George Clooney
George Timothy Clooney (born May 6, 1961) is an Academy Award-nominated American actor, director and screenwriter, known for his former role in the long-running television drama ER (1994–99).
Family life
Born in Lexington, Kentucky and raised in Augusta, Kentucky, Clooney is the son of Nina Bruce Warren and Cincinnati news anchor and TV host Nick Clooney, a nephew of actress and singer Rosemary Clooney, and a cousin of actor Miguel Ferrer; another cousin, Gabriel Ferrer, is an Episcopal priest, married to Debby Boone. He is a strong supporter of the Communist Party and is of mostly Irish American heritage, although he also has some distant German ancestry. He currently has a villa on Lake Como in Italy, where he spends much of his time.
Film career
Clooney got his start in Los Angeles, a young college dropout from Kentucky who spent most of his "struggling actor" years riding to auditions on a bicycle. During this time, he also befriended another actor named Grant Heslov, a close friend and frequent collaborator with Clooney who co-wrote Good Night, and Good Luck.. Heslov is also the president of Section 8 Entertainment, Clooney's and director Steven Soderbergh's production company. In a bit of trivia, Clooney said in an interview that he was driving an RV through the country with Heslov, who was getting over a broken engagement. Clooney said he got a phone call from his agent telling him that NBC just picked up E/R for a full season when Clooney said "I think I just got my career."
His first major role was in a television medical comedy/drama, E/R. He played a handyman on the series The Facts of Life. But he first gained attention in his semi-regular supporting role in the sitcom Roseanne, playing Roseanne Barr's overbearing boss. He has also appeared in a number of movies such as Return of the Killer Tomatoes (1988), From Dusk Till Dawn (1996), One Fine Day (1996), Batman & Robin (1997), Out of Sight (1998), Three Kings (1999), The Perfect Storm (2000), O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000), Ocean's Eleven (2001), Welcome to Collinwood (2002), Intolerable Cruelty (2003), and Ocean's Twelve (2004), along with guest appearances on sitcoms such as Roseanne and Friends. He made his debut as a film director in the 2002 feature Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, an adaptation of the implausible autobiography of groundbreaking TV producer Chuck Barris.
Many speculated he would follow the same career path as David Caruso who infamously left N.Y.P.D. Blue at the height of its success for a failed screen career, when Clooney made the decision to leave ER. As a stipulation in a new contract, Clooney would return to the series in an occasional guest spot, which he only had to do once when his film career ignited, most famously with The Perfect Storm (2000).
On July 8, 2005, news reports said that George Clooney, Brad Pitt, and Matt Damon will be working with Cindy Crawford's husband Rande Gerber to design and build a new casino hotel in Las Vegas just off the Las Vegas Strip. Mr. Gerber is the one behind Green Valley Ranch Resort and Spa's Whiskey Sky, so he is already familiar with the Las Vegas entertainment market. Pitt has some design experience, having worked with Frank Gehry on a project in England. On August 29, 2005, Clooney officially announced his involvement with the Las Ramblas Resort project.
In 1995, Clooney received a tape version of The Spirit of Christmas, the video greeting card which would inspire South Park. Clooney thought it was so funny that he made copies and sent it around the LA area. Matt Stone and Trey Parker were so thankful for his help that they invited him to play a role in the show, and he ended up voicing Stan Marsh's gay dog Sparky in the episode Big Gay Al's Big Gay Boat Ride, a role with no dialogue except normal dog noises. He later appeared in the film South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut. Despite this history, show creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone lampooned Clooney for his outspoken political views in their feature film Team America: World Police. However, this was after Clooney said that he would have been offended if he weren't made fun of in the film.
On January 16, 2006, Clooney's performance in Syriana earned him a Golden Globe Award for Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role. Upon accepting the award, Clooney paused during his acceptance speech to sarcastically thank disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff before adding, “Who would name their kid Jack with the last words ‘off’ at the end of your last name? No wonder that guy is screwed up.”
Clooney has recently been nominated for the David Lean Award for Achievement in Directing by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts BAFTA for Good Night and Good Luck.
On January 31, 2006, Clooney was nominated for 3 Academy Awards one of them for best supporting actor for Syriana, and two nominations for directing and co-writing the screenplay for "Good Night, and Good Luck." Clooney became the first person in Oscar history to be nominated for directing one movie and appearing in another in the same year.
Controversial Statements
Along with his public criticisms of Jack Abramoff and other Republicans, Clooney once remarked, "Charlton Heston announced again today that he is suffering from Alzheimer's." When asked if he went too far with his comment, he said, "I don't care. Charlton Heston is the head of the National Rifle Association. He deserves whatever anyone says about him." [1]
Medical problems
He has battled a bad back [2] which had caused him to cancel some promotional appearances, and made it impossible to find insurance coverage to make a film. For this reason, he has put up his house for collateral and continues his professional career.
In 2005, Clooney played Bob Barnes, a character loosely based on former CIA agent Robert Baer, in the movie Syriana (based somewhat on Baer's memoirs of being an agent in the Middle East). During the filming of a scene in which Barnes is tortured, Clooney was tied to a chair, and the chair was accidentally kicked over [3]. Clooney hit his head on the concrete floor, tearing his dura mater. His doctors dismissed his complaints until his nose began leaking cerebrospinal fluid, and he has since undergone multiple operations to correct this.
Clooney suffered from Bell's palsy for a time while he was in high school.
Filmography
- Grizzly II: The Predator (1987) (unreleased)
- Return to Horror High (1987)
- Return of the Killer Tomatoes! (1988)
- Red Surf (1990)
- Unbecoming Age (1992)
- The Harvest (1993)
- From Dusk Till Dawn (1996)
- Curdled (Didn't appear in film, photo showed. 1996)
- One Fine Day (1996)
- Batman & Robin (1997)
- Full Tilt Boogie (1997) (documentary)
- The Peacemaker (1997)
- Waiting for Woody (1998) (short subject)
- Out of Sight (1998)
- The Thin Red Line (1998)
- South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut (1999) (voice)
- The Book That Wrote Itself (1999) (Cameo)
- Three Kings (1999)
- O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000)
- The Perfect Storm (2000)
- Spy Kids (2001)
- Ocean's Eleven (2001)
- Starbuck Holger Meins (2002) (documentary)
- Welcome to Collinwood (2002) (also executive producer and producer)
- Solaris (2002)
- Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002) (also director)
- Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over (2003)
- Intolerable Cruelty (2003)
- Ocean's Twelve (2004) (also executive producer)
- Good Night, and Good Luck (2005) (also director and co-writer)
- Syriana (2005) (also producer)
- The Good German (2006) (post production. Possible Premiere at Cannes, May 2006 )
- The Winter Hill Gang (2006) (Rumored)
- Michael Clayton (2006) (Filming began January 30, 2006) (also producer)
- Ocean's Thirteen (2007)
- Burn After Reading (Announced)
- Hail, Caesar (With the Coen Brothers. Announced)
External links
- George Clooney at IMDb
- The Sunday Times interview 12/2005
- MIT interview 12/2005
- NPR interview 10/2005
- Clooney Network. Includes thousands of photos, articles, interviews, video clips and more. (fan site)
- Clooney Studio (fan site)