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| Birth Name(s) : Charles Robert Redford Jr. |
Date of Birth: August 18, 1937 |
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| Profession:
Actor |
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Full Robert Redford Biography
Born on August 18, 1937, in Santa Monica, California, to Charles Robert Redford, an accountant for Standard Oil, and Martha Redford, who died in 1955, the year he graduated high school, Charles Robert Redford, Jr. was a scrappy kid who stole hubcaps in high school and lost his college baseball scholarship at the University of Colorado because of drunkenness.
TV and stage experience coupled with all-American good looks led to movies and a breakthrough role as the Sundance Kid, in 1969, when the actor was thirty-two. Way We Were, The (1973) and Sting, The (1973), both in 1973, made Redford No. 1 at the box office for the next three years. Redford used his clout to advance environmental causes and his riches to acquire Utah property, which he transformed into a ranch and the Sundance ski resort. In 1980, he established the Sundance Institute for aspiring filmmakers.
In 1980, he established the Sundance Institute for aspiring filmmakers. Its annual film festival has become one of the world's most influential. |
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Additional Robert Redford Biography
Robert Redford (born Charles Robert Redford, Jr. on August 18, 1936), is an American motion picture actor, director, producer, businessman, model, environmentalist, and philanthropist.
Redford was born in Santa Monica, California, to Charles Robert Redford, Sr., a milkman turned accountant, and Martha W. Hart. He has a half-brother, William, from his father's re-marriage. Redford graduated from Van Nuys High School in Los Angeles, California, in 1954 and received a baseball scholarship to the University of Colorado, where he was a pitcher and a member of the Kappa Sigma fraternity. He lost the scholarship due to adolescent drinking, fueled in part by the death of his mother when Redford was 18. Redford was later a painting student at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn and took classes in theatrical set design at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City. He currently resides in Sundance, Utah.
In 1980, Redford's directorial debut, Ordinary People, won him the Academy Award for Directing; his 1994 film, Quiz Show, was nominated for best director, but lost to Forrest Gump. Along with Warren Beatty, Clint Eastwood, Mel Gibson, Richard Attenborough, and Kevin Costner, Redford is one of the few major actors to win an Academy Award for Best Director. Despite a number of critically acclaimed roles, he has never won an Academy Award for acting (the closest he came was a nomination for The Sting). His only Oscar came for directing Ordinary People.
Redford made his screen debut in War Hunt (1962), co-starring with John Saxon in a film set during the last days of the Korean War. This film also marked the debuts of Sydney Pollack and Tom Skerritt. After his Broadway success, he was cast in larger feature roles in movies. He played a bisexual movie star who marries starlet Natalie Wood in Inside Daisy Clover (1965) and rejoined her for Pollack's This Property Is Condemned (1966)—again as her lover. The same year saw his first teaming with Jane Fonda (Arthur Penn's pallid The Chase, in which he was a fugitive on the run). Fonda and Redford were paired to better effect in the big screen version of Barefoot in the Park (1967), and were again co-stars in Pollack's The Electric Horseman (1979).
His next few films, while not artistic losses, were hardly hits at the box office. Downhill Racer (1969), for which he served as executive producer, was a look at the world of competitive skiing; Tell Them Willie Boy Is Here (1969), Little Fauss and Big Halsey (1970), The Hot Rock (1972) did little to augment Redford's stardom. The wilderness drama Jeremiah Johnson (1972) was a critical and box office hit and was reportedly one of Redford's favorite roles. His next real success came with the incisive political satire The Candidate (1972), which traded on his Golden Boy image to skewer Watergate-era Washington.
His second stint behind the camera would not be for another eight years with The Milagro Beanfield War (1988), a well-crafted—though not commercially successful screen version of John Nichols' acclaimed novel of the Southwest. Other directorial projects have included the successful period family drama A River Runs Through It (1992), based on Norman Maclean's novella, and the intelligent expose Quiz Show (1994), about the quiz show scandal of the late 1950’s. Working from a screenplay by Paul Attanasio with noted cinematographer Michael Ballhaus and a strong cast that featured John Turturro, Rob Morrow and Ralph Fiennes. Redford's skill behind the camera earned him well-deserved praise. Redford handpicked Morrow for his part in the film (his only high profile feature film role to date), because he liked his work on Northern Exposure.
Robert Redford is politically liberal, and has supported environmentalism and Native American rights. Most of his federal political contributions have been to Democrats (61.0%) or special interest groups (34.6%) like the DGA-PAC, the Political Action Committee of the Directors Guild of America ($8,100). He did break ranks and contributed to two Republicans, Brent Cornell Morris in 1990 and Gary R. Herbert in 1994, both running for Utah's 3rd congressional district (both Morris and Herbert lost their congressional bids in the primaries). |
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Robert Redford Quote(s)
| As a director, I wouldn't like me as an actor. As an actor, I wouldn't like me as a director. |
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