CLINT EASTWOOD
Date of Birth: May 31, 1930
Born in San Francisco, Clint Eastwood worked as a logger and a gas station attendant, among other things,
before coming to Hollywood in the mid-1950's. After his arrival, he played small roles in several
Universal features. But he was soon dropped when some execs decided his Adam's apple was too big.
He swallowed his pride and, over the next few years, he dug swimming pools between playing bit parts
in movies and on TV.
While visiting a friend at CBS, Eastwood was spotted by a network exec who cast him as cattle driver
Rowdy Yates in the long-running western series Rawhide. The show achieved some limited star status for
Eastwood.
Thanks to the success of three Italian-made Sergio Leone westerns: A Fistful of Dollars (1964), For a
Few Dollars More (1965), and The Good, The Bad and the Ugly (1966) Eastwood soon exchanged this
limited status for bonifide international stardom.
Upon his return to the U.S., Eastwood set up his own production company, Malpaso, which had a hit right
out of the box with the revenge western Hang 'Em High (1967). He expanded his relatively limited acting
range in a succession of roles--most notably with the hit Dirty Harry (1971)--during the late 1960's
and early 1970's, and directed several of his most popular movies, including 1971's Play Misty for Me
(a forerunner to Fatal Attraction), High Plains Drifter (1973) and The Outlaw Josie Wales (1976).
Throughout the '70s, he was the world's biggest box-office draw, but his critical reputation didn't
begin to turn until 1980, when New York's Museum of Modern Art honored him with a career retrospective.
In 1985, he was decorated by the French, and, the year after that, he was elected mayor of a Northern
California seaside community, Carmel.
Although Eastwood became known for his violent roles, the gentler side of his persona came through
in pictures such as Bronco Billy (1980), a romantic comedy that he directed and starred in. As a
filmmaker, Eastwood learned his lessons from the best of his previous directors, Don Siegel and Sergio
Leone. Their approaches perfectly suited Eastwood's restrained acting style, and he integrated their
them into his filmmaking technique with startling results, culminating in 1993 with his "Best Director"
Oscar for The Unforgiven (1992). The same year, Eastwood had another hit on his hands with In the Line of
Fire.
In 1995, Eastwood, then 65, earned the honorary Irving G. Thalberg Award from the Academy. He
scored yet again with his film adaptation of the best-selling book The Bridges of Madison County in
which he starred opposite Meryl Streep; in addition to serving as one of the film's stars, he also
acted as its director and producer. Aside from producing the critical and financial misstep The Stars
Fell on Henrietta in 1995, Eastwood's subsequent efforts have proven to be largely successful.
In 1997, he produced and directed the film adaptation of John Berendt's tale of Southern murder and
mayhem, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, and followed this as the director, producer, and star of 1997's Absolute Power and 1999's True Crime. When Eastwood directed the critical hit Mystic River (2003), he was awarded with a Golden Coach at the 2003 Cannes Film Festival. He also received nominations from the Golden Globes and the Academy awards for Best Director.
Married in 1954 to Maggie Johnson, he fathered a daughter, Kimber, by actress Roxanne Tunis in 1964.
He and Maggie later had two kids of their own (both of whom have starred in his movies), but the couple split in the late '70s, when Eastwood took up with sometime co-star Sondra Locke. His split from Locke was even more traumatic, leading to multimillion-dollar lawsuits against Eastwood and his studio, Warner Bros. Eastwood and Locke finally
settled out of court for an undisclosed amount. On a much happier note, Eastwood married television
news journalist Dina Ruiz, 35 years his junior, and the couple had a baby daughter in December 1996.
At the 2005 Golden Globes, where Eastwood's 16-year-old daughter Kathryn, from a relationship with Jacelyn Reeves, was Miss Golden Globe, Eastwood picked up his third Best Director Golden Globe for Million Dollar Baby (2004). He also received an Academy Award nod for Best Actor and took home Oscars for Best Director and Best Picture for Million Dollar Baby (2004). In 2006, he received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Directors Guild of America. Gran Torino (2008), which he directed and starred in, won AFI Movie of the Year in 2008 as well as Best Foreign Film at France's César Awards.