John Malkovich

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

John Malkovich
Image:John Malkovich.jpg John Malkovich at the Grimme Online Award 2005 at Schloss Bensberg.
Born	December 9, 1953 Christopher, Illinois
Height	1.83 m / 6 ft
Notable roles	Biff Loman in Death of a Salesman Mr. Will in Places in the Heart Vicomte Sébastien de Valmont in Dangerous Liaisons Mitch Leary in In the Line of Fire John Horatio Malkovich in Being John Malkovich

John Gavin Malkovicha.k.a. Sirus the Virus from Con Air (born December 9, 1953) is an Academy Award-nominated American actor, producer and director.

1 Biography
2 Political views
3 Selected filmography
4 Director - filmography
- 4.1 Trivia
5 Notes
6 Resources
7 External links

[edit] Biography

[edit] Early life

John Malkovich was born in Christopher, Illinois, to a Croatian father Daniel Malkovich, a state conservation director and publisher of a conservation magazine, and Joe Anne, who owned the Benton Evening News in Benton, Illinois, as well as the Outdoor Illinois.<ref>John Malkovich. Yahoo! Movies.</ref> Because of his father's work, the Malkovich family is widely acknowledged as one of the founding families of the environmental movement in Illinois. By high school, he had transformed himself physically and was a star athlete. He transferred to Illinois State University from Eastern Illinois University, with an interest in ecology, but he soon changed his major to theatre

[edit] Career

Shortly after dropping out of college, Malkovich took on a series of odd jobs to make ends meet: school bus driver, house painter, office supply store employee, and landscaping. In 1976, Malkovich became a charter member of the Steppenwolf Theatre Company in Chicago, Illinois. He moved to New York City in 1983 and appeared in the play True West. He appeared on Broadway with Dustin Hoffman in Death of a Salesman (1984). Malkovich won an Emmy Award for this role when the play became a television movie. One of his first forays into film was as an extra alongside Terry Kinney, George Wendt, Joan Allen, and Laurie Metcalf in Robert Altman's A Wedding (1978).

He made his film debut in Places in the Heart (1984) for which he was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role. He got fame in 1988 playing the leading part of Valmont in Stephen Frears' adaptation of Choderlos de Laclos' Dangerous Liaisons. In 1994, he was nominated for an Oscar in the same category for In the Line of Fire (1993). Malkovich also plays the main villain Cyrus "The Virus" Grissom in the movie "Con Air." Though he played the title role in the Charlie Kaufman-penned Being John Malkovich, he is playing a slight variation of himself, as indicated by the character's middle name of "Horatio". Malkovich has a cameo in the movie Adaptation.—also written by Kaufman—appearing as himself during the filming of Being John Malkovich. The Dancer Upstairs, Malkovich's directorial debut, was released in 2002. He recently appeared in Art School Confidential (2006) as a pompous art professor.

Of the many people he has worked with, Malkovich is often associated with Gary Sinise, a fellow Steppenwolf alum. Also, Joan Allen was a fellow drama student at Eastern Illinois University whom Malkovich brought into Steppenwolf. He met actor John Mahoney in a Chicago acting class years later, and advised him to join Steppenwolf.

John Malkovich has an interest in clothing design and sales,- http://www.unclekimono.com/ is his site regarding a certain style of clothes.

[edit] Personal life

Malkovich was previously married to actress Glenne Headly from 1982 to 1988. They divorced and Malkovich briefly dated Michelle Pfeiffer, co-star on Dangerous Liaisons. Malkovich has been based in France for many years but has recently announced he is ending his residency in that country. He currently resides in Harvard Square in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He and his Italian wife, Nicoletta Peyran, have two children, Amandine and Loewy. The children and their mother are frequently seen in Harvard Square, Cambridge.

On April 4,2005, while speaking at Illinois State University, Malkovich was awarded a diploma in theatre. When attending the university as a student in the 1970s, he failed to take his last remaining graduation requirement, the U.S. Constitution test. This requirement was waived in order to award him the diploma.

[edit] Political views

Politically, Malkovich has described himself a libertarian.<ref>Being John Malkovich. The Age (2003-04-26).</ref><ref>Praying (or not) for a little publicity. New York Daily News (2004-02-20).</ref> Malkovich supports some of the policies of President George W. Bush and the war in Iraq. Malkovich is a supporter of the government of Israel and the death penalty.[1] When the Chicago serial killer John Wayne Gacy was executed in 1994, Malkovich organised a champagne party for he and his friends. Actor William Hootkins, who worked with Malkovich in BBC television's Rocket to the Moon, stated "In fact he's so Right-wing you have to wonder if he's kidding."[2]

In the United Kingdom in 2002 at the Cambridge Union Society, when asked whom he would most like to "fight to the death," he replied that he would rather just shoot journalist Robert Fisk and British MP George Galloway. <ref>MP stunned at actor's outburst. BBC News (2002-05-04).</ref>

When he was interviewed by The Observer, Malkovich elaborated on his comments: "I hate somebody who is supposed to be a Middle Eastern expert who thinks Jesus was born in Jerusalem. I hate what I consider his vile anti-semitism." (With his comment, Malkovich seems to have misinterpreted a line from Fisk's "The Great War for Civilization." The sentence from the book (p. 501) actually reads, "If this was a war on terror [...] then Jesus was not born in Bethlehem.")

Malkovich then added: "I'm a [Christopher] Hitchens fan myself. But no one has thinner skins than journalists, in my experience, and I come from a family of them. [His mother owns the Benton Evening News in Illinois; his brother edits it.] They can dish it out but they can't take it. But the reason I don't like the topic, why I don't really say anything about a whiner like Fisk, is it gives them more oxygen."<ref>Guardian.co.uk. Life and taxes.</ref>

Fisk reacted with outrage. [3]