Paul Newman
Birth name: Paul Leonard Newman
Born: January 26, 1925 (age 82) Shaker Heights, Ohio, USA
Paul Leonard Newman (born January 26, 1925) is an iconic, Academy Award, Golden Globe, Cannes Award, and Emmy Award-winning American actor and film director. He is the founder of Newman's Own, a food company of which all profits and royalties are donated to charity.[1] As of 2006, these donations exceeded $200 million USD.
Newman was born in Shaker Heights, Ohio, near Cleveland, to Theresa Fetzer and Arthur S. Newman, a retail store owner. Newman's father was Jewish, the son of European immigrants Simon Newman and Hannah Cohn,[2] while his mother was Slovak and practiced Christian Science.
Newman served in the Navy during World War II in the Pacific theater. He flew off of aircraft carriers as a tailgunner in the Avenger (the same aircraft that George H.W. Bush flew). He had hoped to be accepted for pilot training, but did not qualify because of being color blind (which is ironic considering that his blue eyes are now his trademark). Newman was onboard the carrier Hollandia (CVE-97) roughly five hundred miles from Japan when the Enola Gay dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima.[3] Prior to entering the service, he attended Ohio University in Athens, Ohio, where he was initiated into the Phi Kappa Tau fraternity. He completed his degree at Kenyon College after the war and later studied acting at Yale University and under Lee Strasberg at the Actors Studio in New York City. Oscar Levant writes that Newman was initially hesitant to leave New York for Hollywood: "Too close to the cake," he reports him saying, "Also no place to study."[4]
While he was attending graduate school at Yale, he became a successful stage actor in New York City. He made his Broadway theatre debut in the original production of William Inge's Picnic with Kim Stanley. He later appeared in the original Broadway productions of The Desperate Hours and Sweet Bird of Youth with Geraldine Page. He would later star in the film version of Sweet Bird of Youth, which also starred Page.
His first movie, The Silver Chalice (1954) has been described by Newman himself as the "worst movie of the entire 1950s decade," but he rebounded with acclaimed roles such as Somebody Up There Likes Me (1956) as boxer Rocky Graziano and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof opposite Elizabeth Taylor.
Newman appeared in a screen test with James Dean for the role of Cal Trask in East of Eden, but Dean won the part.
With his piercing blue eyes and handsome chiseled features, he could have been just a romantic leading man, but he wanted much more than that. Newman fought for important roles in great movies, rather than trade on his good looks and take standard pretty boy roles Hollywood offered every young handsome actor. Newman was one of the few actors who successfully made the transition from 1950s to the 1960s and 1970s cinema. His rebellious persona translated well to a subsequent generation. He has been frequently mentioned by younger actors as an influence.
Newman has appeared in such classics as Exodus (film), The Hustler (1961), Hud (1963),Harper (1966), Cool Hand Luke (1967), The Towering Inferno (1974), Slap Shot (1977) and The Verdict (1982). He appeared most notably with Robert Redford in the films Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969) and The Sting (1973).
He also appeared with his wife, Joanne Woodward, in the feature films The Long, Hot Summer (1958), Rally 'Round the Flag, Boys!, (1958), From the Terrace (1960), Paris Blues (1961), A New Kind of Love (1963), Winning (1969), WUSA (1970), The Drowning Pool (1975), Harry & Son (1984) and Mr. and Mrs. Bridge (1990). They also both starred in the HBO miniseries Empire Falls, but did not have any scenes together.
In addition to Harry & Son, which Newman starred and directed, he also directed three feature films (which he was only the director) that starred Woodward. They were Rachel, Rachel (1968), based on Margaret Laurence's A Jest of God, the screen version of the Pulitzer Prize-winning play The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds (1972), the television screen version of the Pulitzer Prize-winning play The Shadow Box (1980) and a screen version of Tennessee Williams' The Glass Menagerie (1987).
