co-founded the production company Plan B Entertainment. As a producer, he won the Academy Award for Best Picture for 12 Years a Slave (2013). He was nominated for Moneyball (2011) and The Big Short (2015). An influential figure in popular culture, Pitt appeared on Forbes' annual Celebrity 100 list from 2006 to 2008, and the Time 100 list in 2007. Regarded as a sex symbol, Pitt was named People's Sexiest Man Alive in 1995 and 2000. Pitt's relationships have also been subject to widespread media attention, particularly his marriages to actresses Jennifer Aniston and Angelina Jolie, the latter of whom he shares six children with.

Description above from the Wikipedia article Brad Pitt, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

place_of_birth: Shawnee, Oklahoma, USA


Madeleine Stowe

biography:
Madeleine Marie Stowe Mora (born August 18, 1958) is an American actress. She appeared mostly on television before her role in the 1987 crime-comedy film Stakeout. She went on to star in the films Revenge (1990), Unlawful Entry (1992), The Last of the Mohicans (1992), Blink (1993), 12 Monkeys (1995), The General's Daughter (1999), and We Were Soldiers (2002). For her role in the 1993 independent film Short Cuts, she won the National Society of Film Critics Award for Best Supporting Actress.

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Kim Basinger

biography:
Kimila Ann Basinger (born December 8, 1953) is an American actress and former fashion model. She has garnered acclaim for her work in film and television, for which she has received various accolades including an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, a Screen Actors Guild Award, and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Following a brief but successful career modeling in New York, Basinger moved to Los Angeles where she began acting on television in 1976. She appeared in several made-for-TV films, including a remake of From Here to Eternity (1979), before making her feature debut in the drama Hard Country (1981). Hailed as a sex symbol of the 1980s and 1990s, Basinger came to prominence for her performance of Bond girl Domino Petachi in Never Say Never Again (1983). She went on to receive a Golden Globe nomination for her work in The Natural (1984), starred in the erotic drama 9½ Weeks (1986), and played Vicki Vale in Tim Burton's Batman (1989), which remains the highest-grossing film of her career. For her femme fatale portrayal in L.A. Confidential (1997), Basinger won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. Her other films include No Mercy (1986), Blind Date (1987), My Stepmother Is an Alien (1988), Cool World (1992), The Real McCoy (1993), I Dreamed of Africa (2000), 8 Mile (2002), The Door in the Floor (2004), Cellular (2004), The Sentinel (2006), The Burning Plain (2009), Grudge Match (2013), and Fifty Shades Darker (2017).

Divorced from makeup artist Ron Snyder and actor Alec Baldwin, Basinger cohabits with her longtime hairdresser, Mitch Stone. She had a high-profile relationship between marriages with the late musician Prince, with whom she recorded an album, Hollywood Affair, and is the mother of social media influencer Ireland Baldwin from her marriage to Alec.

place_of_birth: Athens, Georgia, USA


Michael Shannon

biography:
Michael Corbett Shannon (born August 7, 1974) is an American actor, producer, musician, and theatre director. He has been nominated twice for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his roles in the Sam Mendes period drama Revolutionary Road (2008) and the Tom Ford psychological thriller Nocturnal Animals (2016). He earned Screen Actors Guild Award and Golden Globe Award nominations for his role in 99 Homes (2014), and a Tony Award nomination for Best Featured Actor in a Play for the Broadway revival of Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey into Night (2016).

Shannon made his film debut in 1993 with Groundhog Day and received widespread attention for his performance in 8 Mile (2002). He is known for his on-screen versatility, performing in both comedies and dramas such as Pearl Harbor (2001), Bad Boys II (2003), Bug (2006), Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (2007), Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans (2009), The Iceman (2012), Premium Rush (2012), The Night Before (2015), The Shape of Water (2017) and Knives Out (2019). He played Superman's Kryptonian adversary General Zod in Man of Steel (2013) and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016), and is set to reprise the role in The Flash (2022). Shannon is a frequent collaborator of Jeff Nichols, appearing in all of his films: Shotgun Stories (2007), Take Shelter (2011), Mud (2012), Midnight Special, and Loving (both 2016). He is also known for his role as Nelson Van Alden in the HBO period drama series Boardwalk Empire (2010–2014), for which he was nominated for three Screen Actors Guild Awards. In 2021, he had a main role in the Hulu drama miniseries Nine Perfect Strangers.

place_of_birth: Lexington, Kentucky, USA


Laura Linney

biography:
Laura Leggett Linney (born February 5, 1964) is an American actress. She is the recipient of several awards, including two Golden Globe Awards and four Primetime Emmy Awards, and has been nominated for three Academy Awards and five Tony Awards.

Linney made her Broadway debut in 1990 before going on to receive Tony Award nominations for the 2002 revival of The Crucible, the original Broadway productions of Sight Unseen (2004), Time Stands Still (2010), My Name Is Lucy Barton (2020), and the 2017 revival of The Little Foxes. On television, she won her first Emmy Award for the television film Wild Iris (2001), and had subsequent wins for the sitcom Frasier (2003–04) and the miniseries John Adams (2008). From 2010 to 2013, she starred in the Showtime series The Big C, which won her a fourth Emmy in 2013, and from 2017 to 2022 she starred in the Netflix crime series Ozark.

Linney is also an established film actress. She made her film debut with a minor role in Lorenzo's Oil (1992) and went on to receive Academy Award nominations for the dramas You Can Count on Me (2000), Kinsey (2004), and The Savages (2007). She's also known for her performances in Primal Fear (1996), The Truman Show (1998), Mystic River and Love Actually (both 2003), The Squid and the Whale (2005), The Nanny Diaries (2007), Hyde Park on Hudson (2012), Mr. Holmes (2015), Sully and Nocturnal Animals (both 2016).

place_of_birth: Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA


Hany Abu-Assad

biography:
Hany Abu-Assad is a Palestinian film director, writer and producer. Born in Nazareth 1961, he is one of the most eminent Arab directors of our time. He broke into filmmaking after working for several years as an flight engineer in The Netherlands. In 1994, he produced the feature film Curfew, directed by Rashid Masharawi. Since then, Abu-Assad has written, directed and produced several award winning films which include Nazareth 2000, Ranaâ€™s Wedding, Ford Transit, Paradise Now, The Courier, Omar and The Idol.

His film Paradise Now was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film and won the Golden Globe for Best Foreign Language film. His film, Omar was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film 2014 and won several awards. The awards include the Independent Spirit Award, Felix Award,Berlin Blue Angel Award, Amnesty International Film Prize, Golden Calf, and the Jury Prize in the competition of Certain Regard at the Cannes Film Festival.

In 2017, Abu-Assad directed The Mountain Between Us, starring Kate Winslet and Idris Elba, which opened the 39th edition of Cairo International Film Festival (CIFF). Hudaâ€™s Salon is his latest feature film.


Reese Witherspoon

biography:
Laura Jeanne Reese Witherspoon (born March 22, 1976) is an American actress and producer. She is the recipient of various accolades, including an Academy Award, a Primetime Emmy Award, and two Golden Globe Awards. Time magazine named her one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2006 and 2015, and Forbes listed her among the World's 100 Most Powerful Women in 2019 and 2021. In 2021, Forbes named her the world's highest earning actress, and in 2023, she was named one of the richest women in America with an estimated net worth of $440 million.

Witherspoon began her career as a teenager, making her screen debut in The Man in the Moon (1991). Her breakthrough came in 1999 with a supporting role in Cruel Intentions, and for her portrayal of Tracy Flick in the black comedy Election. She gained wider recognition for playing Elle Woods in the comedy Legally Blonde (2001) and its 2003 sequel, and for starring in the romantic comedy Sweet Home Alabama (2002). She won the Academy Award for Best Actress for portraying June Carter Cash in the musical biopic Walk the Line (2005). Following a career downturn, during which her sole box-office success was the romantic drama Water for Elephants (2011), Witherspoon made a comeback by producing and starring as Cheryl Strayed in the drama Wild (2014), which earned her a second nomination for Best Actress at the Academy Awards.

She has since worked primarily in television, producing and starring in several female-led literary adaptations under her company Hello Sunshine. These include the HBO drama series Big Little Lies (2017–2019), the Apple TV+ drama series The Morning Show (2019–present), and the Hulu miniseries Little Fires Everywhere (2020). For the first of these, she won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Limited Series. She has also produced the film adaptations Gone Girl (2014) and Where the Crawdads Sing (2022), and the miniseries adaptation Daisy Jones & the Six (2023).

Witherspoon also owns Reese's Book Club and a clothing company, Draper James. She is involved in children's and women's advocacy organizations. She serves on the board of the Children's Defense Fund (CDF) and was named Global Ambassador of Avon Products in 2007, serving as honorary chair of the charitable Avon Foundation dedicated to women's causes.

place_of_birth: New Orleans, Louisiana, USA


Tom Stoppard

biography:
Sir Tom Stoppard OM CBE FRSL Hon FBA (born Tomáš Sträussler, 3 July 1937 — 29 November 2025) was a Czech-born British playwright and screenwriter. He has written for film, radio, stage, and television, finding prominence with plays. His work covered the themes of human rights, censorship, and political freedom, often delving into the deeper philosophical thematics of society. Stoppard had been a playwright of the National Theatre and is one of the most internationally performed dramatists of his generation.

Stoppard died at his home in Dorset, England on 29 November 2025 at the age of 88.

Description above from the Wikipedia article Tom Stoppard, licensed under CC-BY-SA,full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

place_of_birth: Zlín, Czechoslovakia


Jonathan Pryce

biography:
Jonathan Pryce, CBE (born June 1, 1947) is a Welsh stage and film actor and singer. He earned an Academy Award nomination for his performance in the 2019 film "The Two Popes."

After studying at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and meeting his long time partner, English actress Kate Fahy, in 1974, he began his career as a stage actor in the 1970s. His work in theatre, including an award-winning performance in the title role of the Royal Court Theatre's "Hamlet", led to several supporting roles in film and television. He made his breakthrough screen performance in Terry Gilliam's 1985 cult film "Brazil". Critically lauded for his versatility, Pryce has participated in big-budget films such as "Evita", "Tomorrow Never Dies", "Pirates of the Caribbean" and "The New World", as well as independent projects such as "Glengarry Glen Ross" and "Carrington". His career in theatre has also been prolific, and he has won two Tony Awards—the first in 1977 for his Broadway debut in "Comedians", the second for his 1991 role as "The Engineer" in the musical "Miss Saigon".

place_of_birth: Carmel, Flintshire, Wales, UK


Robert De Niro

biography:
Robert Anthony De Niro (born August 17, 1943) is an American actor and film producer. Considered one of his generation's greatest and most influential actors, De Niro has received various accolades, including two Academy Awards and a  Golden Globe Award, as well as nominations for eight BAFTA Awards and four Emmy Awards. He was honoured with the AFI Life Achievement Award in 2003, the Kennedy Center Honors in 2009, the Cecil B. DeMille Award in 2011, and the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award in 2019. De Niro was presented with the Presidential Medal of Freedom by U.S. President Barack Obama in 2016.

De Niro studied acting at HB Studio, Stella Adler Conservatory, and Lee Strasberg's Actors Studio. His first credited screen role was in Brian de Palma's Greetings (1968). De Niro's first collaboration with Martin Scorsese was with the crime drama film Mean Streets (1973). De Niro has earned two Academy Awards: one for Best Supporting Actor for his role as Vito Corleone in Francis Ford Coppola's The Godfather Part II (1974) and the other for Best Actor portraying Jake LaMotta in Scorsese's drama Raging Bull (1980). De Niro was also Oscar-nominated for Taxi Driver (1976), The Deer Hunter (1978), Awakenings (1990), Cape Fear (1991), Silver Linings Playbook (2012), and Killers of the Flower Moon (2023).

He is also known for his film roles in Bang the Drum Slowly (1973), 1900 (1976), The King of Comedy (1982), Once Upon a Time in America(1984), Brazil (1985), The Mission (1986), Angel Heart (1987), The Untouchables (1987), Goodfellas (1990), This Boy's Life (1993), Mary Shelley's Frankenstein (1994), Heat (1995), Casino (1995), Jackie Brown (1997), Joker (2019), and The Irishman (2019). He directed and acted in A Bronx Tale (1993) and The Good Shepherd (2006). His comedic roles include Hi, Mom! (1970), Midnight Run (1988), Wag the Dog (1997), Analyze This (1999) and its sequel, Analyze That (2002), the Meet the Parents films (2000–2010), and The Intern (2015).

Also known for his television roles, De Niro portrayed Bernie Madoff in the HBO film The Wizard of Lies (2017), earning a nomination for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Limited Series or Movie. He received further Emmy Award nominations for producing the Netflix limited series When They See Us (2019) and for portraying Robert Mueller on Saturday Night Live.

De Niro and producer Jane Rosenthal founded the film and television production company TriBeCa Productions in 1989, which has produced several films alongside his own. Also with Rosenthal, he founded the Tribeca Film Festival in 2002. Many of De Niro's films are considered classics of American cinema. Six of De Niro's films have been inducted into the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" as of 2023. Five films are featured on the American Film Institute's (AFI) list of the 100 greatest American films ever. Timeout magazine's list of 100 best movies included seven of De Niro's films, as chosen by actors in the industry.

place_of_birth: Greenwich Village, New York City, New York, USA


Jim Broadbent

biography:
Jim Broadbent (born May 24, 1949) is an English actor. He won an Academy Award and a Golden Globe Award for his supporting role as John Bayley in the feature film Iris (2001), as well as winning a BAFTA TV Award and a Golden Globe for his leading role as Lord Longford in the television film Longford (2006). Broadbent received four BAFTA Film Award nominations and won for his performance in Moulin Rouge! (2001). He was also nominated for two Primetime Emmy Awards and four Screen Actors Guild Awards.

A graduate of the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art in 1972, Broadbent first came to prominence in the 1980s, chiefly appearing in television comedy including playing Roy Slater in the BBC sitcom Only Fools and Horses. He appeared in the Terry Gilliam films Time Bandits (1981) and Brazil (1985) before a breakthrough role in Mike Leigh's independent comedy drama Life Is Sweet (1990). His notable film roles since include The Borrowers (1997), Bridget Jones's Diary (2001), The Gathering Storm (2002), Hot Fuzz (2007), Another Year (2010), The Iron Lady (2011), Arthur Christmas (2011), Cloud Atlas (2012) and Brooklyn (2015). He played Horace Slughorn in the Harry Potter film series, Archmaester Ebrose in the seventh season of the television series Game of Thrones and Samuel Gruber in the Paddington film series.

place_of_birth: Lincoln, Lincolnshire, England, UK


Phedon Papamichael

biography:
Phedon Papamichael, ASC (Greek: Φαίδων Παπαμιχαήλ, Faidon Papamihail; born February 1962) is a Greek cinematographer and film director known for his collaborations with directors James Mangold, Alexander Payne and Wim Wenders. He has twice been nominated for the Academy Award for Best Cinematography and the BAFTA Award for Best Cinematography. He has been a member of the American Society of Cinematographers since 2000.

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place_of_birth: Athens, Greece

known_for_department: Camera


Stephen Daldry

biography:
Stephen David Daldry CBE (born 2 May 1960) is an English director and producer of film, theatre, and television. He has won three Tony Awards for his work on Broadway and an Olivier Award for his work in the West End. He has received three Academy Awards nominations for Best Director, for the films Billy Elliot (2000), The Hours (2002), and The Reader (2008).

From 2016 to 2020, he produced and directed the Netflix television series The Crown, for which he received one Producers Guild Award nomination, one Producers Guild Award win, two Primetime Emmy Award nominations, and one Primetime Emmy Award win for Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series and Outstanding Drama Series.

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place_of_birth: Dorset, England


Jamie Bell

biography:
Andrew James Matfin Bell (born March 14, 1986) is an English actor. He rose to prominence for his debut role in Billy Elliot (2000), for which he won the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role, becoming one of the youngest winners of the award. He is also known for his leading roles as Tintin in The Adventures of Tintin (2011) and as Ben Grimm/Thing in Fantastic Four (2015).

Other notable performances include in the films King Kong (2005), Jumper (2008), Snowpiercer (2013), Rocketman (2019), and All of Us Strangers (2023). He earned a second BAFTA Award nomination for his leading performance in Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool (2017). In television, Bell starred as Abraham Woodhull in the AMC historical drama series Turn: Washington's Spies (2014–2017).

Description above from the Wikipedia article Jamie Bell, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

place_of_birth: Billingham, Stockton on Tees, England, UK


Tom Cruise

biography:
Thomas Cruise Mapother IV (born July 3, 1962) is an American actor and film producer. Regarded as a Hollywood icon, he has received various accolades, including an Honorary Palme d'Or, an Academy Honorary Award, and three Golden Globes, in addition to nominations for four competitive Academy Awards. As of 2025, his films have grossed more than $13.3 billion worldwide, placing him among the highest-grossing actors of all time. One of Hollywood's most bankable stars, he is consistently one of the world's highest-paid actors.

Cruise began acting in the early 1980s and made his breakthrough with leading roles in Risky Business (1983) and Top Gun (1986), the latter earning him a reputation as a sex symbol. Critical acclaim came with his roles in the dramas The Color of Money (1986), Rain Man (1988), and Born on the Fourth of July (1989). For his portrayal of Ron Kovic in the latter, he won a Golden Globe Award and received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actor. As a leading Hollywood star in the 1990s, he starred in commercially successful films, including the drama A Few Good Men (1992), the thriller The Firm (1993), the horror film Interview with the Vampire (1994), and the sports comedy-drama Jerry Maguire (1996); for the latter, he won a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor and his second nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actor. Cruise's performance in the drama Magnolia (1999) earned him another Golden Globe Award and a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.

Cruise subsequently established himself as a star of science fiction and action films, often performing his own risky stunts. He played fictional agent Ethan Hunt in the Mission: Impossible film series. His other films in the genre include Vanilla Sky (2001), Minority Report (2002), The Last Samurai (2003), Collateral (2004), War of the Worlds (2005), Knight and Day (2010), Jack Reacher (2012), Oblivion (2013), Edge of Tomorrow (2014), and Top Gun: Maverick (2022).

Cruise holds the Guinness World Record for the most consecutive $100-million-grossing movies, a feat achieved with eleven films released between 2012 and 2025. In December 2024, he was awarded the U.S. Navy's highest civilian honor, the Distinguished Public Service Award, in recognition of his "outstanding contributions" to the military, with his screen roles. In March 2025, he was named the recipient of the British Film Institute Fellowship, the BFI's highest honor, for his contributions to cinema. Forbes ranked him as the world's most powerful celebrity in 2006. He was named People's Sexiest Man Alive in 1990, and received the top honor of "Most Beautiful People" in 1997. Outside his film career, Cruise has been an outspoken advocate for the Church of Scientology, which has resulted in controversy and scrutiny of his involvement in the organization. An aviation enthusiast, he has held a pilot certificate since 1994.

Description above from the Wikipedia Tom Cruise, article licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

place_of_birth: Syracuse, New York, USA


Tim Robbins

biography: Timothy Francis Robbins (born October 16, 1958) is an American actor, screenwriter, director, producer, and musician. He is best known for his portrayal of Andy Dufresne in the prison drama film The Shawshank Redemption (1994).

place_of_birth: West Covina, California, USA


David Koepp

biography:
David Gerard Koepp (born June 9, 1963) is an American screenwriter and director. He is the ninth most successful screenwriter of all time in terms of U.S. box office receipts, with a total gross of over $2.3 billion. Koepp has achieved both critical and commercial success in a wide variety of genres: thriller, science fiction, comedy, action, drama, crime, superhero, horror, adventure, and fantasy.

Some of the best-known films he has written include the sci-fi adventure films Jurassic Park (1993), The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997), and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008); the crime film Carlito's Way (1993); the action spy films Mission: Impossible (1996) and Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit (2014); the superhero film Spider-Man (2002); the sci-fi disaster film War of the Worlds (2005); and the mystery thriller Angels & Demons (2009). Koepp has directed seven feature films over the course of his career: The Trigger Effect (1996), Stir of Echoes (1999), Secret Window (2004), Ghost Town (2008), Premium Rush (2012), Mortdecai (2015), and You Should Have Left (2020).

place_of_birth: Pewaukee, Wisconsin, USA


Jack Nicholson

biography:
John Joseph "Jack" Nicholson (born April 22, 1937) is a retired American actor, film director, producer and writer. He is renowned for his often dark-themed portrayals of neurotic characters. Nicholson has been nominated for Academy Awards 12 times, winning Best Actor for One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and for As Good as It Gets, and Best Supporting Actor for Terms of Endearment. He is tied with Walter Brennan for most acting wins by a male actor (three), and second to Katharine Hepburn for most acting wins overall (four).

He is also one of only two actors nominated for an Academy Award for acting (either lead or supporting) in every decade from the 1960s to 2000s (the other one being Michael Caine). He has won seven Golden Globe Awards, and received a Kennedy Center Honor in 2001. In 1994, he became one of the youngest actors to be awarded the American Film Institute's Life Achievement Award. Notable films in which he has starred include, Easy Rider, Chinatown, The Shining, Reds, Batman, A Few Good Men, About Schmidt, Something's Gotta Give, and The Departed.

place_of_birth: Manhattan, New York, USA


Glenn Close

biography:
Glenda Veronica Close (born March 19, 1947) is an American actress. In a career spanning over five decades on screen and stage, she has received numerous accolades, including three Primetime Emmy Awards, three Tony Awards and three Golden Globe Awards, in addition to nominations for eight Academy Awards, two BAFTA Awards, and three Grammy Awards. She was named by Time as one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2019.

Close received eight Academy Award nominations for playing a feminist mother in The World According to Garp (1982), a baby boomer in The Big Chill (1983), a love interest in The Natural (1984), a psychotic ex-lover in Fatal Attraction (1987), a cunning aristocrat in Dangerous Liaisons (1988), an English butler in Albert Nobbs (2011), a troubled wife in The Wife (2017), and an eccentric grandmother in Hillbilly Elegy (2020). Her other films include Reversal of Fortune (1990), The Paper (1994), and Mars Attacks! (1996), Air Force One (1997), and Guardians of the Galaxy (2014). Close also portrayed Cruella de Vil in 101 Dalmatians (1996) and its 2000 sequel and voiced Kala in Tarzan (1999).

In television, Close received her first Primetime Emmy Award nomination for her role in the film Something About Amelia (1984) and later won three—Outstanding Lead Actress in a Limited Series or Movie for portraying Margarethe Cammermeyer in the NBC film Serving in Silence (1995) and Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series twice consecutively for playing Patty Hewes in Damages (2007–2012).

On stage, Close made her Broadway debut in the play Love for Love (1974). She later won three Tony Awards, two for Best Actress in a Play for her roles in the plays The Real Thing (1983) and Death and the Maiden (1992), and one for Best Actress in a Musical for the musical Sunset Boulevard (1995). She was Tony-nominated for Barnum (1980). She returned to the Broadway stage in a 2014 revival of A Delicate Balance. In 2016, she returned to Sunset Boulevard on the West End stage, earning a Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actress in a Musical nomination.

Close is the president of Trillium Productions and co-founder of the website FetchDog. She has made political donations in support of Democratic politicians. She is vocal on issues such as women's rights, same-sex marriage, and mental health. Married three times, she has one daughter, Annie Starke, from her relationship with producer John Starke.

place_of_birth: Greenwich, Connecticut, USA


Pierce Brosnan

biography:
Pierce Brendan Brosnan, OBE (May 16, 1953) is an Irish actor, film producer and environmentalist who holds Irish and American citizenship.

After leaving school at 16, Brosnan began training in commercial illustration, but trained at the Drama Centre in London for three years. Following a stage acting career he rose to popularity in the television series Remington Steele (1982–87). After Remington Steele, Brosnan took the lead in many films such as Dante's Peak and The Thomas Crown Affair. In 1995, he became the fifth actor to portray secret agent James Bond in the official film series, starring in four films between 1995 and 2002. He also provided his voice and likeness to Bond in the 2004 video game James Bond 007: Everything or Nothing.

Since playing Bond, he has starred in such successes as The Matador (nominated for a Golden Globe, 2005), Mamma Mia! (National Movie Award, 2008), and The Ghost Writer (2010). In 1996, along with Beau St. Clair, Brosnan formed Irish DreamTime, a Los Angeles-based production company.

In later years, he has become known for his charitable work and environmental activism. He was married to Australian actress Cassandra Harris from 1980 until her death in 1991. He married American journalist and author Keely Shaye Smith in 2001, becoming an American citizen in 2004.

place_of_birth: Navan, County Meath, Ireland


Danny DeVito

biography:
Daniel Michael DeVito Jr. (born November 17, 1944) is an American actor, comedian, director, and producer. He first gained prominence as the irascible dispatcher Louie De Palma on Taxi, for which he won a Golden Globe and an Emmy. He plays Frank Reynolds on the long-running sitcom It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia (2006 - present).

In film, DeVito is known for his roles in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975), Terms of Endearment (1983), Head Office (1985), Ruthless People (1986), Twins (1988), Batman Returns (1992), Jack the Bear (1993), Junior (1994), L.A. Confidential (1997), The Big Kahuna (1999), Big Fish (2003), Deck the Halls (2006), When in Rome (2010), Wiener-Dog (2016) and Jumanji: The Next Level (2019). DeVito has voiced characters in numerous animated films including Space Jam (1996), Hercules (1997), The Lorax (2012), Smallfoot (2018), and Migration (2023).  He both directed and starred in several films such as Throw Momma from the Train (1987), The War of the Roses (1989), Matilda (1996), and Death to Smoochy (2002). He has served as a producer on notable films such as Reality Bites (1994), Pulp Fiction (1994), Gattaca (1997), Erin Brockovich (2000), and Garden State (2004).

DeVito married actress Rhea Perlman in 1982; they have three children. The couple separated in 2012.

place_of_birth: Asbury Park, New Jersey, USA


Sarah Jessica Parker

biography:
Sarah Jessica Parker (born March 25, 1965) is an American actress and television producer. She is the recipient of numerous accolades, including six Golden Globe Awards and two Primetime Emmy Awards. Time magazine named her one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2022.

She is known for her role as Carrie Bradshaw on the HBO television series Sex and the City (1998–2004), for which she won two Emmy Awards, four Golden Globe Awards for Best Actress in a Comedy Series and three Screen Actors Guild Awards. The character was widely popular during the airing of the series and was later recognized as one of the greatest female characters in American television. She later reprised the role in films Sex and the City (2008) and Sex and the City 2 (2010), as well as the television show And Just Like That... (2021–present).

Parker made her Broadway debut at the age of 11 in the 1976 revival of The Innocents, before going on to star in the title role of the Broadway musical Annie in 1979. She made her first major film appearances in the 1984 dramas Footloose and Firstborn. Her other film roles include L.A. Story (1991), Honeymoon in Vegas (1992), Hocus Pocus (1993), Ed Wood (1994), The First Wives Club (1996), The Family Stone (2005), Failure to Launch (2006), Did You Hear About the Morgans? (2009), and New Year's Eve (2011).

In 2012, Parker returned to television for the first time since Sex and the City, portraying Isabelle Wright in three episodes of the FOX series Glee. She starred as Frances Dufresne in the HBO series Divorce (2016–2019), for which she was nominated for a Golden Globe Award. Since 2005, she has run her own production company, Pretty Matches, which has been creating content for HBO and other channels.

place_of_birth: Nelsonville, Ohio, USA


Christopher Nolan

biography:
Sir Christopher Edward Nolan (born 30 July 1970) is a British and American filmmaker. As a significant auteur of his generation, he has established himself as a major figure of 21st-century Hollywood. His films have earned over $6 billion worldwide, making him the seventh highest-grossing film director of all time. Nolan's accolades include two Academy Awards, a Golden Globe Award and two British Academy Film Awards. He was appointed as a CBE in 2019 and was knighted in 2024 for his contributions to film.

Nolan developed an interest in filmmaking from a young age. After studying English literature at University College London, he made several short films before his feature film debut with Following (1998). Nolan gained international recognition with his second film, Memento (2000), and transitioned into studio filmmaking with Insomnia (2002). He became a high-profile director with The Dark Knight trilogy (2005–2012). He found further success with The Prestige (2006), Inception (2010), Interstellar (2014) and Dunkirk (2017). After the release of Tenet (2020), Nolan parted ways with longtime distributor Warner Bros. Pictures. He signed with Universal Pictures for Oppenheimer (2023), which won him Academy Awards for Best Director and Best Picture.

Three of Nolan's films have been inducted into the National Film Registry. Infused with a metaphysical outlook, his works thematise epistemology, existentialism, ethics, the construction of time and the malleable nature of memory and personal identity. They feature mathematically inspired images and concepts, unconventional narrative structures, practical special effects, experimental soundscapes, large-format film photography and materialistic perspectives. His enthusiasm for the use and preservation of traditional film stock has also garnered significant attention. He has co-written several of his films with his brother, Jonathan. He runs the production company Syncopy Inc. with his wife, Emma Thomas.

Description above from the Wikipedia article Christopher Nolan, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

place_of_birth: Westminster, London, England, UK


Sylvia Sidney

biography: Sylvia Sidney (born Sophia Kosow, August 8, 1910 – July 1, 1999) was an American stage, screen and film actress whose career spanned over 70 years. She rose to prominence in dozens of leading roles in the 1930s. She later gained attention for her role as Juno, a case worker in the afterlife, in Tim Burton's film Beetlejuice, for which she won a Saturn Award as Best Supporting Actress. She also was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in Summer Wishes, Winter Dreams (1973).

place_of_birth: The Bronx, New York, USA


Carrie-Anne Moss

biography: Carrie-Anne Moss (born August 21, 1967) is a Canadian actress. After early roles on television, she rose to international prominence for her role of Trinity in The Matrix franchise. She has starred in Memento (2000) for which she won the Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Female, Red Planet (2000), Chocolat (2000), Fido (2006), Snow Cake (2006) for which she won the Genie Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role, Disturbia (2007), Unthinkable (2010), Silent Hill: Revelation (2012), and Pompeii (2014). She also portrayed Jeri Hogarth in several television series produced by Marvel Television for Netflix, most notably Jessica Jones (2015–2019).

place_of_birth: Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada


Thomas Lennon

biography:
Thomas Patrick Lennon (born August 9, 1970) is an American actor, comedian, writer, director and producer best known as a cast member on MTV's The State and for his role as Lieutenant Jim Dangle on the Comedy Central series Reno 911!. Andrei Novak on Santa Clarita Diet and Felix Unger on The Odd Couple. He is the screenwriter of several comedies released by major film studios with writing partner Robert Ben Garant. They wrote the Night at the Museum films, The Pacifier, Balls of Fury, and Baywatch

Lennon was born on August 9, 1970 in Oak Park, Illinois. Of Irish and Scottish descent, he is the son of Kathleen (née McSheehy) and Timothy Lennon.  He graduated from Oak Park and River Forest High School in 1988.

At 16, he met friend and future co-star Kerri Kenney at theater camp at Northwestern University. The two later attended NYU, where they joined a comedy troupe called The New Group.

place_of_birth: Oak Park, Illinois, USA


Callum Keith Rennie

biography:
Callum Keith Rennie is a British-born Canadian actor, based in British Columbia. His breakthrough role was as punk rocker Billy Talent in the music mockumentary Hard Core Logo (1996), followed by a starring role as Det. Stanley Raymond Kowalski on the third and fourth seasons of the television series Due South (1997–99). He then won a Genie Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for his performance in the Don McKellar film Last Night (1998).

Rennie's television roles include Leoben Conoy on Battlestar Galactica (2003–09), Lew Ashby on Californication (2008–13), Rick Felder on The Killing (2011–12), Gary Connell on The Man in the High Castle (2016), Karl Malus on Jessica Jones (2018), and Commander Rayner on Star Trek: Discovery (2024). He won a Gemini Award for Best Actor in a Continuing Leading Dramatic Role for his portrayal of Detective Ben Sullivan on Shattered, and a second Genie Award for the film Normal (2007). He has also won four Leo Awards.

place_of_birth: Sunderland, Tyne and Wear, England, UK


Rutger Hauer

biography:
Rutger Oelsen Hauer (January 23, 1944 – July 19, 2019) was a Dutch film actor. He was well known for his roles in Flesh + Blood, Blind Fury, Blade Runner, The Hitcher, Nighthawks, Sin City, Ladyhawke, The Blood of Heroes and Batman Begins.

Hauer was born in Breukelen, Netherlands, to drama teachers Arend and Teunke, and grew up in Amsterdam. Since his parents were very occupied with their careers, he and his three sisters (one older, two younger) were raised mostly by nannies. At the age of 15, Hauer ran off to sea and spent a year scrubbing decks aboard a freighter. Returning home, he worked as an electrician and a carpenter for three years while attending acting classes at night school. He went on to join an experimental troupe, with which he remained for five years before he was cast in the lead role in the very successful 1969 television series Floris, a Dutch Ivanhoe-like medieval action drama. The role made him famous in his native country.

Hauer's career changed course when director Paul Verhoeven cast him as the lead in Turkish Delight (1973) (based on the Jan Wolkers book of the same name). The movie found box-office favour abroad as well as at home, and within two years, its star was invited to make his English-language debut in the British film The Wilby Conspiracy (1975). Set in South Africa and starring Michael Caine and Sidney Poitier, the film was an action melodrama with a focus on apartheid. Hauer's supporting role, however, was barely noticed in Hollywood, and he returned to Dutch films for several years. Hauer made his American debut in the Sylvester Stallone vehicle Nighthawks (1981), cast as a psychopathic and cold-blooded terrorist named "Wolfgar" (after a character in the Old English poem Beowulf). The following year, he appeared in arguably his most famous and acclaimed role as the eccentric, violent, yet sympathetic replicant Roy Batty in Ridley Scott's 1982 sci-fi thriller, Blade Runner.

Hauer was a dedicated environmentalist. He fought for the release of Greenpeace's co-founder, Paul Watson, who was convicted in 1994 for sinking a Norwegian whaling vessel. Hauer has also established an AIDS awareness foundation called the Rutger Hauer Starfish Foundation. He married his second wife, Ineke, in 1985 (they had been together since 1968); and he has one child, actress Aysha Hauer, who was born in 1966 and who made him a grandfather in 1988. In April 2007, he published his autobiography All Those Moments: Stories of Heroes, Villains, Replicants, and Blade Runners (co-written with Patrick Quinlan) where he discussed many of his movie roles. Proceeds of the book go to Hauer's Starfish Foundation.

place_of_birth: Breukelen, Utrecht, Netherlands


M. Emmet Walsh

biography: Michael Emmet Walsh (March 22, 1935 – March 19, 2024) was an American character actor who has appeared in over 200 films and television series, including supporting roles in dozens of major studio features of the 1970s and 1980s.  He starred in Blood Simple (1984), the Coen Brothers' first film for which he won the Independent Spirit Award for Best Male Lead. He also appeared in The Jerk (1979), Ordinary People (1980), Blade Runner (1982), Wild Wild West (1999), and The Iron Giant (1999). His final films included Knives Out (2019) and Brothers (2024).

place_of_birth: Ogdensburg, New York, USA


Shōji Sakai

biography:
Shōji Sakai is a Japanese film editor and director. In 1968, he entered the film department of Tama Art School (now Tama Art University). After graduating in 1971, he studied under editors Shunji Takemura and Osamu Tanaka as an assistant editor. Around 1975, he became an independent editor while working as an assistant director to director Kōji Seki. Around this time, director Kan Mukai founded Universe Productions, and pink films distributed by Toei began to be produced regularly, and since then, his editing work began to increase. At his peak, he edited 10 adult film works in a month. At the end of 2014, Okura Eiga (OP Eiga), which had continued to produce and distribute films on 35mm film, stopped producing films on film. As a result, film editing work also decreased dramatically.

He has edited over 1,200 films (including V-cinema), and currently has 1,076 confirmed theatrical release titles (as of December 2017).

place_of_birth: Nagano Prefecture, Japan

known_for_department: Editing


Moritz Bleibtreu

biography:
Moritz Bleibtreu is a German actor.

Bleibtreu's first appearance on TV was in the late seventies on the children's television series Neues aus Uhlenbusch. This was followed by a role in Ich hatte einen Traum and in the miniseries Mit meinen heißen Tränen.  In 1992 he began his acting career at the Schauspielhaus in Hamburg. He had roles in the films Speed Racer, The Baader Meinhof Complex, Run Lola Run, and Das Experiment.

place_of_birth: Munich, Bavaria, Germany


Tom Schilling

biography: Tom Schilling (born February 10, 1982, in East Berlin) is a German actor and musician. He had his breakthrough in 2000 playing the boarding school student Janosch Schwarze in the feature film Crazy. He became further known through the films Robert Zimmermann Is Wondering About Love, A Coffee in Berlin (Oh Boy), Never Look Away (Werk ohne Autor), and Fabian: Going to the Dogs (Fabian oder Der Gang vor die Hunde). He is also known under his musical alter ego, Die Andere Seite.

place_of_birth: East Berlin, Germany


Patrick Swayze

biography:
Patrick Wayne Swayze (August 18, 1952 – September 14, 2009) was an American actor, dancer and singer-songwriter. Known for his romantic, tough, and comedic roles in blockbusters and cult films, Swayze was nominated for three Golden Globes and received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1997.

Swayze received recognition for acting in the drama film The Outsiders (1983), the action film Red Dawn (1984), and the miniseries North and South (1985–1986). His breakthrough came with the romantic drama film Dirty Dancing (1987), receiving a Golden Globe nomination. He rose to further prominence in the action films Road House (1989) and Point Break (1991), and received two more Golden Globe nominations for his roles in the supernatural romance film Ghost (1990) and the road comedy film To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar (1995). He also had a major role in the cult thriller Donnie Darko (2001).

Outside of acting, Swayze co-wrote and recorded the song "She's Like the Wind" with Stacy Widelitz for the Dirty Dancing soundtrack album, which peaked at number three on the Billboard Hot 100. He was also recognized for his public image and looks, and was named "Sexiest Man Alive" by People magazine in 1991. On September 14, 2009, Swayze died of pancreatic cancer at the age of 57.

Description above from the Wikipedia article Patrick Swayze, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

place_of_birth: Houston, Texas, USA


Michael Byrne

biography: Michael Byrne was a British actor sometimes cast as Nazis such as Colonel Vogel in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Major Schroeder in Force 10 from Navarone, Reinhard Beck in The Scarlet and the Black, General Olbricht in The Plot to Kill Hitler and Obergruppenführer Odilo Globocnik in the BBC radio dramatisation of the novel Fatherland by Robert Harris. Also seen as the aged but fanatical SS General Neurath in "Outpost 2 - Black Sun", former concentration camp commandant and involved in the Nazis's sinister reality-shifting experiments. Byrne appeared as a Jewish concentration camp survivor who is instrumental in the capture of a Nazi war criminal (played by Ian McKellen) in the film Apt Pupil.  He was also familiar to audiences as Smythe, a soldier who attempts to rape William Wallace's wife and first inspires Wallace to seek independence from England in the film Braveheart.  His other film credits include The Eagle Has Landed, A Bridge Too Far, The Medusa Touch, The Saint, Tomorrow Never Dies, The Good Father, The Sum of All Fears, Gangs of New York and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1.  On television, heappeared in Z-Cars, Secret Army, Tales of the Unexpected, The Professionals, The Devil's Crown,Smiley's People, Yes, Prime Minister, Lord Mountbatten - the Last Viceroy, Between The Lines, Sharpe, The Mists of Avalon, Waking the Dead, The Body Farm, Honest, Hamish Macbeth, and Casualty.  From April 2008 to January 2010, Michael starred in Coronation Street, as Ted Page, Gail Platt's long lost father and the ex-lover of Audrey Roberts.  Byrne appeared in State of Play at the Edinburgh Festival written by Zia Trench. He played Romeo to Siân Phillips' Juliet at the Bristol Old Vic.  He was the father of actress Allie Byrne.

place_of_birth: London, England, UK


Daniel Petrie Jr.

biography:
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Daniel Petrie, Jr. (born 1952), the son of Daniel Petrie, Sr., is perhaps best known as the one of the screenwriters of the mid-1980s hit movie, Beverly Hills Cop and The Big Easy as well as the director of Toy Soldiers.

He is currently (October 2004) president of the western chapter of the Writers Guild of America.

Description above from the Wikipedia article Daniel Petrie, Jr., licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

place_of_birth: Canada


Paul Reiser

biography: Paul Reiser (born March 30, 1956) is an American actor, comedian, television writer, and musician. He is known for his roles as Michael Taylor in the 1980s sitcom My Two Dads, Paul Buchman in the NBC sitcom Mad About You, Modell in the 1982 film Diner, Carter Burke in the 1986 film Aliens, as Detective Jeffrey Friedman in Beverly Hills Cop (1984) and Beverly Hills Cop II (1987). More recently, Reiser is recognized as Jim Neiman in the 2014 film Whiplash and Doug Getty in the Amazon Video series Red Oaks.

place_of_birth: New York City, New York, USA


Jonathan Banks

biography:
Jonathan Banks (born January 31, 1947) is an American character actor in film and television.

Banks dropped out of Indiana University to join a touring company as a stage manager. He went to Australia with the company and stayed on working in theatre there. In 1974, he moved to Los Angeles and performed on stage before picking up bit parts on television. Probably his best-known movie roles are in two films starring Eddie Murphy: 48 Hrs. and Beverly Hills Cop. In 48 Hrs. he plays a character who is a friend of the lead and is killed by the villain, beginning the lead characters' story. In Beverly Hills Cop, he plays a villain who kills the lead characters' friend and begins his story. Other movie roles include appearances in Armed and Dangerous, Freejack, Flipper, Airplane!, Gremlins, Murder Me, Murder You, and Under Siege 2: Dark Territory.

His biggest break on television, came with the series Wiseguy, in which he played Frank McPike for four years, a role which led to an Emmy award nomination. Although his character was primarily the hero's mentor, stories occasionally featured McPike as hero. In 1981 he appeared as Dutch Schultz on the NBC series the Gangster Chronicles. He also starred on the short-lived science fiction TV series Otherworld, as Kommander Neveen Kroll and in the sitcom Fired Up.

Banks has also made guest appearances on TV shows including Alias, CSI, Day Break, Highlander: The Series, Matlock, SeaQuest DSV, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Women of the House and Walker Texas Ranger. Most recently, Banks appeared in the final Season Two episodes of Dexter, and in episodes of ER, Cold Case, and Shark, Modern Family. In the second season finale of Breaking Bad, Banks appeared as a mysterious character named Mike. Banks was made a series regular for the third season.

place_of_birth: Washington, D.C., USA


Michael Champion

biography:
Michael Campbell (born in Anderson, Indiana) started his public career as a singer, songwriter and musician in Detroit. In 1967 with a short-lived band called 'The Abstract Reality', a 45 rpm single Love Burns Like A Fire Inside was released. With Bob 'Babbitt' Kreinar, Ray Monette and Andrew Smith he formed Scorpion (1968–1970 band). His name appears as Mike Campbell on Scorpion (1969 album) and Meat Loaf's debut album Stoney & Meatloaf (1971). For this recording, apart from having cowritten four songs, he played the harmonica on Lady Be Mine.

He became an actor by the name Michael Champion and since 1979 played in several TV series and movies such as Diagnosis Murder (1993), Matlock (1989), and The Flash (1991), History of the World: Part I (1981), Beverly Hills Cop (1984), Total Recall (1990) and Toy Soldiers (1991), and video game characters like the terrorist in Flash Traffic: City of Angels (1994) and 'Wolf' in Maximum Surge (1996).

place_of_birth: Anderson, Indiana, USA


Michael Glawogger

biography:
Michael Glawogger (3 December 1959 – 23 April 2014) was an Austrian film director, screenwriter and cinematographer.

From 1981 to 1982, Glawogger studied at the San Francisco Art Institute, and from 1983 to 1989 at the Vienna Film Academy. Like fellow Austrian director Ulrich Seidl, with whom he collaborated several times, he was mainly known for his documentary films, such as Megacities (1998), Workingman's Death (2005) and Whores' Glory (2011). In 2008 he was a member of the jury at the 30th Moscow International Film Festival.

In 2013, Glawogger contributed one chapter to "Cathedrals of Culture", a 3-D film on architecture produced by Wim Wenders.

Four days after incorrectly being diagnosed with typhus, he died from malaria on 22 April 2014 shortly before midnight in Monrovia, Liberia during a movie production. In February 2015, a book of stories entitled 69 Hotelzimmer was released. The stories used hotel rooms Glawogger had visited (or in some cases only heard about in passing) as a departure for stories that reflect the visual richness for which his films are celebrated.

place_of_birth: Graz, Austria


Edward Norton

biography:
Edward Harrison Norton (born August 18, 1969) is an American actor and filmmaker. After graduating from Yale College in 1991 with a degree in history, he worked for a few months in Japan before moving to New York City to pursue an acting career. He gained recognition and critical acclaim for his debut in Primal Fear (1996), which earned him a Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actor and an Academy Award nomination in the same category. His role as a redeemed neo-Nazi in American History X (1998) earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor. He also starred in the film Fight Club (1999), which garnered a cult following.

Norton established the production company Class 5 Films in 2003, and was director or producer of the films Keeping the Faith (2000), Down in the Valley (2005), and The Painted Veil (2006). He continued to receive praise for his acting roles in films such as The Score (2001), 25th Hour (2002), The Italian Job (2003), The Illusionist (2006), Moonrise Kingdom (2012), and The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014). His biggest commercial successes have been Red Dragon (2002), Kingdom of Heaven (2005), The Incredible Hulk (2008), and The Bourne Legacy (2012). For his roles as a haughty actor in Birdman (2014) and Pete Seeger in A Complete Unknown (2024), Norton earned further Academy Award nominations for Best Supporting Actor. He has also directed and acted in the crime film Motherless Brooklyn (2019) and starred in Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery (2022).

Norton is an environmental activist and social entrepreneur. He is a trustee of Enterprise Community Partners, a non-profit organization that advocates for affordable housing, and serves as president of the American branch of the Maasai Wilderness Conservation Trust. He is also the UN Goodwill Ambassador for Biodiversity.

place_of_birth: Boston, Massachusetts, USA


Stacy Keach

biography:
Walter Stacy Keach Jr. (born June 2, 1941) is an American actor, active in theatre, film and television since the 1960s. Keach first distinguished himself in Off-Broadway productions and remains a prominent figure in American theatre across his career, particularly as a noted Shakespearean. He is the recipient of several theatrical accolades: four Drama Desk Awards, two Helen Hayes Awards and two Obie Awards for Distinguished Performance by an Actor. He was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play for his performance in Arthur Kopit's 1969 production of Indians.

In film, he garnered critical acclaim for his portrayal of a washed-up boxer in the John Huston film Fat City (1972) and appeared as Sergeant Stedenko in Cheech & Chong's films Up in Smoke (1978) and Nice Dreams (1981).[4] His other notable film credits include Brewster McCloud (1970), Doc (1971), The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean (1972), The New Centurions (1972), Luther (1974), Slave of the Cannibal God (1978), The Ninth Configuration (1980), The Long Riders (1980), Roadgames (1981), Batman: Mask of the Phantasm (1993), Escape from L.A. (1996), American History X (1998), The Bourne Legacy (2012) and Nebraska (2013).

Keach is known to television audiences for his portrayal of private detective Mike Hammer in television movies and on the television series Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer (1984–1987), for which he was nominated for a Golden Globe, as Ken Titus on the sitcom Titus (2000–2002) and as the narrator of the crime documentary series American Greed (2007–present). He also had a main cast role on the sitcom Man with a Plan (2017–2020) and recurring roles on series such as Prison Break (2005–2007), Two and a Half Men (2010), Blue Bloods (2016–2024) and The Blacklist (2019–2023). He won a Golden Globe and was nominated for an Primetime Emmy Award for playing Ernest Hemingway on the television miniseries Hemingway (1988).

He is an inductee of the Theatre Hall of Fame and was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2019. He is the son of theatre director Stacy Keach Sr., and the older brother of actor James Keach.

place_of_birth: Savannah, Georgia, USA


William Russ

biography:
Handsome 6-foot-1 European-American businessman, entrepreneur, actor and television director.

William Russ was born on October 20, 1950 in Portsmouth, Virginia, USA as William Hardy Russ IV. He is known for his work on Boy Meets World (1993), Wiseguy (1987) and Wanted: Dead or Alive (1986). He is married to Clare Wren. They have two children.

place_of_birth: Portsmouth, Virginia, USA


James Stewart

biography:
James Maitland "Jimmy" Stewart was an American film and stage actor, known for his distinctive voice and his everyman persona. Over the course of his career, he starred in many films widely considered classics and was nominated for five Academy Awards, winning one in competition and receiving one Lifetime Achievement award. He was a major MGM contract star. He also had a noted military career and was a World War II and Vietnam War veteran, who rose to the rank of Brigadier General in the United States Air Force Reserve.

Throughout his seven decades in Hollywood, Stewart cultivated a versatile career and recognized screen image in such classics as Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, The Philadelphia Story, Harvey, It's a Wonderful Life, Shenandoah, Rear Window, Rope, The Man Who Knew Too Much, and Vertigo. He is the most represented leading actor on the AFI's 100 Years…100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition) and AFI's 10 Top 10 lists. He is also the most represented leading actor on the 100 Greatest Movies of All Time list presented by Entertainment Weekly. As of 2007, ten of his films have been inducted into the United States National Film Registry.

Stewart left his mark on a wide range of film genres, including westerns, suspense thrillers, family films, biographies and screwball comedies. He worked for a number of renowned directors later in his career, most notably Alfred Hitchcock, John Ford, Billy Wilder, Frank Capra, George Cukor, and Anthony Mann. He won many of the industry's highest honors and earned Lifetime Achievement awards from every major film organization. He died at age 89, leaving behind a legacy of classic performances, and is considered one of the finest actors of the "Golden Age of Hollywood". He was named the third Greatest Male Star of All Time by the American Film Institute.

place_of_birth: Indiana, Pennsylvania, USA


Billy Bob Thornton

biography: Billy Bob Thornton (born August 4, 1955) is an American actor, screenwriter, director and musician. Thornton gained early recognition as a cast member on the CBS sitcom Hearts Afire and in several early 1990s films including On Deadly Ground and Tombstone. In the mid-1990s, after writing, directing, and starring in the independent film Sling Blade, he won an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. He appeared in several major film roles following Sling Blade 's success, including 1998's Armageddon and A Simple Plan. During the late 1990s, Thornton began a career as a singer-songwriter. He has released three albums and was the singer of a blues rock band.

place_of_birth: Hot Springs, Arkansas, USA


Ben Affleck

biography:
Benjamin Géza Affleck (born August 15, 1972) is an American actor and filmmaker. His accolades include two Academy Awards and three Golden Globe Awards. He began his career as a child when he starred in the PBS educational series The Voyage of the Mimi (1984, 1988). He later appeared in the independent coming-of-age comedy Dazed and Confused (1993) and various Kevin Smith films, including Mallrats (1995), Chasing Amy (1997) and Dogma (1999). Affleck gained wider recognition when he and childhood friend Matt Damon won the Golden Globe and Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for writing Good Will Hunting (1997), which they also starred in. He then established himself as a leading man in studio films, including the disaster film Armageddon (1998), the war drama Pearl Harbor (2001), and the thrillers The Sum of All Fears and Changing Lanes (both 2002).

After a career downturn, during which he appeared in Daredevil (2003) and Gigli (2003), Affleck received a Golden Globe nomination for portraying George Reeves in the noir biopic Hollywoodland (2006). His directorial debut, Gone Baby Gone (2007), which he also co-wrote, was well received. He then directed, co-wrote and starred in the crime drama The Town (2010) and directed and starred in the political thriller Argo (2012); both were critical and commercial successes. For the latter, Affleck won the Golden Globe and BAFTA Award for Best Director, and the Golden Globe, BAFTA, and Academy Award for Best Picture. He has since starred in the psychological thriller Gone Girl (2014), the thriller The Accountant (2016), the action-adventure Triple Frontier (2019), and the sports drama The Way Back (2020). In 2016, he began portraying Batman in superhero films set in the DC Extended Universe.

Affleck is the co-founder of the Eastern Congo Initiative, a grantmaking and advocacy-based nonprofit organization. He is also a stalwart supporter of the Democratic Party. Affleck and Damon are co-owners of the production company Pearl Street Films.

place_of_birth: Berkeley, California, USA