Name: Jonathan Voight
DoB: 29/12/38 - New York, USA
Jon Voight claims he has always had a passion for drama.
Born and raised in New York he managed to carve his way on Broadway still as a teenager. He tirelessly auditioned for film productions and landed him self a few minor roles which gave him mild critical acclaim.
His big break cam when he was cast in Midnight Cowboy as the male hustler fighting for survival in the Big Apple.
This performance earned him an Oscar nomination.
Heaped with appraisal he took a role in the high profile supporting cast of the big screen production of
Catch-22. This film gave him the chance to work along side performers such as
Orson Welles,
Anthony Perkins and
Bob Newhart.
This was followed in the same year by a role as a young man who takes rebelion to far in the movie
The Revolutionary.
His star still shining brightly he took up another high profile project entitled
Deliverance (along side
Burt Reynolds).
After this Jon Voight took a step back and generally took anything he was offered, this lead to rather uninspired choices. But this gave him time to develop his new found skills as a father. In 1973 his wife at the time, Marcheline Bertrand, gave birth to his son James. In 1975 she again gave birth this time to a daughter - Angelina Jolie Voight.
In 1978 he came back into force. The screening of Coming Home earned him a long awaited Academy Award (Best Actor in a Lead Role) for his portrayal of a crippled Vietnam veteran how falls in love with a married woman whose husband is in that very war.
After this he again found it hard to stay on top and went on to star in a series of mediocre films which are to many and too mediocre to add here (see filmography below).
His drowning career seemed to revive yet again in 1985 with an Oscar nomination for his role in The Runaway Train; but then again Eric Roberts was also nominated that year.
After dabbling with his directing skills with the TV production Tin Soldier. In 1995 he made an appearance in Heat and was then offered a major role in Mission: Impossible along side Tom Cruise.
This film seemed to set a new trend for his performance. He is to be seen often as the clever, behind the scenes bad guy (See: Enemy Of The State and The Rainmaker).
Lately he has carried on taking part in well know projects such as U-Turn, Anaconda, Pearl Harbor and Tomb Raider (where he plays the on-screen father to Angelina Jolie).
But he has also made rather dull films, the sporting drama Varsity Blues (with James Van Der Beek) spring to mind.
A surprising actor, more for the fact that he turns up in the most
unexpected places and he is still going strong, even though he probably will probably be remembered for his early work.
Filmography
IMDB deserves the credit for the filmogrpahy