Celebrity Names with the Letter J: Part 9
I never realized how many people have their first name start with J. This is part 9 of the list of celebs with their first name beginning with J. I'm doing this so you can easier learn about a celebrity you may be curious about, or learn about the lesser known actors and actresses. Click on a name to learn more about that celebrity. Enjoy!
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- Actor
- Writer
- Composer
John Ventimiglia is an American actor. He portrayed Artie Bucco in the HBO television series The Sopranos and had a recurring role as Dino Arbogast, an Organized Crime Control Bureau Chief for the NYPD, on the American police procedural/drama series Blue Bloods on CBS. Ventimiglia was born in Ridgewood, Queens to Sicilian immigrants and grew up in Teaneck, New Jersey. He graduated from Teaneck High School in 1981 where he played on the football team.- Actor
- Production Manager
- Soundtrack
John Vernon was a prolific stage-trained Canadian character player who made a career out of convincingly playing crafty villains, morally-bankrupt officials and heartless authority figures in American films and television since the 1960s. Vernon was directed by some stellar filmmakers, including Alfred Hitchcock (Topaz (1969)); George Cukor (Justine (1969)); Don Siegel (Dirty Harry (1971)) and Clint Eastwood (The Outlaw Josey Wales (1976)). After training at London's Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and honing his skills in Canadian theatre and television, Vernon made his US film debut in John Boorman's noir/gangster classic Point Blank (1967) as a trusted friend who betrays Lee Marvin. He again failed to inspire confidence as the ineffectual mayor of San Francisco in Dirty Harry (1971). Vernon may be best remembered as the sinister Dean Vernon Wormer in John Landis' National Lampoon's Animal House (1978), a role he reprised for the TV spin-off Delta House (1979). This led to more film comedy roles, a highlight being Mr. Big in the blaxploitation spoof I'm Gonna Git You Sucka (1988).- Actor
- Music Department
- Soundtrack
John Waters is one of Australia's most recognised and respected television, film and theatrical actors. He was born in London, England on December 8 1948, to Scottish actor Russell Waters and wife Barbara. The family, including siblings Philip, Angela, Stephen and Fiona, lived in a rented top floor 2 bedroom flat in 56c Anlaby Road, Teddington, Middlesex close to the Thames TV studios.
Growing up around his fathers film studio's found him catching the acting bug early. His youngest appearance was at age ten in the original Titanic movie A Night To Remember, followed by a Disney classic Dr Syn and a bit part in Z Cars. John attended Hampton Grammar School from approx 1960 to 1967, appearing as Macbeth in the school play in about 1966 complete with the normally banned long hair.
As a teen he lived every boyhood dream, singing and playing bass in a rock and roll band called The Riots.
In 1968 he took the "ten pound" opportunity offered by the Australian government and sailed to Australia with his guitar and a few pounds in his pocket. He worked on a sheep station before moving to Sydney, where he was working as a storeman by day and frontman of a cover band at night. He soon heard a US film called Adam's Woman, starring Beau Bridges, was being filmed in NSW and got a job as a grip on set. Cast members, including Helen Morse, recommended he try auditioning for an up and coming new musical. He did, and landed the lead role of Claude in Sydney's 1969 production of the landmark rock musical, Hair. This was followed by the role of Judas in Godspell.
This led to an acting career on stage, film and television that elevated him to his current status as Australia's most versatile leading man.
In order to appear a more mature actor, John added 5 years to his age in the early 70s. This, along with exciting stories of how he came to acquire the famous scar beneath his left eye (anything from sword fight in Algiers to bar brawls in Paris), enabled John to get many of the most sought after roles in Australia at the time.
Articles in womens magazines had John celebrating his 40th birthday several years too early. Around the late 80s - early 90s John gradually let the extra years slip until he was back to his real age - where he has remained ever since.
And as for that scar, barely visible thru the rugged character lines etched upon his face these days, but so darned appealing 'back then', an interview with his sister Fizz in 2002 revealed it to be no more than a childhood mishap with some traffic that was never treated properly by the doctor.
John wasnt the first actor in the world to embelish his age or past, and he certainly wont be the last. Thats showbiz folks. After all, a 29 year old with a scar from a brawl in Paris certainly sounds more exciting than a 24 year old who came off a footpath as a kid !! Funnily- while John was able to revert back to his correct age eventually, one
While he played hard nosed criminals, policemen, soldiers and murderers on television through the 70s, the other side of John was enthralling an audience of 5 year olds (and thier mums) as he had tea and played dress ups with Jemima and Big Ted as a regular host of Play School for 10 years.
As a television actor John was the brooding Sgt. McKellar of ABC TV's Rush which earned him a Logie Award for Best New Talent, and the sexy paddlesteamer captain Brenton Edwards in All The Rivers Run. He guest starred in everything from Homicide to The Box, Good Guys Bad Guys, The Man From Snowy River, All Together Now and Young Lions. Not forgeting the memorable mini series and telemovies of the 80s Nancy Wake, Alice To Nowhere and Singapore Sling.
He also starred in the ABC series Fireflies and Channel 7's hospital drama All Saints (for which he received a 2006 AFI Award nomination for "Best Guest or Supporting Actor in a TV Drama"). In 2010 he guest starred in Channel 9's Underbelly - The Golden Mile and Sea Patrol , channel 7's City Homicide and earned a lead role in the Ch10 series Offspring. In 2012 John starred in the ABC mystery drama telemovie The Mystery of the Hansom Cab.
As a presenter/narrator/spokesman he has been seen and heard on ad campaigns for The Bankers Trust, MBF Health Fund, Birdseye, Sudafed, Uncle Toby's Porridge, Qantas , Telstra, Mao's Last Dancer, MLC, Arnotts, Sydney Wildlife World, Toyota Hybrid Camry, Continental Tortilla Stacks. He has narrated programs such as Mind Games: Real Life Adventures, Nostradamus, Triple Zero Heroes and Kapyong.
On film John has appeared in many Australian productions, from End Play, Summerfield, Breaker Morant, Eliza Frazer, Boulevard of Broken Dreams, The Getting Of Wisdom, Bushfire Moon, Heaven Tonight, The Real McCaw, The Bouncer, Centre Place and The Return to Nim's Island alongside Bindi Irwin.
John is a big supporter of up and coming Australian film makers and adds gravitas to their casting by appearing in their short films including Ragtime, Worm and Luck.
As a theatrical performer John has starred in all the classics from Hair to Godspell, Dracula, Jesus Christ Superstar, My Fair Lady, The Sound Of Music, They're Playing Our Song, The Hunting of the Snark, A Little Night Music, Love Letters, Children of a Lesser God, Oliver, The Graduate, An Ideal Husband , Influence, The Rocky Horror Show and The Swimming Club. In 2013 John starred as Gomez Addams in The Addams Family Musical.
He wrote, financed and composed the rock musical ReUnion with friend Stewart D'Arrietta. He and Stewart also wrote the one man show Looking Through a Glass Onion, based on the life of John Lennon and toured nationally regularly since 1992 and also played six months in London's West End in 1995. Glass Onion returned in an all new season for 2010-2011 and again for full Australian tours in 2012 - 2014 and will head to New York in 2014.
He performed a one-man Cabaret season as Jacques Brel in Cafe Brel in the 70's and brought the show back to life as BREL in 2010 followed by the release of a cd of the same name. He has performed the songs of Lennon & McCartney with Christine Anu, Leo Sayer & Rick Price in Let It Be in 2006, and with Jon Stevens, Jack Jones and Doug Parkinson in 2010.
John's solo album Cloudland was released in 2010 and features his own work as well as a couple of special covers. He has also released a new CD version of Pilliga Pete and Clarrie the Cocky, a childrens story & songs first released in the 80s.
John has been imortalised on canvas twice when portraits of him have been entered in the esteemed Archibald Prize in 2001 and 2014.
On the family side, John's first marriage was to actress Jenny Cullen - a union that produced children Ivan and Rebecca. His second marriage was to actress Sally Conabere. His third marriage, to Zoe Burton, was in January 2002 and they became parents to son Archie in January 2003 and twins Gloria & Rusty in September 2006.
John continues to be one of the hardest working and most employable actors in Australia. Happily married for the third time, he is a father of 5 and grandfather of 2.- Actor
- Writer
- Director
Growing up in Baltimore in the 1950s, John Waters was not like other children; he was obsessed by violence and gore, both real and on the screen. With his weird counter-culture friends as his cast, he began making silent 8mm and 16mm films in the mid-'60s; he screened these in rented Baltimore church halls to underground audiences drawn by word of mouth and street leafleting campaigns. As his filmmaking grew more polished and his subject matter more shocking, his audiences grew bigger, and his write-ups in the Baltimore papers more outraged. By the early 1970s he was making features, which he managed to get shown in midnight screenings in art cinemas by sheer perseverance. Success came when Pink Flamingos (1972) - a deliberate exercise in ultra-bad taste - took off in 1973, helped no doubt by lead actor Divine's infamous dog-crap eating scene.
Waters continued to make low-budget shocking movies with his Dreamland repertory company until Hollywood crossover success came with Hairspray (1988), and although his movies nowadays might now appear cleaned up and professional, they retain Waters' playfulness, and reflect his lifelong obsessions.- Actor
- Producer
- Art Department
John Wayne was born Marion Robert Morrison in Iowa, to Mary Alberta (Brown) and Clyde Leonard Morrison, a pharmacist. He was of English, Scottish, Ulster-Scots, and Irish ancestry.
Clyde developed a lung condition that required him to move his family from Iowa to the warmer climate of southern California, where they tried ranching in the Mojave Desert. Until the ranch failed, Marion and his younger brother Robert E. Morrison swam in an irrigation ditch and rode a horse to school. When the ranch failed, the family moved to Glendale, California, where Marion delivered medicines for his father, sold newspapers and had an Airedale dog named "Duke" (the source of his own nickname). He did well at school both academically and in football. When he narrowly failed admission to Annapolis he went to USC on a football scholarship 1925-7. Tom Mix got him a summer job as a prop man in exchange for football tickets. On the set he became close friends with director John Ford for whom, among others, he began doing bit parts, some billed as John Wayne. His first featured film was Men Without Women (1930). After more than 70 low-budget westerns and adventures, mostly routine, Wayne's career was stuck in a rut until Ford cast him in Stagecoach (1939), the movie that made him a star. He appeared in nearly 250 movies, many of epic proportions. From 1942-43 he was in a radio series, "The Three Sheets to the Wind", and in 1944 he helped found the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, a Conservative political organization, later becoming its President. His conservative political stance was also reflected in The Alamo (1960), which he produced, directed and starred in. His patriotic stand was enshrined in The Green Berets (1968) which he co-directed and starred in. Over the years Wayne was beset with health problems. In September 1964 he had a cancerous left lung removed; in 1977 when Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope was being made, John Waynes archive voice was used for the character Garindan ezz Zavor, later in March 1978 there was heart valve replacement surgery; and in January 1979 his stomach was removed. He received the Best Actor nomination for Sands of Iwo Jima (1949) and finally got the Oscar for his role as one-eyed Rooster Cogburn in True Grit (1969). A Congressional Gold Medal was struck in his honor in 1979. He is perhaps best remembered for his parts in Ford's cavalry trilogy - Fort Apache (1948), She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949) and Rio Grande (1950).- Producer
- Writer
- Director
John Wells is one of the most prolific writers, directors and producers for television, film and the stage. Over the past two decades, Wells has been a creative force behind some of primetime's biggest hit series, including ER, The West Wing, Third Watch and China Beach. He is currently Executive Producer of the hit NBC crime drama Southland.
Shows produced by John Wells have received an astounding 267 Emmy nominations with 55 Emmy wins, not to mention 5 Peabody Awards, and numerous People's Choice Awards, Producers Guild Awards, a HUMANITAS Prize (nominated 7 times), as well as numerous distinctions from health care organizations across the country for ER. During its fifteen year run, ER earned 122 Emmy nominations, the most in television history.
A seven-time Writers Guild Award nominee, in 2007, Wells received the WGA's prestigious Paddy Chayefsky Television Laurel Award, given to writers who have advanced the literature of television and made outstanding contributions to the profession of television writers. In 2005, Wells was awarded the David Susskind Achievement Award in Television from the Producers Guild of America.
Wells and his team at John Wells Productions have a number of high-profile films in various stages of production and development.
Wells recently wrote and directed The Company Men, a drama set against the backdrop of affluent Boston suburbs that vividly portrays the struggles of families coping with the current ongoing economic meltdown. The film marks Wells' feature film directorial debut with an extraordinary ensemble cast including Academy Award® winners Ben Affleck, Kevin Costner, Tommy Lee Jones and Chris Cooper, as well as Emmy® winner Craig T. Nelson and Golden Globe nominee Maria Bello.
As a producer, Wells' most recent motion-picture credits include: Carroll Ballard's critically-acclaimed drama Duma, a children's film starring Hope Davis and Campbell Scott; Peter Kosminsky's adaptation of Janet Fitch's critically acclaimed novel White Oleander, starring Alison Lohman, Robin Wright Penn, Michelle Pfeiffer and Renée Zellweger; and Neil Jordan's The Good Thief, starring Nick Nolte. Wells also served as a producer on Andrzej Bartkowiak's Doom, based upon the popular video game and starring Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson.
In an arrangement unique to the business, John Wells Productions also funds Killer Films, the independent operation of Christine Vachon, Pam Koffler and Katie Roumel. For Killer Films, Wells executive produced Todd Haynes' innovative Bob Dylan biopic I'm Not There, Tom Kalin's Savage Grace, Douglas McGrath's Infamous, Mary Harron's The Notorious Bettie Page and Phyllis Nagy's Mrs. Harris for HBO, which garnered several Emmy nominations. Also in collaboration with Killer Films was Todd Haynes' Far From Heaven, Mark Romanek's One Hour Photo, Todd Graff's Camp, Fenton Bailey's Party Monster, Robert Altman's The Company, Michael Mayer's A Home at the End of the World and John Waters' A Dirty Shame.
As a TV producer, Wells' diverse projects include series Smith, The Evidence and Jonny Zero, as well as telemovies Dark Shadows (2004) and The Big Time (2002). Wells' award-winning stage productions include Judgement, Balm in Gilead, Battery and She Also Dances.
Wells served as President of the Writers Guild of America, West (1999-2001) and was vital to the success of the 2001 MBA contract negotiations.
Born in Alexandria, Virginia, and raised in Denver, Colorado, Wells graduated from Carnegie-Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, with a bachelor of fine arts and later earned a Masters degree in film and television at the University of Southern California, where he also serves on the school's Television Executive Advisory Council.- Actor
- Script and Continuity Department
- Director
John White was born on 10 June 1981 in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. He is an actor and director, known for American Pie Presents: The Naked Mile (2006), American Pie Presents: Beta House (2007) and BlackBerry (2023).- Music Department
- Composer
- Actor
As one of the best known, awarded, and financially successful composers in US history, John Williams is as easy to recall as John Philip Sousa, Aaron Copland or Leonard Bernstein, illustrating why he is "America's composer" time and again. With a massive list of awards that includes over 52 Oscar nominations (five wins), twenty-odd Gold and Platinum Records, and a slew of Emmy (two wins), Golden Globe (three wins), Grammy (25 wins), National Board of Review (including a Career Achievement Award), Saturn (six wins), American Film Institute (including a Lifetime Achievement Award) and BAFTA (seven wins) citations, along with honorary doctorate degrees numbering in the teens, Williams is undoubtedly one of the most respected composers for Cinema. He's led countless national and international orchestras, most notably as the nineteenth conductor of the Boston Pops Orchestra from 1980-1993, helming three Pops tours of the US and Japan during his tenure. He currently serves as the Pop's Conductor Laureate. Also to his credit is a parallel career as an author of serious, and some not-so-serious, concert works - performed by the likes of Mstislav Rostropovich, André Previn, Itzhak Perlman, Yo-Yo Ma, Gil Shaham, Leonard Slatkin, James Ingram, Dale Clevenger, and Joshua Bell. Of particular interests are his Essay for Strings, a jazzy Prelude & Fugue, the multimedia presentation American Journey (aka The Unfinished Journey (1999)), a Sinfonietta for Winds, a song cycle featuring poems by Rita Dove, concerti for flute, violin, clarinet, trumpet, tuba, cello, bassoon and horn, fanfares for the 1984, 1988 and 1996 Summer Olympics, the 2002 Winter Olympics, and a song co-written with Alan Bergman and Marilyn Bergman for the Special Olympics! But such a list probably warrants a more detailed background...
Born in Flushing, New York on February 8, 1932, John Towner Williams discovered music almost immediately, due in no small measure to being the son of a percussionist for CBS Radio and the Raymond Scott Quintet. After moving to Los Angeles in 1948, the young pianist and leader of his own jazz band started experimenting with arranging tunes; at age 15, he determined he was going to become a concert pianist; at 19, he premiered his first original composition, a piano sonata.
He attended both UCLA and the Los Angeles City College, studying orchestration under MGM musical associate Robert Van Eps and being privately tutored by composer Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco, until conducting for the first time during three years with the U.S. Air Force. His return to the states brought him to Julliard, where renowned piano pedagogue Madame Rosina Lhevinne helped Williams hone his performance skills. He played in jazz clubs to pay his way; still, she encouraged him to focus on composing. So it was back to L.A., with the future maestro ready to break into the Hollywood scene.
Williams found work with the Hollywood studios as a piano player, eventually accompanying such fare such as the TV series Peter Gunn (1958), South Pacific (1958), Some Like It Hot (1959), The Apartment (1960), and To Kill a Mockingbird (1962), as well as forming a surprising friendship with Bernard Herrmann. At age 24, "Johnny Williams" became a staff arranger at Columbia and then at 20th Century-Fox, orchestrating for Alfred Newman and Lionel Newman, Dimitri Tiomkin, Franz Waxman, and other Golden Age notables. In the field of popular music, he performed and arranged for the likes of Vic Damone, Doris Day, and Mahalia Jackson... all while courting actress/singer Barbara Ruick, who became his wife until her death in 1974. John & Barbara had three children; their daughter is now a doctor, and their two sons, Joseph Williams and Mark Towner Williams, are rock musicians.
The orchestrating gigs led to serious composing jobs for television, notably Alcoa Premiere (1961), Checkmate (1960), Gilligan's Island (1964), Lost in Space (1965), Land of the Giants (1968), and his Emmy-winning scores for Heidi (1968) and Jane Eyre (1970). Daddy-O (1958) and Because They're Young (1960) brought his original music to the big theatres, but he was soon typecast doing comedies. His efforts in the genre helped guarantee his work on William Wyler's How to Steal a Million (1966), however, a major picture that immediately led to larger projects. Of course, his arrangements continued to garner attention, and he won his first Oscar for adapting Fiddler on the Roof (1971).
During the '70s, he was King of Disaster Scores with The Poseidon Adventure (1972), Earthquake (1974) and The Towering Inferno (1974). His psychological score for Images (1972) remains one of the most innovative works in soundtrack history. But his Americana - particularly The Reivers (1969) - is what caught the ear of director Steven Spielberg, then preparing for his first feature, The Sugarland Express (1974). When Spielberg reunited with Williams on Jaws (1975), they established themselves as a blockbuster team, the composer gained his first Academy Award for Original Score, and Spielberg promptly recommended Williams to a friend, George Lucas. In 1977, John Williams re-popularized the epic cinema sound of Erich Wolfgang Korngold, Franz Waxman and other composers from the Hollywood Golden Age: Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope (1977) became the best selling score-only soundtrack of all time, and spawned countless musical imitators. For the next five years, though the music in Hollywood changed, John Williams wrote big, brassy scores for big, brassy films - The Fury (1978), Superman (1978), 1941 (1979), Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) ... An experiment during this period, Heartbeeps (1981), flopped. There was a long-term change of pace, nonetheless, as Williams fell in love with an interior designer and married once more.
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982) brought about his third Oscar, and The River (1984), Empire of the Sun (1987), The Accidental Tourist (1988) and Born on the Fourth of July (1989) added variety to the 1980s, as he returned to television with work on Amazing Stories (1985) and themes for NBC, including NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt (1970). The '80s also brought the only exceptions to the composer's collaboration with Steven Spielberg - others scored both Spielberg's segment of Twilight Zone: The Movie (1983) and The Color Purple (1985).
Intending to retire, the composer's output became sporadic during the 1990s, particularly after the exciting Jurassic Park (1993) and the masterful, Oscar-winning Schindler's List (1993). This lighter workload, coupled with a number of hilarious references on The Simpsons (1989) actually seemed to renew interest in his music. Two Home Alone films (1990, 1992), JFK (1991), Nixon (1995), Sleepers (1996), Seven Years in Tibet (1997), Saving Private Ryan (1998), Angela's Ashes (1999), and a return to familiar territory with Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace (1999) recalled his creative diversity of the '70s.
In this millennium, the artist shows no interest in slowing down. His relationships with Spielberg and Lucas continue in A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001), the remaining Star Wars prequels (2002, 2005), Minority Report (2002), Catch Me If You Can (2002), and a promised fourth Indiana Jones film. There is a more focused effort on concert works, as well, including a theme for the new Walt Disney Concert Hall and a rumored light opera. But one certain highlight is his musical magic for the world of Harry Potter (2001, 2002, 2004, etc.), which he also arranged into a concert suite geared toward teaching children about the symphony orchestra. His music remains on the whistling lips of people around the globe, in the concert halls, on the promenades, in album collections, sports arenas, and parades, and, this writer hopes, touching some place in ourselves. So keep those ears ready wherever you go, 'cause you will likely hear a bit of John Williams on your way.- John Williams was a tall, urbane Anglo-American actor best known for his role as Chief Inspector Hubbard in Dial M for Murder (1954), a role he played on Broadway, in Alfred Hitchcock's classic 1954 film, and on television in 1958. Playing Hubbard on the Great White Way brought him the 1953 Tony Award as Best Featured Actor in a Play. "Dial M for Murder" was the 27th Broadway play he had appeared in since making his New York debut in "The Fake" in 1924, which he had originally appeared in back in his native England.
Williams was born on April 15, 1903 in Buckinghamshire and attended Lancing College. He first trod the boards as a teenager in a 1916 production of Peter Pan (1924). He moved to America in the mid-1920s and was a busy and constantly employed stage actor for 30 years. After "Dial M for Murder" in the 1953-54 season, though, he appeared in only four more Broadway plays between 1955 and 1970 as he focused on movies and television.
In addition to "Dial M for Murder", he appeared in Hitchcock's The Paradine Case (1947) and in To Catch a Thief (1955) and in 10 episodes of the TV series Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1955). For Billy Wilder, he appeared in Sabrina (1954) and Witness for the Prosecution (1957). Beginning in the 1960s, most of his work was in television, including a nine-episode stint on Family Affair (1966) taking over Sebastian Cabot's duties as Brian Keith's butler when Cabot was waylaid by health problems.
He retired in the late '70s, his last acting gig being an appearance on Battlestar Galactica (1978) in 1979. He was known by many in the last phase of his career for his work on one of the first TV infomercials, when he served as the pitchman for a classical music record collection called "120 Music Masterpieces."
John Williams died on May 5, 1983 in La Jolla, California from an aneurysm. He was 80 years old. - Actor
- Producer
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John Witherspoon was an African-American actor from Detroit, Michigan known for playing Granddad from The Boondocks and Willie Jones from the Friday trilogy. He also acted in Boomerang, Little Nicky, Soul Plane, Vampire in Brooklyn, Black Jesus and The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. He passed away in October 29, 2019 due to a heart attack.- Director
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Born in southern China, John Woo grew up in Hong Kong, where he began his film career as an assistant director in 1969, working for Shaw Brothers Studios. He directed his first feature in 1973 and has been a prolific director ever since, working in a wide variety of genres before A Better Tomorrow (1986) established his reputation as a master stylist specializing in ultra-violent gangster films and thrillers, with hugely elaborate action scenes shot with breathtaking panache. After gaining a cult reputation in the US with The Killer (1989), Woo was offered a Hollywood contract. He now works in the US.- Studied law at Jesus College, Oxford, but became president of OUDS by his final year, when he played the lead in "Richard III" to wide critical acclaim. Subsequently joined the Old Vic, where among other roles he played "the Dauphin" to Richard Burton's "Henry V". Left the Old Vic under less than happy circumstances and had even less luck with the Royal Court. Spent some time in France, where he briefly considered remaining, but returned to the UK and spent some seven years working in television and low-paying quickie films. In 1966, played one of the leads in Tom Stoppard's teleplay Teeth (1967) -- an instant artistic rapport was the result, as was a second Stoppard role in Another Moon Called Earth (1967), a sort of proto-Jumpers. Critical and commercial break came with the role of "Guil" in the NYC run of Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead, for which he received a Tony nomination. Back in the UK, won Most Promising Actor award in 1970 for his role in the Harold Pinter production of James Joyce's "Exiles". Invited to join the RSC, he began a series of highly individual Shakespearean roles, as well as more popularly-based efforts. His "Sherlock Holmes" in 1974 was reprised in NYC, resulting in a second Tony nomination. The following year, the New York run of Stoppard's "Travesties" -- in which he starred as "Henry Carr" -- gave him the Tony for Best Actor. Additional theatre work in America: "Tartuffe", "Deathtrap" and "Amadeus". UK theatre work included "Devil's Disciple", "Every Good Boy Deserves Favour", "Undiscovered Country", "Man Who Came To Dinner", title role in "Richard III", "Prospero" in "Tempest", "Lear" in "King Lear" and, of course, "A.E. Housman" in Stoppard's "Invention of Love" in 1997, for which he received an Laurence Olivier Award nomination. Married twice, four children.
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Johnathon Schaech exploded onto the scene as one of Hollywood's most handsome leading men in Jocelyn Moorhouse's How to Make an American Quilt (1995) and Tom Hanks' directorial debut That Thing You Do! (1996) Since then, Johnathon has shown incredible versatility as an actor. Over the last twenty years, he's starred in over one-hundred and sixty Hollywood productions. Working opposite some of the most acclaimed and awarded actors, producers, writers and directors including Gwyneth Paltrow, Kenneth Branagh, Ed Harris, Idris Elba, Antonio Banderas, Bruce Willis, Tom Fontana, Gary Goetzman, Neil Moritz, Greg Araki, Cary Brokaw, Roy Lee, Jessica Lange and Bill Paxton. Schaech recently captivated television audiences as the eccentric movie-star in Showtime's hit series Ray Donovan (2014) and has portrayed comic-book legend Jonah Hex on the first three season's of DC's Legends. (2015-2018) Having aged into a ruggedly handsome man, he's fast becoming one of Hollywood's go-to stars for action roles. Starring in Renny Harlin's 5 Days of War (2014), Todd Robinson's Phantom (2015), Roland Joffe's Texas Rising (2016), Steven C. Miller's Marauders (2017) and soon takes the lead opposite Frank Grillo in the action-packed Reprisal (2018). Johnathon now uses his national voice for dyslexia, working with Harvard University accredited NoticeAbility.org; a nonprofit dedicated to helping students with the brain-based difference identify their unique strengths and build their self-esteem. Johnathon has a four-year-old son, Camden, with his wife of five years, internet influencer Julie Solomon.- Director
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With over thirty directing and producing credits to his name, Johnnie To enjoyed international breakthroughs with Election (2005), Election 2 (2006) (aka "Triad Election") and Exiled (2006); those films enjoyed multiple international film festival appearances and were separately sold to more than 21 foreign territories (including theatrical distributions in France and USA).
Stretching from the height of the Hong Kong New Wave right up to today, über-filmmaker Johnnie To could be considered an institution in the former British colony. Johnnie To's Milky Way production company, which he formed in partnership with frequent collaborator Wai Ka-fai in 1996, has become the de facto hallmark of quality filmmaking in Hong Kong since the Handover in 1997. His filmography is an eclectic collection of films from almost every genre and featuring almost every major Hong Kong film star, including classic films from the late Eighties and early Nineties including Heroic Trio (1993) & All About Ah-Long (1989), some ultra-cool crime-noir productions during the late Nineties; The Longest Night, Expect the Unexpected, and The Mission. Romances; Loving You (1995) & Needing You (2000). As well as a number of crowd-pleasing comedies; Wu Yen (2001) and Love on a Diet (2001).
Unfortunately, the 'Jerry Bruckheimer of Hong Kong' has been in a creative and financial lull since 2001. In addition to facing diminishing box office returns stemming from the overall decline of the Hong Kong film industry, some of To's recent efforts have performed disappointingly, such as Fat Choi Spirit (2002), Full-Time Killer (2001), and Running Out of Time 2 (2001).
However, in 2003, the veteran filmmaker was back in fine form with the release of PTU (2003), a crime-noir thriller, and Running on Karma (2003), about a body builder/exotic dancer with special visions that helps a cop track a vicious killer. These were both award winners at the Hong Kong Film Awards that year. These were followed closely by Breaking News (2004) & Throw Down (2004), then Election (2005) and follow-up Election 2 (2006), the award nominated companion piece.- Actor
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Johnny Brown was born on 11 June 1937 in St. Petersburg, Florida, USA. He was an actor, known for Good Times (1974), Man in the Mirror (2008) and Life (1999). He was married to June Russell. He died on 2 March 2022 in Los Angeles, California, USA.- Actor
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Johnny Yong Bosch (born John Jay Bosch) was born in Kansas City, Missouri and raised in Garland, Texas. While growing up, he had taken an interest in martial arts after having seen the works of Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan, winning several martial arts competitions as a result. After being informed about the TV series Mighty Morphin Power Rangers (1993) by his martial arts teacher, Bosch subsequently joined the show's second season as Adam Park (replacing Walter Jones, who had played the character in season 1), and reprised the role in both films based on the franchise as well as Power Rangers Zeo (1996) and Power Rangers Turbo (1997)
His main claim to fame, however, arrived in the form of his voice acting career in anime and video games, when he landed the role of Kaneda in a redub of Akira (1988) that was recorded by Pioneer in 2001, with Cam Clarke having previously voiced the character in the 1988 Streamline dub. This ultimately lead to further roles in more anime series and games in the years that followed, including Vash the Stampede in Trigun (1998), Renton Thurston in Eureka Seven (2005), Genma Shiranui and Sasori in the Naruto franchise, Yu Narukami in Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4 (2008), and, most notably, Ichigo Kurosaki in the Bleach franchise. Among Bosch's later roles include Sabo in One Piece (1999) from 2020 onward, Toji Suzuhara in Netflix's 2019 redub of Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995), and Ryogi in Boruto: Naruto Next Generations (2017), among others.- Actor
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Johnny Carson, the legendary "King of Late Night TV" who dominated the medium's nether hours for three decades, was born in Corning, Iowa, but moved with his family to nearby Norfolk, Nebraska when he was eight years old. He was the son of Ruth E. (Hook) and Homer Lloyd "Kit" Carson, a manager of the Iowa-Nebraska Light & Power Company. It was in Norfolk, where he lived until he was inducted into the U.S. Navy in 1943, that he started his show business career. At age 14, Carson began appearing as the magician "The Great Carsoni" at local venues.
In 1962, Carson was chosen by NBC to succeed the controversial Jack Paar and his The Tonight Show Starring Jack Paar (1957). Paar had decided to quit the show and begin a once-a-week show for NBC in prime time on Friday nights. Carson would never be controversial like Paar, preferring to good-naturedly skewer politicians and celebrities in his opening monologue and staging stunts such as the on-stage marriage of retro-singer Tiny Tim to his "Miss Vicky" in 1969. His popularity with the late-night audience became so great, and the income from advertising on his show so profitable that, in 1967, NBC had to lure Johnny back to The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson (1962)after a walkout with a three-year contract guaranteeing him a minimum of $4 million. In the early 1970s, TV Guide reported that Carson was earning $2 million a year, making him the highest paid TV entertainer ever, a record he repeatedly surpassed, pulling down a then-record $5 million annual salary in the 1980s. Carson created a sense of intimacy with his guests and audiences that made him the unvanquished "King of Nighttime TV". Countless talk shows hosted by the likes of Joey Bishop and Dick Cavett and other non-talk show programs were launched against him year after year only to fail, with the notable exception of ABC News Nightline (1980) halfway through his reign. His tempestuous love-life, which included two high-profile divorces, became the fodder of such celebrity staples as "The National Enquirer" and later "People Magazine", and he was even the subject of a roman a clef pulp novel in the early 1970s. There have been at least seven published biographies of Carson.
After brief stints on radio stations in Omaha and Lincoln, Nebraska, his career was exclusively in television, starting with work at Nebraska TV stations in the late 1940s which preceded his 1951-53 skit program Carson's Cellar (1953) on Los Angeles station KNXT-TV. Attracting the attention of the industry, he was hired as a comedy writer for The Red Skelton Hour (1951) which provided him with a career breakthrough when Skelton was injured backstage and Carson substituted for him, delivering his first monologue before a national audience. This led to a stint as the host of the quiz show Earn Your Vacation (1954) and the variety showcase The Johnny Carson Show (1953) in 1955-56. The man who would soon become the most famous late-night TV personality in history hosted the daytime game show Who Do You Trust? (1956) from 1957-62, teaming up with longtime sidekick, Ed McMahon, in 1958.
Before his triumph on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson (1962), Carson tried his hand at dramatic acting, appearing in Three Men on a Horse (1957) (episode # 1.29) during the inaugural season of Playhouse 90 (1956) in 1957. In 1960, he shot a pilot for a prime-time TV series, "Johnny Come Lately", that was not picked up by a network. Carson had sat in for "Tonight Show" host Jack Paar in 1958 and, when Paar left the show four years later, NBC chose Carson as his replacement, taking over the catbird seat on October 2, 1962. The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson (1962). Sidekick McMahon's "Heeeeere's Johnny!!!" introduction of Carson became a cultural catchphrase, memorably reprised by Jack Nicholson in Stanley Kubrick's The Shining (1980), Woody Allen's character in the Best Picture Academy Award-winning Annie Hall (1977), stand-up comic Alvy Singer, is recognized in front of a movie theater by a street tough due to his appearance on "The Tonight Show".
Aside from his banter with celebrities, he amused his audience for 30 years with broadly played skit comedy by his "Mighty Carson Art Players" and his spoof clairvoyant "Carnac the Magnificent". He made memorable put-downs of politicians and celebrities, a format that was used by his successors Jay Leno and David Letterman and legions of comics who came after him. When a joke bombed during his monologues, Carson would do a wounded double-take as the audience jeered, fully aware of the awfulness of the joke he had just unloaded. Following these bombs with a sly, self-deprecating remark engendered a sense of intimacy between Carson and his fans.
A liberal in the increasingly liberal age of the 1960s and 1970s, so powerful were his opening monologues that by the early 1970s, he could actually affect society at large outside of the pop culture realm. A joke about a shortage of industrial grade toilet paper caused a national panic and a run on all grades of t.p., with a resulting shortage of the product about which he had kidded. Playing off current events such as the Watergate crisis, his comic evisceration of President Richard Nixon was credited with some critics as exerting such a drag on Nixon's approval rating that it made his resignation possible, if not inevitable. After Carson's reign, it became increasingly de rigueur for politicians to appear on late-night TV talk shows and bear a host's jibes in order to stump for votes.
Carson's connection with the American culture was so absolute, it contributed to one of his few failures, the rejection of "The Tonight Show" in the early 1980s by British audiences who could not understand the topical references of his monologues. And his audience's identification of Johnny with the "Tonight Show" effectively stopped him from work in other media. In the mid-1960s, Carson's agents wanted to trade on his vast popularity to position him in motion pictures as the "New Jack Lemmon", but Carson never made any forays outside of television. His connection with the movie industry remained his hosting of three generations of stars and his memorable turns as the host of five Academy Awards telecasts from 1979-84. In that role, he generally is regarded as the best successor to long-time Oscar host Bob Hope. He did stretch his wings as a producer, his Carson Productions producing TV pilots and series, TV movies and [error], in addition to his own talk show.
The six-time Emmy-winner considered a follow-up to "The Tonight Show", but nothing caught his interest and he spent the last decade of his life in a quiet retirement in Malibu, California, as befitted his private nature. Thus, it was "The Tonight Show" that remains his creative legacy. Unlike every other TV star, he remained on top until the very end, the show winning its ratings period every year for 30 years. When Carson retired, his last appearance was one of the highest rated late night TV shows ever.
"I have an ego like anybody else", Carson told The Washington Post in 1993, "but I don't need to be stoked by going before the public all the time". Frederick De Cordova, the producer of "The Tonight Show" throughout Carson's 30-year run, believed that Carson never pressured himself to launch a follow-up as he already had achieved unprecedented success on TV. "He is one of a kind, was one of a kind", De Cordova said in 1995. "I don't think there's any reason for him to try something different".
Carson, who was suffering from emphysema and had quadruple bypass surgery in 1999, died peacefully at the age of 79 on January 23, 2005, surrounded by his family and friends. In terms of career longevity, popularity, peer respect and impact on the medium, Carson ranks with Lucille Ball and Jackie Gleason as a television great.- Music Artist
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Johnny Cash was born February 26, 1932, in Kingsland, Arkansas, to Carrie Cash (Rivers) and Raymond Cash. He made his first single, "Hey Porter", for Sun Records in 1955. In 1958 he moved to Columbia Records. He had long periods of drug abuse during the 1960s, but later that decade he successfully fought his addiction with the help of singer June Carter Cash, whom he married in 1968. In 1971 he appeared in the western A Gunfight (1971) with 'Kirk Douglas (I)'. Cash made only a few films, but quite a few appearances on television, both in series and made-for-TV films, and was especially effective as a rural Southern sheriff in the 1930s determined to bring to justice a wealthy landowner who committed murder because he believed he was above the law in Murder in Coweta County (1983), a drama based on a true story. In 1975 Cash wrote his autobiography, "Man In Black", which is now out of print. In the late 1980s he moved from Columbia Records to Mercury, then in the next decade moved again to American Recordings. Amongst his biggest hit records were "I Walk the Line", "Ring of Fire" and "A Boy Named Sue". After several years of ill health, he died of complications from diabetes on 12 September 2003, only a few months after the death of his beloved wife.- Actor
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Johnny Crawford was born on 26 March 1946 in Los Angeles, California, USA. He was an actor and producer, known for The Rifleman (1958), Hellboy (2004) and The Thirteenth Floor (1999). He was married to Charlotte Samco. He died on 29 April 2021 in Los Angeles, California, USA.- Actor
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John Christopher "Johnny" Depp II was born on June 9, 1963 in Owensboro, Kentucky, to Betty Sue Palmer (née Wells), a waitress, and John Christopher Depp, a civil engineer. He was raised in Florida. He dropped out of school when he was 15, and fronted a series of music-garage bands, including one named 'The Kids'. When he married Lori A. Depp, he took a job as a ballpoint-pen salesman to support himself and his wife. A visit to Los Angeles, California, with his wife, however, happened to be a blessing in disguise, when he met up with actor Nicolas Cage, who advised him to turn to acting, which culminated in Depp's film debut in the low-budget horror film, A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984), where he played a teenager who falls prey to dream-stalking demon Freddy Krueger.
In 1987 he shot to stardom when he replaced Jeff Yagher in the role of undercover cop Tommy Hanson in the popular TV series 21 Jump Street (1987). In 1990, after numerous roles in teen-oriented films, his first of a handful of great collaborations with director Tim Burton came about when Depp played the title role in Edward Scissorhands (1990). Following the film's success, Depp carved a niche for himself as a serious, somewhat dark, idiosyncratic performer, consistently selecting roles that surprised critics and audiences alike. He continued to gain critical acclaim and increasing popularity by appearing in many features before re-joining with Burton in the lead role of Ed Wood (1994). In 1997 he played an undercover FBI agent in the fact-based film Donnie Brasco (1997), opposite Al Pacino; in 1998 he appeared in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998), directed by Terry Gilliam; and then, in 1999, he appeared in the sci-fi/horror film The Astronaut's Wife (1999). The same year he teamed up again with Burton in Sleepy Hollow (1999), brilliantly portraying Ichabod Crane.
Depp has played many characters in his career, including another fact-based one, Insp. Fred Abberline in From Hell (2001). He stole the show from screen greats such as Antonio Banderas in the finale to Robert Rodriguez's "mariachi" trilogy, Once Upon a Time in Mexico (2003). In that same year he starred in the marvelous family blockbuster Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003), playing a character that only the likes of Depp could pull off: the charming, conniving and roguish Capt. Jack Sparrow. The film's enormous success has opened several doors for his career and included an Oscar nomination. He appeared as the central character in the Stephen King-based movie, Secret Window (2004); as the kind-hearted novelist James Barrie in the factually-based Finding Neverland (2004), where he co-starred with Kate Winslet; and Rochester in the British film, The Libertine (2004). Depp collaborated again with Burton in a screen adaptation of Roald Dahl's novel, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005), and later in Alice in Wonderland (2010) and Dark Shadows (2012).
Off-screen, Depp has dated several female celebrities, and has been engaged to Sherilyn Fenn, Jennifer Grey, Winona Ryder and Kate Moss. He was married to Lori Anne Allison in 1983, but divorced her in 1985. Depp has two children with his former long-time partner, French singer/actress Vanessa Paradis: Lily-Rose Melody, born in 1999 and John Christopher "Jack" III, born in 2002. He married actress/producer Amber Heard in 2015, divorcing a few years later.- Johnny 'Bananas' Devenanzio was born on 22 June 1982 in Santa Monica, California, USA. He is an actor, known for Jay and Silent Bob Reboot (2019), The Head Thieves (2018) and Talk Is Jericho (2013).
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Joe Flynn, A.K.A. Johnny Flynn, is an English poet, musician, and actor. He is the son of Eric Flynn, who was an actor who specialized in musicals. As a child, Johnny sang in the Winchester College chapel choir. He knew that he wanted to be a musician after listening to the Bob Dylan record, "Freewheelin,'" when he was eleven years old. Johnny is now the front-man of the English folk band, "Johnny Flynn And The Sussex Witt." His band has released three albums, "A Larum" (2008), "Been Listening" (2010) and "Country Mile" (2013).- Actor
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John Mark Galecki was born in Bree, Belgium, to American parents; his father was stationed there while serving in the U.S. Air Force. When he was three years old, his family moved to Chicago, Illinois, where he grew up with his parents, Mary Lou and Richard Galecki, and siblings, sister Allison (1980) and brother Nick (1982). His father was of Polish descent, and his mother's ancestry is Irish and Italian. His mother was a mortgage consultant and his father became a teacher for blind veterans in a VA hospital outside of Chicago. When Galecki was sixteen, his father died in an accident.
His mother recalled in an interview with People magazine that Galecki was a very artistic kid; at only 4 years old, he told her: "Mom, I'm gonna be on T.V., and I don't mean when I grow up." Two years later, when their attempts to distract him with sports failed, Galecki's parents took him to open auditions at local theaters in Chicago. He landed his first role in "Fiddler on the Roof," and more parts in other productions followed. By age 11, he was already known as an excellent actor in Chicago's theater scene evidenced by him receiving a Joseph Jefferson Citation nomination for portraying John Henry in "The Member of the Wedding."
In 1989 he was cast in his first movie, a holiday film called Prancer (1989), but his big break was in another Christmas movie as Chevy Chase's son Rusty Griswold, in National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (1989). On the set, Chase took a liking to him, and Galecki recalled in a later interview that Chevy Chase showed him some tricks for comedic timing.
By that time, his whole family had moved from Chicago to L.A. to support his career. But within 10 months they realized they missed Chicago too much, and moved back home. Galecki, still just 14, was under contract on a show with Robert Urich called "American Dreamer (1990)", so he stayed in L.A. Although he was living alone in a studio apartment, he never got into trouble and was a good kid. He recalled living alone in L.A. without adult supervision as "not fun" and "quite intimidating and lonely, to be honest. But I've always been happiest when I'm working, so..." He bought a motorcycle with a mirrored helmet so he could get to work and back, at Paramount studios.
In 1991 Galecki was picked by Roseanne Barr to play her son in the made for T.V. movie Backfield in Motion (1991). She liked him so much she asked him to come on her sitcom for what started as a one-off appearance, but soon turned into the important recurring role of David Healy. His family was religious viewers of the show and he was somewhat intimidated at first to be working with his television heroes. However, before long, it was his heroes that praised him: Roseanne said he showed "great vulnerability." John Goodman said: "If he was one of those little stuffed bears at a carny, he'd have a Wuv me t-shirt on. People just want to take care of him." Galecki also became very close friends with co-star Sara Gilbert and the show's executive producer Eric Gilliland.
After Roseanne (1988) he worked on a number of diverse roles, from funny Ira alongside Christopher Walken in the 1997 dark-comedy Suicide Kings (1997) to a drug-addicted student in 2003's Bookies (2003), and he played gay characters in Don Roos's Bounce (2000) and The Opposite of Sex (1998). He never stayed far from the television industry as he made guest appearances such as Laurie Freeman's younger lover in Norm (1999) (where he once again worked with Laurie Metcalf, his former Roseanne cast mate), as a golfer in My Name Is Earl (2005), as Hope & Faith (2003)'s younger brother in the sitcom of the same name, and as hilarious party-boy Trouty on My Boys (2006). In 2006 he returned to his theater roots as he took on the role of conflicted but sweet male escort Alex in Douglas Carter Beane's play "The Little Dog Laughed," for which he received a 2007 Theatre World Award for Outstanding Browdway Debut.
In 2007 he was back on the small screens, starring as Leonard Hofstadter in the sitcom The Big Bang Theory (2007). Not only was Chuck Lorre, a former producer for Roseanne, a producer of the new show, but Sara Gilbert and Laurie Metcalf both made guest appearances.
Galecki is a self-admitted motorcycle "nerd," and rides a Harley Davidson Softail Deluxe. Although he never went to college, he has said: "I'm not dead! We should never stop learning. We should never stop absorbing," and so he learned how to play the cello in his early twenties. He likes traveling around the world, painting, music (he also plays bass), and hiking with his dog Vera.
He always has been very private about his personal life and little is known about past relationships. It has only been confirmed that he dated actresses Laura Harris and Kaley Cuoco. He isn't on twitter, and Galecki once said, "I don't understand the current frame of mind in our society that seems to say that any action is not of value until it's broadcast somehow."
He still lives in Los Angeles but is often spotted in Chicago, where his siblings still live.- Music Artist
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Johnny Hallyday was born on 15 June 1943 in Paris, France. He was a music artist and actor, known for Man on the Train (2002), The Pink Panther 2 (2009) and The Walk (2015). He was married to Laeticia Hallyday, Adeline Blondieau, Elisabeth Etienne and Sylvie Vartan. He died on 5 December 2017 in Marnes-la-Coquette, Hauts-de-Seine, France.- Actor
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Johnny Harris first burst onto our screens in 2006 in the highly acclaimed British film London to Brighton. The film was voted into Time Out Magazine's '100 Greatest British Films of All Time' and celebrated British director Shane Meadows said of Harris' performance in the film: "It's an incredibly bold and massively powerful performance, the best I've seen on celluloid for a long time."
He went on to star in Shane Meadows cult television series This Is England '86 receiving BAFTA and Royal Television Society Award nominations for his performance. The final episode of This is England '86 was recently named: 'The Greatest TV Episode of All Time' by The Independent Newspaper.
In 2017, Johnny made his debut as a screenwriter with the highly acclaimed feature film, Jawbone. Harris also starred in and co-produced the movie. He received a BAFTA Film Award nomination for Outstanding Debut, two BIFA Film Award nominations for his performance in the leading role, and a Writers Guild Award nomination for his screenplay. Song-writing icon Paul Weller composed and recorded the soundtrack for Jawbone (his first) and in October 2018, Johnny made his debut behind the camera, directing the video for Paul's hit single, Gravity.
He has starred in film and TV hits including Without Sin, Great Expectations, Jawbone, A Christmas Carol, The Salisbury Poisonings, This is England 86-90, Snow White and the Huntsman, Fortitude, Troy Fall of a City, Medici, Monsters: Dark Continent, From Darkness, Welcome to the Punch, and Jack Thorne's BAFTA Award-winning TV show The Fades.
Nev Pierce, Editor of Empire Magazine, has described Johnny as "An heir to Oldman, in terms of being able to be both sensitive and scary, indelible and real." The Independent described Harris as "One of Britain's finest actors".
Johnny's most recent work includes playing the iconic role of Magwitch in the BBC/FOX/Disney TV adaptation of Great Expectations, alongside Olivia Colman. The show was exec-produced by Tom Hardy and Sir Ridley Scott. He also co-starred alongside, Vicky McClure in ITV's hit new drama series, Without Sin.
Johnny has been cast as Osip Glibnikov in 'A Gentleman in Moscow' with Ewan McGregor. A new 8 part series based on Amor Towles Best-Selling novel for Showtime and Paramount UK. The show is due for release at the end of 2023- Writer
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Johnny Knoxville was born on 11 March 1971 in Knoxville, Tennessee, USA. He is a writer and producer, known for Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa (2013), The Dukes of Hazzard (2005) and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2014). He has been married to Naomi Nelson since 24 September 2010. They have two children. He was previously married to Melanie Lynn Cates.- Born and raised in Los Angeles, California, the middle of three siblings, Johnny began performing from the age of 5 at a small performing arts school, making his debut as a Chanukah candle.
Pursuing the acting profession, he appeared with success in many TV and film projects, handling both drama and comedy with finesse.
Johnny was what used to be called a Renaissance Man. He was not only a superb actor, but excelled in the other arts as well. He was a prolific writer, poet and painter.
He also was a philanthropist, donating hundreds of thousands of dollars to worthy causes, as well as being an active member of a number of charitable organizations.
He had seen too many of his friends succumb to the curse of drug abuse, and so he became an outspoken advocate against drugs, using his celebrity status to speak to large groups of educators and law enforcement officials about the dangers of street and psychiatric drug abuse.
He created friends everywhere he went. And he went everywhere. Europe, Asia, South America. He slept with natives in grass huts in Southeast Asia, and was the first white man allowed passage to a sacred lake in Laos.
Of his many talents, one that he treasured was the mentoring of other artists. Many successful performers, some of whom have reached the top of their profession have ascribed their success to Johnny.
His most recent work includes Sons of Anarchy (two seasons), Felon, The Runaways, 186 Dollars to Freedom and Lovely Molly.
In late October 2011 he suffered head injuries from a motorcycle accident. Immediately thereafter his thinking and behavior took a serious turn for the worse. He was arrested on January 3, 2012 for allegedly trespassing at a neighbor's home. He was beaten violently in the head approximately 17 times before the police arrived, causing further injuries. In jail, following additional head injuries he was diagnosed by the prison medics as suffering from internal bleeding in the brain. Despite the diagnosis of Traumatic Brain Injury and despite never testing positive for drugs that year he was treated for psychosis and chemical dependency. Two more arrests followed, including near drowning (another traumatic brain incident). Symptoms of Traumatic Brain Injury include impaired judgement, sensitivity to light, and sudden inexplicable violent behavior. Typical of the misperception on the part of law enforcement officials was the often-quoted remark by the probation official who expressed that Johnny suffered from mental health issues as well as chemical dependency. Prior to his injuries Johnny had never had a brush with the law. And the toxicology report following his death revealed absolutely no drugs whatsoever in his system.
In late May of 2012 the Santa Monica Superior Court allowed his admission to Ridgeview, a drug rehab center in Alta Dena, California. Though a drug rehab facility, the rest and quiet were a tonic for him, and he gradually, over the summer, regained himself. He wrote, in a journal entry, "Felt more whole today. . .more complete. Like parts of myself had been stolen in my sleep and scattered all over the world and they've begun to return. So I think better, my thoughts aren't being sent off on their own." He began planning for a return to acting, via the stage, and spoke of possibly bringing Shakespeare to inner city kids. In August he tragically accepted the DA's offer to serve "just a couple more days in jail," in exchange for his freedom. The "couple days" became nearly two months, during which he suffered additional abuse and a violent downturn in spirits and health. Finally released in late September, he died in sad and disturbing circumstances on September 26, 2012. - Music Artist
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He was the fourth of seven children born to Clement and Mildred Mathis. His father performed briefly in vaudeville and exposed all of the Mathis siblings to music. Before he entered his teens, young John received vocal lessons from Connie Cox in exchange for performing chores around her home. When he entered San Francisco State College he originally had planned to become a physical education instructor. At San Francisco State he broke classmate and basketball great Bill Russell's high jump record. While in college he began performing at a small local bar called The International Settlement, where he met performers Maya Angelou and Joan Weldon. Later performances at a club called The Blackhawk caught the attention of Columbia Records producer George Avakian. When Avakian called for Mathis to make his first recording, the young singer and then college track star had to make a unique decision: whether to record or to tryout for the 1956 Olympics held in Melbourne, Australia. He chose to make his first single "Wonderful, Wonderful". To date he has recorded over 80 albums selling millions of albums worldwide More than 60 of his albums have been certified gold and/or platinum. "Heavenly" alone remained on the pop charts for 295 weeks. His 1958 album "Johnny's Greatest Hits" began "Greatest Hits" tradition copied by every record company since then. This album spent an unprecedented 490 continuous weeks (almost ten years) on the Billboard Top Albums Chart, and garnered notation in the Guinness Book Of World Records. For over 6 decades Mathis has continued to record, musically evolve, and perform at the world's most prestigious venues, earning a permanent place in American music history.- Actor
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Johnny Messner was born on 11 April 1970 in Syracuse, New York, USA. He is an actor and producer, known for Running Scared (2006), Tears of the Sun (2003) and Spartan (2004).- Actor
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Johnny Pacar was born in Dearborn, Michigan. He grew up an avid hockey player, who always dreamed of one day playing in the NHL. However, Johnny's hockey career was put on hold after he was discovered while performing in his high school's theater productions. Johnny received great feedback for his acting talents and was encouraged to move to Los Angeles. Within a month of arriving in Los Angeles Pacar booked a national commercial. Not long after that came numerous television roles on many prime time shows including recurring characters on Boston Public and American Dreams.
He became a teen icon when landing the lead in the Disney Channel Original Movie Now You See It.... He went on to star as a series regular in NBC/Discovery Kids hit series Flight 29 Down (2005-2007). His success in television propelled him into film landing him many starring roles in such features as Universal Pictures Wild Child and the lead opposite Richard E. Grant in the romantic comedy Love Hurts which earned him numerous acting nominations and a Best Supporting Actor award win. He also starred in the CBS/Hallmark hit Front of the Class (based on the novel "Front of the Class" that explored a families struggle with Tourette's Syndrome).
In 2009 he landed a role in ABC Family's gymnastics hit series Make It or Break It where he played the bad boy rocker Damon Young. While on hiatus from the show he got the chance to star opposite one of his childhood idols Christian Slater in the thriller Playback. He continued landing roles in film and television such as SyFy Network's hit TV movie Zombie Apocalypse and in the MTV pilot Hot Mess where he played the heartthrob Ben. He also starred in the Sony/Affirm thriller The Remaining. Aside from his acting career Johnny is an accomplished musician releasing two records with his pop/rock band Forever The Day where he served as frontman/lead singer and has released several singles as a solo artist as well. Johnny played for the charity celebrity basketball organization the Hollywood Knights playing for local schools and USO sponsored tours overseas.
When he's not acting or making music his other passions include cooking, painting and writing.- Actor
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Johnny Pemberton was born on 1 June 1981 in Rochester, Minnesota, USA. He is an actor and writer, known for In the Loop (2009), Ant-Man (2015) and 21 Jump Street (2012).- Johnny Sequoyah was born on 25 October 2002 in Los Angeles, California. She is an actress, known for Believe (2014), Dexter: New Blood (2021) and American Housewife (2016).
- Jonathan James Simmons was born November 28, 1986 in Montgomery, Alabama, to Cindy and Ben Simmons. He was raised in Dallas, Texas.
His first film in Los Angeles was entitled "My Ambition". When casting notices went out, there was a misprint stating that the production was looking for a lead female to play Julie Walters. He contacted the production office in hopes they would have a part for a male and was asked to audition for the lead. Producers cast him on the spot and never bothered to rerun the correct casting notice, which in turn, got him his first manager.
His big break came on only his second feature film audition, Evan Almighty (2007), in which he played Dylan Baxter, opposite Steve Carell and Lauren Graham. Since then, he has had major roles in many Hollywood films, including Hotel for Dogs (2009), Jennifer's Body (2009), 21 Jump Street (2012), The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012), and The To Do List (2013). - Actor
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Johnny Sneed is an actor, musician, and photographer based in Los Angeles, California, with a repertoire of film, television and commercial work that has seen him starring alongside award winners such as Bryan Cranston, Paul Dano, Helen Mirren, Janelle Monáe, and Amy Poehler, just to name a few. He's had numerous television guest appearances, including a recurring role on NBC's Emmy-nominated sitcom "Parks and Recreation," the popular Netflix series "13 Reasons Why", season two of Amazon's psychological thriller "Homecoming," and Netflix's "Painkiller." In 2014 he landed a pivotal career opportunity-as an actor and drummer-to portray Hal Blaine, session drummer and member of the legendary Wrecking Crew, in the biographical drama film Love & Mercy. The following year, he landed a role in another biographical drama, Trumbo, starring Bryan Cranston, who earned an Oscar nomination for his role.
In his commercial work, Sneed has appeared in over 50 ads, including spots for Hyundai, AT&T, Subaru, Progressive, Kayak and Volkswagen, and Super Bowl commercials for Cadillac (with Timothée Chalamet and Winona Ryder), Little Caesars (alongside Rainn Wilson) and Budweiser (as the famous "Bud Knight").
Born in Japan and raised in Gulfport, Mississippi, Sneed was raised in a family of artists. He grew up watching his insurance executive father, John, perform in theatre productions at Center Stage in Biloxi, and even acted alongside his father in the production of The Lady from Maxim's. Sneed's mother, Patti, plays piano, sings and paints. However, the individual from whom Johnny Sneed drew the most inspiration was his late sister, Lori. Though she was paralyzed from 1991 until her untimely passing in 2017, she lived a full life, working for years at CNN while studying and performing stand-up and improv comedy in classes in Atlanta. She was also a gifted painter, and widely acclaimed for her talented impersonations.
In addition to acting, Sneed plays drums with several bands in Los Angeles. As a fan of the great drummer, Levon Helm, he once recorded an album at Helm's studio in Woodstock, New York. A graduate of the University of Texas at Austin, Sneed also holds a degree from the University of Mississippi School of Law and worked as a lawyer before developing a career in acting. He lives in Los Feliz with his wife, Cristina, their son and two cats.- Actor
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Johnny Strong is an enigmatic American artist. Johnny's career as an artist has touched various forms of expression; An Actor, Musician, Singer, Songwriter, Painter, Writer, Director, Composer, and Martial Artist.
Johnny's Film credits include; Get Carter, The Fast and Furious, Black Hawk Down, to Sinners and Saints, Daylight's End, and Warhorse One.
Strong was drawn to martial arts at age 7 which paved the way for him to do all of his own stunts in his features. He began his martial journey, studying Judo, but is also adept in many styles of martial arts. He is currently a Third degree black belt in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu under Professor Chris Lisciandro.
In Music, Strong has been equally successful, creating Seven full length albums under the title of "Operator" where he writes, performs and records all of his music. He's also composed four different full length original scores for four of his films..
He is also known for his work as a weapons maker, and has graced several Blade Magazine covers, featuring his artwork with sharpened steel.
Strong's approach is unconventional, whether it's big Studio films, Major label releases, or independent projects, unlike the norm of most in Hollywood, where the goal is collecting credits, he only works on projects that interest him.
Strong's most recent effort, a huge undertaking, Writing and Starring in his directorial debut with his latest film Warhorse One.- Actor
- Producer
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Johnny Vegas was born on 11 September 1971 in St. Helens, Merseyside, England, UK. He is an actor and producer, known for Bleak House (2005), The Libertine (2004) and Happiness (2001). He has been married to Maia Dunphy since March 2011. They have one child. He was previously married to Catherine "Kitty" Donnelly.- Actor
- Music Department
Johnny Weissmuller was born as Peter Johann Weißmüller in Freidorf, today a district of the city of Timisoara in Romania, then a part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Weissmuller would later claim to have been born in Windber, Pennsylvania, probably to ensure his eligibility to compete as part of the US Olympic team. Weissmüller was one of two boys born to Petrus Weissmuller, a miner, and his wife Elisabeth Kersch, who were both Banat Swabians, an ethnic German population in Southeast Europe. A sickly child, he took up swimming on the advice of a doctor. He grew to be a 6' 3", 190-pound champion athlete - undefeated winner of five Olympic gold medals, 67 world and 52 national titles, holder of every freestyle record from 100 yards to the half-mile. In his first picture, Glorifying the American Girl (1929), he appeared as an Adonis clad only in a fig leaf. After great success with a jungle movie, MGM head Louis B. Mayer, via Irving Thalberg, optioned two of Edgar Rice Burroughs' Tarzan stories. Cyril Hume, working on the adaptation of Tarzan the Ape Man (1932), noticed Weissmuller swimming in the pool at his hotel and suggested him for the part of Tarzan. Weissmuller was under contract to BVD to model underwear and swimsuits; MGM got him released by agreeing to pose many of its female stars in BVD swimsuits. The studio billed him as "the only man in Hollywood who's natural in the flesh and can act without clothes". The film was an immediate box-office and critical hit. Seeing that he was wildly popular with girls, the studio told him to divorce his wife and paid her $10,000 to agree to it. After 1942, however, MGM had used up its options; it dropped the Tarzan series and Weissmuller, too. He then moved to RKO and made six more Tarzans. After that he made 13 Jungle Jim (1948) programmers for Columbia. He retired from movies to run a private business in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.- Actor
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Johnny Whitaker was born on 13 December 1959 in Van Nuys, California, USA. He is an actor and director, known for Tom Sawyer (1973), Sigmund and the Sea Monsters (1973) and A Talking Cat!?! (2013). He was previously married to Symbria Wright.- Actor
- Producer
Johnny Whitworth is an American actor. Born on October 31, in Charleston, SC. . Whitworth studied acting and performed in various productions throughout the south until at the age of 15, when he moved to Los Angeles from Dallas, Texas to pursue his acting career professionally.
Having appeared in over 50 film and television projects throughout his career, Whitworth has starred alongside some of Hollywood's most notable talents in such films as Limitless (2011), Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance (2011), 3:10 to Yuma (2007), Empire Records (1995), Gamer (2009) and Francis Ford Coppola's The Rainmaker (1997), to name a few.
He's gone on to define his craft through a series of formal training, while evolving as a professional actor.
Johnny has said "waiting for opportunities might just be the the hardest part of the job".
Johnny Whitworth is a lifetime member of the actors studio.- Actress
- Soundtrack
Joi Lansing was born Joyce Renee Brown on April 6, 1929 in Salt Lake City, Utah. As a teen she developed early, and because of her striking good looks, she began to model and was extremely successful throughout the 1940s.
It was only natural that her physical assets eventually landed her on the silver screen. Her first go at films occurred in 1948 with roles as--what else?--models in The Counterfeiters (1948), Julia Misbehaves (1948), and Easter Parade (1948). She was 20 years old and her acting wasn't exactly polished in the beginning, but producers cared not--she was hired for her looks and her body.
The following year brought more of the same; she got mostly uncredited roles in films as nothing more than a showpiece. She took a hiatus in 1950 to concentrate on her modeling career. She returned to the big screen in 1951 to play minor roles, though this time went a little better. She played Susan Matthews in F.B.I. Girl (1951) and Marilyn Turner in On the Riviera (1951); at least she played characters with names. Then it was back to being a showpiece. In 1952, she had an uncredited role in one of the most popular movies of all time, Singin' in the Rain (1952). Another minor role as the Maxim Girl in The Merry Widow (1952) followed. She began appearing on television in 1955 when she played in an episode of Adventures of Wild Bill Hickok (1951) and one of I Love Lucy (1951) the following year.
In 1955, Joi landed a recurring role as Shirley Swanson in the television series The Bob Cummings Show (1955). It was this series that proved to all that she actually could act well. Because of this series, she began to get more-substantial parts in films such as The Brave One (1956), Hot Cars (1956), and So You Think the Grass Is Greener (1956), all in 1956. Then it was back to bit roles. For the balance of the 1950s, she continued to appear in B-movies with less-than-quality roles. After appearing in the comedy film Who Was That Lady? (1960), Joi landed the role of Goldie in the television series Klondike (1960). However, most viewers remember her as the wife of Lester Flatt on the situation comedy The Beverly Hillbillies (1962), in which she appeared from 1965 to 1968. As Gladys Flatt, her beauty even surpassed Donna Douglas' as Elly May Clampett.
Her film career was now winding down and she appeared as Boots Malone in the B-movie Hillbillys in a Haunted House (1967), which went nowhere.
Joi Lansing died of breast cancer at age 43 on August 7, 1972 in Santa Monica, California.- Actress
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Joie Lee was born on 22 June 1962 in Brooklyn, New York City, New York, USA. She is an actress and writer, known for Summer of Sam (1999), Coffee and Cigarettes (2003) and Do the Right Thing (1989).- Actor
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Joivan Wade was born on 2 August 1993 in Lewisham, London, England, UK. He is an actor and producer, known for The First Purge (2018), Doctor Who (2005) and The Weekend (2016).- Actress
- Writer
Jolene Blalock was born and raised in San Diego, California. At age 16, she left home to pursue a modeling career in Europe and Asia. It was on a 1998 trip back to the United States that Blalock was compelled to flex her untested acting skills, and after a few commercial appearances and some skill-sharpening at Stella Adler Academy and Toronto's Second City Improv and Second City Los Angeles, she made her acting debut on NBC's Veronica's Closet (1997). Already comfortable in front of the camera, Blalock's magnetism shined through the lens and she was soon cast as Medea in the made-for-TV movie Jason and the Argonauts (2000) alongside acting greats Dennis Hopper and Frank Langella. Blalock is best known for her role as the Vulcan Sub-Commander T'Pol on Star Trek: Enterprise (2001). In 2004, Blalock signed on to film Slow Burn (2005), opposite Ray Liotta. She then went on to play Captain Lola Beck in Starship Troopers 3: Marauder (2008). Blalock has guest-starred on the television series, House (2004), CSI: Crime Scene Investigation (2000) and CSI: Miami (2002). She is married to Michael Rapino, CEO and President of Live Nation.- Actress
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Jolene Anderson was born on 26 May 1980 in Kempsey, New South Wales, Australia. She is an actress and producer, known for All Saints (1998), Rush (2008) and The Dustwalker (2019).- Actress
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Jolene Purdy was born on 9 December 1983 in Redondo Beach, California, USA. She is an actress and writer, known for The White Lotus (2021), WandaVision (2021) and Orange Is the New Black (2013). She has been married to Chuck Brandt since 2007. They have one child.- Actress
- Soundtrack
Jolie Jenkins is an actress, known for Alexa & Katie (2018), The Really Loud House (2022) and One Day at a Time (2017). She has been married to David Pagani since 27 October 2001. They have two children.- Actor
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Jon Avery Abrahams is an American actor. His most notable film roles include Bobby in Scary Movie (2000), Denny Byrnes in Meet the Parents (2000), and Dalton Chapman in the House of Wax (2005). Abrahams was born in New York City. He attended Saint Ann's School in Brooklyn. Abrahams' great-uncles were actor Mack Gray - long time confidant of entertainers George Raft, Dean Martin, and Frank Sinatra - and stuntman and fight coordinator Joe Gray. His father is the artist Martin Abrahams.- Actor
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Jon Bailey known as Epic Voice Guy on social media is an actor, voice actor, content creator, social influencer, stand-up comedian & Christian father of four children. In a decade and a half he has booked over 10,000 gigs ranging from four-time Emmy Nominee Honest Trailers to Ryan Reynolds' soundalike in films like Detective Pikachu, 6 Underground & Red Notice to Optimus Prime in anime, games & other Hasbro projects. Voices for toys, commercials, trailers, promos, anime, game, animation, live action TV series & film including clients like Sony, NBC, ABC, Star Wars, Marvel, 2K, Disney, CBS & many more. Jon has over three quarters of a million followers and over three billion combined credited views on social media.- Actor
- Producer
Jon Bernthal was born and raised in Washington D.C., the son of Joan (Marx) and Eric Bernthal, a lawyer. His grandfather was musician Murray Bernthal. Jon went to study at The Moscow Art Theatre School, in Moscow, Russia, where he also played professional baseball in the European professional baseball federation. While in Moscow, he was noticed by the director of Harvard University's Institute for Advanced Theatre Training at the American Repertory Theatre and was invited to obtain his M.F.A there. After graduating in 2002 he has performed in over 30 plays regionally and off-Broadway including many with his own award-winning theatre company Fovea Floods. He now lives in Venice, California with his dog, Boss.- Now recognizable worldwide as 'King Regis' from the epic 'Final Fantasy' franchise, Jon was born in Hull, Yorkshire and originally an Aerospace engineer & part-time DJ. Always keen to act at 12 Jon's Mam arranged for him to join a local amateur group leading to Hull Truck Youth Theatre at 16, where he performed in many groundbreaking productions, an experience that shaped his decision to pursue acting professionally. In '89 aged 23 Jon left Hull after being awarded a full grant and a 3 year place at the prestigious Birmingham School of Speech Training and Dramatic Art.
A professional Actor since '92 Jon has embraced many 'other' jobs including presenting, face painting, living statue work & treasure hunt designer, to a year at the QE Hospital working in the operating theatre as an O.D.O. Bizarrely Jon would have a major thyroid operation in the same hospital theatre in '93. After his full recovery Jon moved to London settling in Streatham where he spent the next few year gaining as much theatre experience as possible via the amazingly diverse & challenging London fringe. He also toured the south west as D'Artagnan (Three Musketeers) and Alex (A clockwork orange) to exceptional reviews and acclaim. He turned his attention to film in 2010 landing a lead in the dark, indie feature 'Dead End' and his iconic Train stopping cameo in 'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows'.
Jon's reputation as an easygoing, fun loving down to earth actor with a passion for his art, an eye for details and a commitment to the long game, together with his unique yet versatile look have help fuel a solid career that is steadily rising. Including appearances in Jonathan Creek & Doctors, commercials for Budweiser, Ted Baker, Specsavers and Ford, music videos for Trent Reznor, Elbow, Amber Run & The Feeling, and with his recent pivotal lead role as King Regis in the latest epic Final Fantasy XV film installment 'Kingsglaive', that rise continues.
t @joncampling - Producer
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Jon is an alumni of the USC School of Cinema-Television. There, he won the Princess Grace Award, the Dore Schary Award presented by the Anti-Defamation league, the Jack Nicholson directing award, and recognized as an honoree for the IFP/West program Project: Involve.
After making his student short, "When the Kids Are Away", Jon was scooped up by the William Morris Agency and attached to several high profile projects.- Actor
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Jon Cor is a thirty-something-year-old living in Vancouver, BC.
He booked his first audition for a major film franchise while courting multiple agencies at the end of the second year of the Theater Arts and Performance program at Fanshawe College in London, ON.
Since then, he has gone on to win increasingly key, diverse, and demanding roles in projects such as Warner Bros., Berlanti Productions, DC Entertainment, and the CW's The Flash, ABC Disney and Freeform's Shadowhunters: The Mortal Instruments, Syfy's Dark Matter, Hallmark's Crosswords Mysteries: Riddle Me Dead, and CBC's Trouble in the Garden.
Jon Cor is also a writer, producer, an acrobatics-loving martial artist, hobby guitarist, and - with great relief - no longer a Ford model.
His ambitions include releasing his first novel (In Heat) which was originally drafted when he was just nineteen years old, as well as a collection of new and previously-published short stories (A Murder of Prose).- Actor
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Jonathan Niven Cryer is an American actor, comedian and filmmaker. Born into a show business family, he made his motion picture debut as a teenager photographer in the 1984 romantic comedy No Small Affair; his breakout role came in 1986, in the John Hughes-written film Pretty in Pink. In 1998, he wrote and produced the independent film Went to Coney Island on a Mission from God... Be Back by Five.- Actor
- Soundtrack
Jon Cypher was born on 13 January 1932 in New York City, New York, USA. He is an actor, known for Masters of the Universe (1987), Spontaneous Combustion (1989) and Favorite Son (1988). He is married to Carol Rosin. He was previously married to Ruth Wagner.- Actor
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Jon Daly was born on 14 April 1977 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. He is an actor and writer, known for Masterminds (2015), Zoolander 2 (2016) and The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (2013).- Jon Ecker was born in San Marcos, Texas to an American mother and Brazilian actor Guy Ecker. He was raised in Texas and earned a degree in Aquatic Biology from UCSB before moving to Mexico City to pursue acting. Beginning his career in the Latin America, Jon moved back to The U.S. in 2014 and began working in the English-language market.
- Producer
- Actor
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Initially an indie film favorite, actor Jon Favreau has progressed to strong mainstream visibility into the millennium and, after nearly two decades in the business, is still enjoying character stardom as well as earning notice as a writer/producer/director.
The amiable, husky-framed actor with the tight, crinkly hair was born in Queens, New York on October 19, 1966, the only child of Madeleine (Balkoff), an elementary school teacher, and Charles Favreau, a special education teacher. His father has French-Canadian, German, and Italian ancestry, and his mother was from a Russian Jewish family. He attended the Bronx High School of Science before furthering his studies at Queens College in 1984. Dropping out just credits away from receiving his degree, Jon moved to Chicago where he focused on comedy and performed at several Chicago improvisational theaters, including the ImprovOlympic and the Improv Institute. He also found a couple of bit parts in films.
While there, he earned another bit role in the film, Rudy (1993), and met fellow cast mate Vince Vaughn. Their enduring personal friendship would play an instrumental role in furthering both their professional careers within just a few years. Jon broke into TV with a role on the classic series, Seinfeld (1989) (as "Eric the Clown"). After filming rudimentary roles in the movies Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle (1994), Notes from Underground (1995) and Batman Forever (1995), he decided to do some risk taking by writing himself and friend Vaughn into what would become their breakthrough film. Swingers (1996), which he also co-produced, centers on Jon as a luckless, struggling actor type who is emotionally shattered after losing his girlfriend, but is pushed back into the L.A. social scene via the help of cool, worldly, outgoing actor/buddy Vaughn. These two blueprint roles went on to define the character types of both actors on film.
In 1997, Jon appeared favorably on several episodes of the popular TV sitcom, Friends (1994), as "Pete Becker", the humdrum but extremely wealthy suitor for Courteney Cox's "Monica" character, and also appeared to fine advantage on the Tracey Takes On... (1996) comedy series. He later took on the biopic mini-movie, Rocky Marciano (1999), portraying the prizefighter himself in a highly challenging dramatic role and received excellent reviews. Other engagingly offbeat "everyman" films roles came Jon's way -- the ex-athlete in the working class film, Dogtown (1997); a soon-to-be groom whose bachelor party goes horribly awry in the comedy thriller Very Bad Things (1998); a newlywed opposite Famke Janssen in Love & Sex (2000); a wild and crazy linebacker in The Replacements (2000); as Ben Affleck's legal partner in Daredevil (2003); and another down-and-out actor in The Big Empty (2003). He wrote and directed himself and Vaughn as two fellow boxers who involve themselves in criminal activity in Made (2001). Both he and Vaughn produced. He also directed the highly popular Will Ferrell comedy Elf (2003), in which he had a small part.
Jon went on to re-team favorably with his friend, Vince Vaughn, who enjoyed a meteoric rise into the comedy star ranks, in such light-weight features as The Break-Up (2006), Four Christmases (2008) and Couples Retreat (2009), the last of which he co-wrote with Vaughn.
Jon has made even greater strides as a writer, producer and/or director in recent years with the exciting mega-box office action-packed Iron Man (2008), starring Robert Downey Jr., and its sequels, Iron Man 2 (2010) and Iron Man 3 (2013). Jon's character of "Happy Hogan" would be featured in a number of Marvel Comic adventures. Other offerings behind the scenes have included the adventure dramedy Chef (2014), in which he also starred in the title role; the revamped film version of The Avengers (2012) also starring Downey Jr., and it's sequels Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015), Avengers: Infinity War (2018) and Avengers: Endgame (2019); and the animated Disney features The Jungle Book (2016) and The Lion King (2019) and the TV series The Chef Show (2019).
Favreau's marriage to Joya Tillem on November 24, 2000, produced son Max and two daughters, Madeleine and Brighton Rose. Joya is the niece of KGO (AM) lawyer and talk show host, Len Tillem. On the sly, the actor/writer/producer/director enjoys playing on the World Poker Tour.- Dark, mustachioed and broodingly handsome in an Oliver Reed placid manner, Jon Finch was born in Caterham, Surrey, England, on March 2, 1942, the son of a merchant banker. Educated at Caterham School, his first stage role was in elementary school at age 13 playing a Roman noblewoman(!) After gaining experience in amateur theatre groups and following a short stint with a folk singing group, he suddenly left for military service at age 18, serving with a parachute regiment.
Following military duty, Jon returned to acting and delved seriously into classical theatre with several different Shakespeare/repertory companies, appearing in over 50-60 plays, including "Night of the Iguana" and "She Stoops to Conquer," while also serving as stage manager and/or assistant director for several of these companies.
Jon made his on-camera debut on TV in 1964 with guest parts on such British series as the daytime soap "Crossroads," "The Fellows," "Tom Grattan's War," "Z Cars" and the part of Sir Edward Mortimer in the BBC-TV play "Mary, Queen of Scots." This culminated in a leading role in the sci-fi British series Counterstrike (1969). A few years later he broke into films with supporting roles in the Hammer Studio horror classics The Vampire Lovers (1970) and The Horror of Frankenstein (1970). This was a rather intense, dramatic sign as to the direction his cinematic career would take.
Jon's gloomy, Gothic-edged film career peaked in the early 70s with such classy fare as Roman Polanski's Macbeth (1971), in which he played the tormented title role, in a particularly gory and controversial presentation; as cuckold husband William Lamb in the historical romancer Lady Caroline Lamb (1972) opposite Sarah Miles; in Alfred Hitchcock's macabre serial-killer thriller Frenzy (1972), in which he is a suspect in the dastardly crimes; in The Final Programme (1973), an end-of-the-world sci-fi adventure that has since earned cult status; and in the all-star production of Death on the Nile (1978), an elegant whodunnit, courtesy of Agatha Christie. More importantly, he took part in several Shakespearean pieces that were transferred to TV -- Richard II (1978), Henry IV Part I (1979), Henry IV Part II (1979) and Much Ado About Nothing (1984). He also took on another TV series Ben Hall (1975) as the title Australian bushranger
After filming the Spanish historical drama The Second Power (1976) written and directed by José María Forqué and the Swedish/Spanish co-production of La Sabina (1979) written by the notorious filmmaker José Luis Borau, the upcoming 1980's decade would promise more erratic and erotic filming in international drama. Another Spanish-made co-starring role came his way with Gary Cooper, que estás en los cielos (1980) (Gary Cooper, Who Art in Heaven) written and directed by Pilar Miró, followed by the German drama Doktor Faustus (1982); a brief return to English soil to co-star with Glenda Jackson in the political drama Giro City (1982); a pair of German psychological dramas Plaza Real (1988) and The Voice (1988); the Israeli political thriller Streets of Yesterday (1989); and the steamy Italian film La più bella del reame (1989) (Most Beautiful in the Kingdom) opposite sensuous American model-turned-European film actress Carol Alt.
A gentleman with infinite class, intelligence and charm, Jon's pronounced aversion to publicity and preference for privacy kept him from achieving major stardom. Finch turned more and more to British TV work as the years wore on. He appeared as an apparition of Christ in three episodes of the sci-fi mini-series The Martian Chronicles (1980); portrayed the apostle Luke in the biblical drama Peter and Paul (1981); played Uncle Tom in the small screen version of D.H. Lawrence's The Rainbow (1988); appeared as the antagonist King Vortigern in the King Arthur story Merlin of the Crystal Cave (1991); played Count Sylvius in the mini-series The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes (1994); and headed up the cast in the TV-movie murder mystery Bloodlines: Legacy of a Lord (1998). On film, he starred in the horror opus Lurking Fear (1994), filmed in Romania, and co-starred in the Philippine-made horror Darklands (1996). Jon made his last large screen appearance in the Orlando Bloom adventure about the Crusades, Kingdom of Heaven (2005).
Finch was interested in race car driving in the early 1970's but could not obtain a race car license after being diagnosed with diabetes. He was briefly married (1980-1987) to actress Catriona MacColl and they had one child. They co-starred together in the Spanish-made film drama Power Game (1983). He died on December 28, 2012 at age 70 in Sussex, England. - Actor
- Stunts
Jon Foo was born October 30th, 1982 in London England. He is known for his roles in The Protector (2005) Tekken (2010) WEAPONiZED (2016) and Rush Hour (2016) . Inspired by His fathers karate and mothers Judo He began training Kung Fu and now trains mixed styles. He went from performing at festivals with the London Chinese Acrobats (gangs of New York) to signing with one of the biggest film companies in Asia.- Actor
- Producer
Jon Foster has practiced his craft for many years. He started off in a local Iowa theatre and eventually furthered his career in Los Angeles with lead roles on television and on the big screen. He has very diverse interests and talents that include, extreme sports, music production, songwriting and touring with his musical project, KANEHOLLER. He has also spent extensive periods practicing mixed martial arts and boxing. He lives in Los Angeles, and is the younger brother of actor Ben Foster.- Jon Gentry is originally from Houston, Texas. He received his BA in English from Harvard University where he was an integral member of BlackCAST (Community and Student Theater), serving as President. During that time, he also completed an internship in Development at New Line Cinema.
He holds his MFA in Acting from the American Conservatory Theater. As a teaching artist, he co-directed an original high school production of "Child Life" in collaboration with the UCSF Children's Hospital and led a series of acting workshops with community centers throughout the Bay Area. He is a member of the acting faculty at the Los Angeles Performing Arts Conservatory.
Jon has performed at numerous regional theaters throughout California and was a guest artist in the Oregon Shakespeare Festival Culture Fest. Most infamously, he voiced Fallout 4's 'Preston Garvey,' going viral for iconic lines and winning the hearts of fans worldwide.
He recently made his silver screen debut in 'Ten' at the Pan African Film Festival in Los Angeles. - Writer
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Jonathan Daniel Glaser (born June 20, 1968) is an American actor, comedian, writer, producer, and director. He is best known for his work as a writer and sketch performer for many years on Late Night with Conan O'Brien, creating and starring in the Adult Swim series Delocated and Neon Joe, Werewolf Hunter as well as the truTV series Jon Glaser Loves Gear.
Glaser had a recurring role as Councilman Jeremy Jamm on the NBC series Parks and Recreation and appeared as Laird on the HBO series Girls. Glaser was also a writer on the Comedy Central sketch series Inside Amy Schumer.- Actor
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Jon Gries was born on 17 June 1957 in Glendale, California, USA. He is an actor and producer, known for Napoleon Dynamite (2004), Men in Black (1997) and Get Shorty (1995).- Actor
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Jon Robert Hall grew up in West Lafayette Indiana, Prescott Arizona, and Thousand Oaks California. Most of Jon's early life was spent out doors climbing rocks, kicking soccer balls, and throwing the football. He began his music career at an early age, when his mother would drive him 2-3 times a week to Los Angeles for vocal sessions, and auditions. Jon was singing in movies, TV shows, and albums since he was 10. His love of music was equally paralleled with his love for sports.
Jon earned a full football scholarship to Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo. He Graduated after 4 1/2 years with a bachelors in Music and a decision of whether to go to try for the NFL or come back to pursue his Arts career. That decision was made for him when a producer, Tim Davis gave him his first opportunity to work on Glee as a back ground singer.
In 2010, After months of working behind the scenes of Glee, Jon auditioned for the show and earned the role as the beat box Warbler. Since then he has appeared in many different shows on screen and on stage. He spent a year in Las Vegas playing Stacee Jaxx at the Venetian Hotel, and returned to play a guest star on the Emmy award winning Grease Live on Fox as Tom Chisum. He has since been cast and performing on tour in Wicked the Musical as the lead male character Fiyero.- Actor
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Jon Hamm is an American actor and producer from St. Louis, Missouri who is known for playing Don Draper in Mad Men. He also played Mister Sinister in a deleted scene of The New Mutants and Legion, Brogan from Shrek Forever After, and other films and shows including Sucker Punch, Million Dollar Arm, Black Mirror and Good Omens.- Actor
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Jonathan Joseph Heder is an American actor and producer who is known for portraying Napoleon Dynamite in 2004. He returned to play the role in an animated series and a 2005 MTV Movie Awards skit. He also acted in the Pororo the Penguin films including Pororo's Racing Adventure, Pororo's Dinosaur Island, Pororo: Treasure Island Adventure, Surf's Up, Just Like Heaven, Pinocchio: A True Story, The Benchwarmers, Blades of Glory, Monster House, Momma's Boy and other works. He is married to Kirsten Bales since 2004 and has three children. In 2022 He appeared in one episode of Studio C as a guest star.- Actor
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Jon Michael Hill was born on 28 July 1985 in Waukegan, Illinois, USA. He is an actor and director, known for Widows (2018), Elementary (2012) and Detroit 1-8-7 (2010).- Actor
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For six seasons, Jon Huertas starred as Miguel Rivas and directed multiple episodes of NBC's This Is Us (2016). His heartwarming portrayal of a character who spans decades, the 1970s through present day, allowed him to show not only exceptional but also a physically transformative range that captured the hearts of millions of viewers weekly. Audiences will also know him as the tough but affable Detective Javier Esposito from ABC's hit dramedy Castle (2009), as well as for his standout performance as Sgt. Tony "Poke" Espera in HBO's limited docudrama series Generation Kill (2008), where he offered an unheralded streetwise view of the Marine Corps invasion of Iraq that Huertas, being a veteran himself, calls the most meaningful role of his career. As one of a few Latinx actors who've broken the ceiling in mainstream television portraying characters who transcend not only Latinx audiences but also the general market, he's known as an everyman to fans and an industry that is ripe to continue the trend of telling diverse but universal stories.- Writer
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Born September 30, 1979, Jonathan Peter Kasdan's first acting performance in a major motion picture was at the tender age of 3 in "The Big Chill" as the son of Harold, played by Kevin Kline.
Then at age 5, Jonathan Kasdan went on to play an outpost boy in what many critics consider to be the best Western of the 1980s: "Silverado," also starring Kevin Kline as misfit-turned-sheriff Payden, Kevin Costner's character, Jake, Scott Glenn's portrayal of Emmett, and of course, Danny Glover as Malcolm "Mal" Johnson, in their oft awkward efforts to bring justice to the Old American West.
Jon played the 'boy' in a doctor's office in "The Accidental Tourist" alongside William Hurt, Kathleen Turner and Geena Davis.
In 1990 Jon was a lovable Dominic in the John Kostmayer comedy "I Love You to Death," again with Kevin Kline.
But instead of having a big breakaway role in the 1994 neo-classic Western "Wyatt Earp," the 14-year-old played the role of Bar Boy with leading man Kevin Kline. Alas, Jon had to settle for winning the trifecta of his third-in-a-row boy role.
In 2002, he acted in two films as a trainee in "Big Trouble" and Barry in "Slackers".
Continuing the dream in 2003, Jon played a bit part as Defuniak in "Dreamcatcher" with Morgan Freeman.
But in 2007 Jon Kasdan bypassed mere acting, taking the helm of the dramatic romantic comedy, "In the Land of Woman," as its 27-year-old writer/director. In an impressive finish for his directorial debut, his $11 million budget movie earned $12 million at the box office.
Then lightning struck twice as 32-year-old Jonathan Kasdan had two films released the same week in January of 2012, as writer/director of "The First Time" with Dylan O'Brien and Britt Robertson, and back as an actor in the role of Officiant in the Sony Pictures Classics "Darling Companion" with Diane Keaton and Kevin Kline who all got upstaged by a dog named Freeway.
But if anything, Jonathan Kasdan is a survivor. Having been diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma at age 17, he went on to act, direct and write films. His television presence is memorable as an actor in Dawson's Creek and noteworthy is his writing of Freaks and Geeks.
Jonathan is the brother of actor Jake Kasdan and son of Lawrence and Meg Kasdan, both famous directors and writers who, remarkably, have been married since 1971.
And what's next for Jon Kasdan? And action Comedy called "My Spy" co-written with his brother Jake. Oh, and a yet unnamed 2018 Han Solo Star Wars Anthology starring Alden Ehrenreich as Han, where Jon shares the screenplay credit with his father Lawrence Kasdan.
It all goes to show that in an industry that sometimes is faulted for having a dearth in creativity, with a family like the Kasdans, there's hope for Hollywood.- Actor
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Jon Lange was born on 28 March 1980 in Søborg, Denmark. He is an actor and director, known for Alle for fire (2022), Something's Rockin' (2017) and Sygeplejeskolen (2018). He has been married to Mette Marie Lei Lange since 15 June 2013.- Actor
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Jonathan Michael Lovitz is a American comedian and actor from Tarzana who is known for voicing Jay Sherman from The Critic and for being a Saturday Night Live cast member in the 1990s. He acted in a lot of Adam Sandler films such as The Wedding Singer, Little Nicky, Hotel Transylvania, Grown Ups 2 and Eight Crazy Nights.- Actress
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Jon Mack was born in Rochester, Michigan. She grew up on a 180 acre farm owned by her grandparents. The only child of a drama teacher and theater director, she began acting on stage at the age of 5. She is of Polish and Lithuanian descent. Upon graduating high school, Mack attended the prestigious NYU Tisch School of Arts and studied theater under both Lee Strasberg Institute and Experimental Theater programs. After college, Jon relocated to Los Angeles to continue post graduate studies in graphic design at UCLA. At this time, she began working in feature films. She first came to national attention with her performance as Ava Gardner in the Emmy Award winning biopic Introducing Dorothy Dandridge (1999) starring Halle Berry. From there she went on to appear in several feature films as well as television. She played a junkie named Jane in Saw VI (2009) a soccer mom hoping to score with Gerard Butler in Playing for Keeps (2012), also starring Jessica Biel, Uma Thurman and Catherine Zeta Jones. She also appeared in Straight A's (2013) with Anna Paquin, Ryan Phillippe and Luke Wilson as well as Millenium Entertainment's Spiders (2013) In 2015, Mack played Reggie, a gun slinger in Blunt Force Trauma (2015) alongside Mickey Rourke, Ryan Kwanten and Freida Pinto. That same year she also played an entertainment reporter in SyFy's creature comedy Lavalantula (2015) In 2017, she played a telepathic government test subject in Mind Blown (2016) and a time traveling sorceress in Doomsday Device (2017) She's also appeared in 'The The Amityville Murders (2018) and Acceleration (2019) with Dolph Lundgren, Danny Trejo and Sean Patrick Flanery. Following that, she played a street-wise prostitute in Kill Chain (2019) alongside Nicolas Cage. Her most recent projects include Taken from Rio Bravo (2024), a western drama to be released in 2023, Drug Hunter a drama about a Navy Seal and his elite team taking on a drug cartel and the upcoming Sci-Fi action adventure Andromeda Wars. Aside from acting, Mack is also an accomplished musician, singer, songwriter and producer. Her brainchild Auradrone has released 3 albums independently with a soon to be released ep. Auradrone has performed in festivals around the world including Serbia's Exitfest. Animal welfare and preserving endangered wildlife are also a huge passion for Mack who created her foundation Defending the Endangered in 2015 to raise awareness and aid against poaching and trophy hunting. In 2016, she co-directed, starred in and produced Auradrone's music video Auradrone: Weapon of Choice (2016) which illustrates the devastation these practices are causing the wildlife and planet. Defending the Endangered held it's first celebrity charity event in 2017 which raised funds to support the Rhino Rescue Project and Black Mambas APU in South Africa. In 2023, Mack directed her first short film Love Song for A Mermaid in partnership with Defending the Endangered to raise awareness about the plight of manatees.- Producer
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- Make-Up Department
Peters made his Hollywood debut in Cecil B. DeMille's The Ten Commandments (1956) as the boy on the donkey crossing the Red Sea. He went on to be a hard-case kid who spent his formative years in and out of reform school. Peters entered the family business of hairdressing at age 14. Armed with an instinctive genius for self-promotion, he amassed a huge celebrity clientele at his trendy Jon Peters Salon on Rodeo Drive, raking in millions by merchandising the salon's ancillary cosmetic products. Privy to confidences that the rich and famous only reveal to their hairdressers, Peters became hip to the ways and means of Hollywood. In 1973, he fell in love with his client Barbra Streisand and proceeded to manage her early music and film career. He produced her 1976 remake of A Star Is Born (1976) which yielded over $100 million at the box office and four Oscar nominations including the Oscar-winning song, "Evergreen". Peters went on to produce a string of best-selling Streisand albums, "The Main Event", The Eyes of Laura Mars" and "Caddyshack". Peters blossomed into an A-list producer, a status he's maintained over 30 years.
In 1980, Peters teamed with former Casablanca Records and Filmworks exec Peter Guber; together with Neil Bogart, Peters and Guber formed the Polygram Productions, later renamed the Boardwalk Company. A series of mergers and sell-offs later, Guber-Peters was born in 1983. The team's willingness to take enormous chances with huge amounts of money transformed Guber and Peters into the wunderkind of Hollywood, especially after such critical and financial successes as Missing (1982), Flashdance (1983), The Color Purple (1985), Witches of Eastwick (1987), Gorillas in the Mist (1988), and Rain Man (1989). Guber-Peters acquired Chuck Barris Productions (The Gong Show, The Dating Game, The Newlywed Game), cementing their role in television as Guber-Peters-Barris. The partnership took its biggest risk and scored its biggest hit with Batman (1989) which won Peters and his partner a multimillion-dollar seven-year WB contract. Within months, they were wooed away by Sony Corporation, which offered Guber and Peters one billion dollars to assume chief executive posts.
Peters left to start Peters Entertainment which has produced such blockbusters as Batman Returns, Wild Wild West, Ali, and Superman Returns. Peters has received over 254 nominations, and won multiple Oscars, Golden Globes, and Grammys. The producer's combined grosses exceed $6 Billion worldwide and will continue to soar with two Superman sequels and a Star is Born remake in development. Peters is the proud father of five children: Christopher, Caleigh, Jordan, Skye, and Kendyl. Through the Peters Family Foundation he supports the Christopher Reeve Foundation, Life Rolls On, Homeboy Industries, My Friend's Place, Cambodian Children's Fund, Andre Sobel River of Life Foundation, Heartfelt Foundation, The Laurence School, the Sheriff's Youth Foundation, and countless other youth charities.- Actor
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Jon Pertwee is best known for his portrayal of the Third Doctor on the BBC's science-fiction television series Doctor Who (1963) from 1970 to 1974. He was also the first to play the role following the transition of BBC One from black and white to colour. His 60-year entertainment career included work in radio, films and cabaret. This was despite the inauspicious beginning of having been thrown out of drama school as a young man and told he had no future as an actor.
Jon Pertwee was born John (after the apostle and disciple) Devon (after the county) Roland (after his father) Pertwee (an Anglicised version of the true family name, Perthuis de Laillevault) on 7 July 1919 in the Chelsea area of London. He was the second son of famous playwright, painter and actor Roland Pertwee, and his actress wife Avice - his writer brother Michael Pertwee being three years his senior. The Pertwee family had a long connection with show business and the performing arts, and it was at Wellington House preparatory school in Westgate-On-Sea in Kent that Jon, as a small and rebellious child, was encouraged in that direction. Later, at Frensham Heights co-educational school, Jon had his first taste of "real" theatre with real women in the school stage productions of "Twelfth Night" and "Lady Princess Stream". In 1936 he auditioned for, and was accepted by, the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA). He was later kicked out for refusing to play the part of the wind in a play.
Jon Pertwee died on 20 May 1996 of a heart attack. The BBC announced his death. He was survived by his wife Ingeborg Rhoesa, his son Sean Pertwee, a popular and talented actor, and his daughter Dariel Pertwee, an accomplished stage actress.- A veteran of nearly 100 films, Jon Polito is most recognized for his work with The Coen brothers, as well as his many television appearances as a series regular and guest star. Notable motion picture roles include: Millers Crossing, Barton Fink, The Man Who Wasn't There, The Crow, Blankman, and The Freshman with Marlon Brando, and Big Eyes. Directors he has worked with include; Russel Mulcahy, Clint Eastwood, John McNaughton, Tom Hanks, Andrew Bergman, Michael Apted, Ridley Scott, and Tim Burton amongst others. On television, he starred as a series regular on Crime Story, Ohara, Hearts are Wild, The Chronical, and the critically acclaimed Homicide, Life on the Street. Notable guest star roles include the befuddled landlord Sylvio on Seinfeld, his only role as a woman - Rhonda, on The Chris Isaak Show, Gino, brother to Danny Devito's character, Frank, on It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, and Earl Chambers on Modern Family. He starred on Broadway with Faye Dunaway in The Curse Of An Aching Heart, and with Dustin Hoffman in the 1985 Tony award winning revival of Death Of A Salesman, which he also filmed for CBS. He received the Best Actor OBIE award for Off Broadway theatre in 1980. Other awards include the 2001 TELLY for animation voice over in The Dancing Pumpkin which was directed by his brother Jack Polito, The New York Independent Festival Award for Excellence in Acting, and the 2005 Cinequest Maverick Award for his lifetime body of work in Film and Television. In 2012 Jon received the Best Actor Award for the short film Anti-Muse from the Hollywood Reel Independent Film Festival. He credits his success to three people; his mentor Dominic Garvey, his only acting teacher Irene Baird, and to the late, great director, and friend, Paul Bettis. In addition, his inspiration to this day is New York theatre artist, Theodora Skipitares, who taught him film and design in university, and who has since never been far away from his life. She is 'Art' surviving.
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Jon Prescott was born on 10 August 1981 in Mountain View, California, USA. He is an actor, known for The Holiday (2006), Howl (2010) and Parts Per Billion (2014).- Jon Seda's first passion was to be a championship boxer. After taking runner-up in the NJ Golden Gloves, the 1992 Olympics was the next goal. That's when fate stepped in; at his first audition, for Gladiator (1992), he was given a co-starring role! Since then he has branched off into numerous television and film roles. He has garnered critical acclaim for his roles in such films as I Like It Like That (1994), The Sunchaser (1996), Selena (1997), Undisputed (2002), and in television for his roles in Homicide: Life on the Street (1993), UC: Undercover (2001), Third Watch (1999), Oz (1997), NBC Chicago PD, and he also starred as Marine Sgt. John "Manila" Basilone in HBO's award-winning mini series The Pacific (2010).
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Jon Sklaroff is known for Gifted (2017), Three Kings (1999) and Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014).- Producer
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Jon Stewart was born Jonathan Stuart Leibowitz in New York City, New York, to Marian (Laskin), a teacher, and Donald Leibowitz, a physics professor. His family is Ashkenazi Jewish (from Austria, Ukraine, Poland, and Belarus). Stewart moved to Lawrenceville, New Jersey during his childhood. He graduated from the College Of William And Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, in 1984. He made his breakthrough on The Larry Sanders Show (1992), where he had a role playing himself, the oft-timed "Guest Host" of "The Larry Sanders Show". He became as much a part of the show's fabric as some of the regular performers.
In the 2000s, Stewart emerged as a bonafide television personality with his ascension to host of The Daily Show (1996)/Comedy Central, taking over for Craig Kilborn in 1999. Audiences have embraced his sarcastic, sardonic and incisive sense of humor, covering politics and other news stories.
Stewart and his wife, Tracey, have two children.- Producer
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Jon Turteltaub was born on 8 August 1963 in New York City, New York, USA. He is a producer and director, known for Cool Runnings (1993), While You Were Sleeping (1995) and Phenomenon (1996). He has been married to Amy Eldon since 6 July 2006. They have three children.- Actor
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Jon Tenney was born on 16 December 1961 in Princeton, New Jersey, USA. He is an actor and director, known for The Closer (2005), Scandal (2012) and You Can Count on Me (2000). He has been married to Leslie Urdang since 16 June 2012. He was previously married to Teri Hatcher.- Actor
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Jon Voight is an American actor of German and Slovak descent. He has won the Academy Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role for his role as paraplegic Vietnam War veteran Luke Martin in the war film "Coming Home" (1978). He has also been nominated for the same award other two times. He was first nominated for his role as aspiring gigolo Joe Buck in "Midnight Cowboy" (1969), He was last nominated for the award for his role as escaped convict Oscar "Manny" Manheim in "Runaway Train" (1985). He was also nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role, for his role as sports journalist Howard Cosell (1918-1995) in "Ali" (2001).
In 1938, Voight was born in Yonkers, New York. His parents were professional golfer Elmer Samuel Voight (original name Elemír Vojtka) and his wife Barbara Agnes (Kamp). His paternal grandfather was a Slovak immigrant, as were the parents of his paternal grandmother. His maternal grandfather was a German immigrant, as were the parents of his maternal grandmother. His maternal great-uncle was political activist Joseph P. Kamp (1900-1993), a leader of the anti-communist organization "Constitutional Educational League".
Voight has two siblings: volcanologist Barry Voight (1937-) and singer-songwriter James Wesley Voight (pseudonym Chip Taylor, 1940-). Barry is most famous for first predicting and then investigating the eruption of Mount St. Helens (1980). James is most famous for writing the hit songs "Wild Thing" (1965) and "Angel of the Morning" (1967).
Voight was educated at Archbishop Stepinac High School, an all-boys Roman Catholic high school located at White Plains, New York. At the time, the school was operated by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York. He took an interest in acting in his high school years, performing a comedic role in the school's annual musical, "The Song of Norway". He graduated in 1956, at the age of 18.
Voight continued his education at The Catholic University of America, located in Washington, D.C.. He majored in art, and graduated in 1960. He was 22-years-old at the time of graduation. He then moved to New York City, having decided to pursue an acting career.
In the early 1960s, Voight primarily worked as a television actor. He guest starred in episodes of then-popular television series, such as "Naked City", "The Defenders", "NET Playhouse", "12 O'Clock High", and "Gunsmoke". His first notable theatrical role was playing the illegal immigrant Rodolfo in a 1965 Off-Broadway production of the play "A View from the Bridge" (1955) by Arthur Miller (1915-2005). In the play, Rodolfo is the love interest of the American girl Catherine, and disliked by her uncle and guardian Eddie Carbone (who is in love with his niece).
Voight made his film debut in the superhero comedy "Fearless Frank" (1967), playing the role of the eponymous superhero. Frank was depicted as a murder victim who gets resurrected and granted superpowers by a scientist. Voiight's second film role was playing historical gunman and outlaw Curly Bill Brocius (1845-1882) in the Western film "Hour of the Gun" (1967). The historical Brocius was an an enemy of the Esrp family, and was killed by Wyatt Earp (1848-1929).
Voigh't third film appearance was "Midnight Cowboy" (1969), his first great success. He played the role of a naive hustler from Texas who tries to become a gigolo in New York City. The film was critically acclaimed, and became the only X-rated feature to win Best Picture at the Academy Awards. Voight was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor, but the award was instead won by rival actor John Wayne (1907-1979).
Voight's first role in the 1970s was playing lieutenant Milo Minderbinder in the black comedy "Catch-22" (1970). The film was based on a 1961 satirical novel by Joseph Heller (1923-1999), and offered a satirical view on war and bureaucracy. Voight's next role was playing the left-wing student A in the political drama "The Revolutionary" (1970).
Voight found further critical acclaim with the thriller film "Deliverance" (1972), playing Atlanta businessman Ed Gentry. In the film, Gentry and his first are targeted by villainous mountain men in the northern Georgia wilderness. The film earned about 46 million dollars at the domestic box office, and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture.
His subsequent roles included idealistic schoolteacher Pat Conroy in "Conrack" (1974), journalist Peter Miller in "The Odessa File" (1974). His next great success was playing paraplegic war veteran Luke Martin in "Coming Home" (1978), in a role inspired by the life of war veteran and anti-war activist Ron Kovic (1976-). He won the Academy Award for Best Actor for this film. His co-star Jane Fonda (1937-) won her second Academy Award for Best Actress for her role in this film.
Voight's early 1980s roles included conman Alex Kovac in "Lookin' to Get Out" (1982) and widowed father J. P. Tannen in "Table for Five" (1983). His next big success was the role of escaped convict Oscar "Manny" Manheim in "Runaway Train" (1985). He was again nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor, but the Award was instead won by rival actor William Hurt (1950-).
Voight's next role was that of Jack Chismore in the drama film "Desert Bloom" (1986). Chismore is depicted as a war veteran suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), who is trying to raise three stepdaughters. He frequently abuses his stepdaughter Rose Chismore (played by Annabeth Gish), but is genuinely concerned for her safety when Rose runs away from home. This film was Voigh's last film role for several years, as he took a hiatus from acting.
Voight returned to acting with the drama film "Eternity" (1990), where he was also the screenwriter. The film deals with reincarnation, as a medieval war within brothers continues in modern American politics. Following his return to acting, Voight started appearing frequently in television films and miniseries. He also guest-starred in a 1994 episode of "Seinfeld", playing himself.
Voight returned to film acting with the crime drama "Heat" (1995), where he had a minor role as a fence. He had a more substantial role in the spy film "Mission: Impossible" (1996), where he played spymaster James Phelps. The film was an adaptation of the popular television series "Mission: Impossible" (1966-1973), about the adventures of a group of secret agents. The role of James Phelps was previously played by actor Peter Graves (1926-2010). The film was a great commercial success, earning about 458 million dollars at the worldwide box office.
Voight appeared in six different films in 1997, one of the busiest years of his career. The most notable among them was the horror film "Anaconda" (1997), where he played obsessive hunter Paul Serone, the film's main antagonist. The film won about 137 million dollars at the box office, despite a mostly negative critical reception. For this role, Voight was nominated for the Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Actor. He lost the award to rival actor Kevin Costner (1955-).
His next notable role was that Thomas Brian Reynolds, agent of the National Security Agency (NSA) in the action thriller "Enemy of the State" (1998). In the film, the NSA conspires to expand the surveillance powers of intelligence agencies over individuals and groups, at the cost of American citizens' right to privacy. The film was another box office success in Voight's career, earning about 251 million dollars at the box office.
In the same year, Voight played inspector Ned Kenny in the crime film "The General" (1998). The film was loosely based on the career of Irish crime boss Martin Cahill (1949-1994), who was nicknamed "the General". The film was critically acclaimed and director John Boorman won the Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Director.
Voight's next notable role was that of domineering coach Bud Kilmer in the sports film "Varsity Blues" (1999). The film dealt with the difficulties in the life of the players of a Texas-based high school football team, and was not expected to attract much attention by audiences. It earned about 54 million dollars at the box office, making it a modest box office hit. It is credited with introducing Voight to a next generation of fans.
Voight's final film in the 1990s was "A Dog of Flanders" (1999), based on a 1872 novel by Ouida (1839-1908). He played the role of artist Michel La Grande, the mentor of Nello (played by Jeremy James Kissner), who is eventually revealed to be Nello's biological father. The film failed at the box office, failing to earn as much as its modest budget.
Voight appeared in no film released in 2000, but had a busy year in 2001. He appeared in several box office hits of the year. He played President of the United States Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882-1945, term 1933-1945) in the war drama "Pearl Harbor", Lara Croft's father Lord Richard Croft in the action film "Lara Croft: Tomb Raider", coal-miner and working class father Larry Zoolander in action comedy "Zoolander", and sports journalist Howard Cosell in the biographical film "Ali". For his role in "Ali", Voight was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. The award was instead won by rival actor Jim Broadbent (1949-). It was Voight's fourth and (so far) last nomination for an Academy Award.
Voight had a notable role playing Pope John Paul II (1920-2005, term 1978-2005) in the miniseries "Pope John Paul II" (2005). He was nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Limited Series or Movie, but the award was instead won by rival actor Andre Braugher (1962-).
Voight had a supporting role as John Keller, United States Secretary of Defense in the science fiction film "Transformers" (2007). The film was based on the Transformers toy line by Hasbro.It earned about 710 million dollars at the box office, one of the most commercially successful films in Voight's career.
In 2009, Voight had a notable television role, playing Jonas Hodges, the CEO of a Virginia-based private military company in the then-popular television series "24" (2001-2010, 2014). He was a main antagonist in the seventh season of the series. His role was inspired by the careers of Hessian colonel Johann Rall (c. 1726-1776), German industrialist Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach (1907-1967), and private military company CEO Erik Prince (1969-).
His 2010s notable film roles include the role of Dracula's enemy Loonardo Van Helsing in the horror film "Dracula: The Dark Prince" (2013), football coach Paul William "Bear" Bryant (1913-1983) in the sports drama "Woodlawn" (2015), and newspaper owner Henry Shaw Sr. in "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them" (2016). "Fantastic Beasts" earned about 814 million dollars at the worldwide box office, being one of the most commercially successful films that Voight ever appeared in.
In 2020, was 82-years-old, and he is still working as an actor.- Director
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Jon Watts is an American filmmaker and screenwriter. He directed Cop Car and Clown before he was picked by Marvel and Sony to direct Spider-Man: Homecoming starring Tom Holland and Zendaya. It's success resulted in two sequels, Far from Home in 2019 and No Way Home in 2021. He was also picked by Marvel to direct a Fantastic Four reboot film following the failure of Josh Trank's Fant4stic, but dropped the directing role in April 2022.- Actor
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World-class guitarist and vocalist
An accomplished multi-instrumentalist, songwriter and producer, Jon is a veteran of the stage and studio, having worked with many notable artists including (deep breath) Richard Marx, Brian Setzer, David Pack, David Koz, The Doobie Brothers, Michael McDonald, Gregg Allman, Merle Haggard, Roy Acuff, Laurence Juber, John Mayall, Denny Laine, Spencer Davis, Peter and Gordon, Jackie Lomax, Roger Daltrey, The Beach Boy's Al Jardine and David Marks, Dean Torrence of Jan and Dean and Strawberry Alarm Clock.
In addition to an impressive musical career, Jon is also known for his accomplishments as an actor, most notably a nine-season run as "Jason" on "The Waltons", as well as creating the voice of Christopher Robin for Disney's "Winnie-the-Pooh" cartoons.
Jon's musical style runs the gamut from classic pop- rock, blues and country to standards.- Actor
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Jonah Bobo was born on 24 January 1997 in New York City, New York, USA. He is an actor and composer, known for Zathura: A Space Adventure (2005), Crazy, Stupid, Love. (2011) and Disconnect (2012).- Actor
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Jonah Hill was born and raised in Los Angeles, the son of Sharon Feldstein (née Chalkin), a fashion designer and costume stylist, and Richard Feldstein, a tour accountant for Guns N' Roses. He is the brother of music manager Jordan Feldstein and actress Beanie Feldstein. He graduated from Crossroads School in Santa Monica and went on to The New School in New York to study drama.
He began writing and performing in plays while at college in New York, and managed to get himself introduced to Dustin Hoffman, through whom he got an audition for his first film role in I Heart Huckabees (2004). A succession of increasingly high-profile film and TV parts followed until he eventually landed one of the starring roles in the teen hit, Superbad (2007). Continuing to write and act, more roles followed as well as popular appearances on US TV talk shows.- Actor
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Jonah Ray was born on 3 August 1982 in Honolulu, Oahu, Hawaii, USA. He is an actor and writer, known for Mystery Science Theater 3000 (2017), Satanic Hispanics (2022) and Better Things (2016).- Jonas Armstrong was born on 1 January 1981 in Dublin, Ireland. He is an actor, known for Edge of Tomorrow (2014), Book of Blood (2009) and Walking with the Enemy (2013).
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Jonas Karlsson was born on 11 March 1971 in Salem, Stockholms län, Sweden. He is an actor and writer, known for The Snowman (2017), Harmonica (2022) and Cockpit (2012).- Actor
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"This fall, Jonathan Adams stars opposite Lacey Chabert in the Hallmark Channel film "The Sweetest Christmas".
Audiences will recognize Jonathan as "Chuck Larabee", the neighbor/cohort of Tim Allen, on "Last Man Standing", the ABC Series on which he appeared for the past four seasons.
Prior to that he was cast as a regular in "American Embassy" for FBC. He then moved on to play "Henry Walker", for three seasons, on NBC's "American Dreams". The next season, Jonathan was cast as "Dr. Daniel Goodman" for the first year of FBC's 'Bones".
Over the past several years, Jonathan has made notable recurring appearances on such series as "Women's Murder Club", "Revenge", "Castle", "Dallas", "24", and "Hellcats".
In addition to his on-camera experience, Jonathan continues to have a flourishing voice-over career which includes narration, animation, radio and television commercials.
A native of Pittsburgh, PA, he studied theater at Carnegie-Mellon University. After college, Jonathan appeared in numerous regional theaters across the country, most notably playing several seasons at the prestigious Oregon Shakespeare Festival.
Jonathan is married with two beautiful daughters."- Writer
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Jonathan Ames is known for Bored to Death (2009), You Were Never Really Here (2017) and Blunt Talk (2015).- Actor
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Jonathan Del Arco was born in Uruguay from where he relocated with his family at the age of ten to Port Chester, New York, US. He is an actor and activist, best known for his roles of Hugh in Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987) and Star Trek: Picard (2020) and Dr. Morales in The Closer (2005) and Major Crimes (2012). In 1976 his family relocated from Uruguay to Port Chester, New York, US. He became interested in acting as a teenager and moved to New York City after graduating high school. His first acting job was in a touring company of Torch Song Trilogy and his screen debut was an episode of Miami Vice (1984). In 1990 Del Arco relocated to Los Angeles, appearing in both TV shows and theatre productions across California. In 1992 he first appeared on Star Trek: The Next Generation as the Borg drone Hugh, a role to which he later returned several times. Between 2007 and 2018 he played his longest-running role of the medical examiner Doctor Morales on The Closer and its spin-off Major Crimes. In addition to acting, he is an activist, partaking in political, environmental, and LGBT+ rights campaigns. He's married to Kyle Fritz.- Jonathan Aris is the son of the late British character actor Ben Aris but, despite having a thespian as a father, acting was not his first choice. He studied painting at Camberwell School of Art and read Russian and Italian at Cambridge University before training as an actor at the Webber Douglas Academy of Dramatic Art in London. Like his father, Jonathan has chiefly been seen in character roles, notably on television as the private secretary to the (female) Prime Minister in The Amazing Mrs Pritchard (2006). He also does a great number of voice-overs for television commercials and narration for documentaries. He has made numerous stage appearances and was in the original London cast of "Fame - the Musical".
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Jonathan Stuart Bailey is an English actor. Known for his roles on stage and screen, he began his career as a child performer in Royal Shakespeare Company productions when he was seven years old, and by eight was performing as Gavroche in a West End production of Les Misérables. Since then, he has established a prolific career on screen and stage working on different genres and portraying a wide array of characters.- Actor
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Versatile veteran character actor Jonathan Banks was born in Washington, D.C. in 1947. While growing up he always had an interest in acting and stage work, so decided to pursue a career in entertainment. To this day he is a very accomplished stage actor. While acting in film, he usually plays sinister types or villains. He can be seen in Better Call Saul (2015) as Mike Ehrmantraut.- Actor
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Jonathan David Bennett was born in Rossford, Ohio, to RuthAnne (Mason) and Dr. David Paul Bennett. He headed straight to New York to pursue acting after graduating from the theater program at Otterbein. He was actually discovered by an agent while sitting on a train. Six months later he signed on to the iconic soap opera "All My Children," playing J.R. Chandler. Since then Jonathan's career has been on fire. He has appeared in a slew of teen comedies, side-by-side with some of the biggest and brightest stars of their time including; "Cheaper by the Dozen 2" (with Steve Martin) and "Lovewrecked" (with Amanda Bynes). He also stepped into and took over the iconic role replacing Ryan Reynolds as Van Wilder in "Van Wilder: Freshman Year."- Actor
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Born in Danbury, Connecticut, USA, to Greg and Mary, Jonathan Brandis began his career at age 5, acting in several television commercials. He also appeared in small parts in several films and TV shows before his first starring role in the 1990 film The NeverEnding Story II: The Next Chapter (1990). He starred in popular films such as Ladybugs (1992) and starred as Lucas Wolenczak in Steven Spielberg's television series SeaQuest 2032 (1993). He doubled up his high school courses so he could finish a year early for his role on SeaQuest. After his career stalled for a bit, he was hoping his role in serious drama film Hart's War (2002) would relaunch it. However, most of his scenes ended up being cut from the finished film. This caused him to fall into a deep depression in which he would drink heavily and tragically end his own life on November 12th, 2003.- Actor
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Jonathan Breck was born on 17 February 1965 in Houston, Texas, USA. He is an actor and producer, known for Jeepers Creepers (2001), Spy Kids 4: All the Time in the World (2011) and Jeepers Creepers 2 (2003).