Nick Nolte

Biography

Early Life Nolte was born Nicholas King Nolte in Omaha, Nebraska on February 8, 1941, the son of Helen (née King), a department store buyer, and Franklin A. Nolte, a farmer's son who worked in irrigation pump sales and who was an All-American football player at Iowa State University in 1934.[1][2] Nolte's father was of German descent.[3] Nolte's maternal grandfather, Matthew Leander King, invented the hollow-tile silo and was prominent in early aviation. His maternal grandmother ran the student union at Iowa State University. He has an older sister, Nancy, who was an executive for the Red Cross. Nolte went to Westside High School in Omaha, where he was the kicker on the football team. Nolte originally attended Benson High, but got kicked out for a fight and hiding beer before practice and then getting caught drinking it during a practice session.[citation needed] He later attended Pasadena City College in southern California, and Arizona State University in Tempe (on a football scholarship); Eastern Arizona College in Thatcher; and Phoenix College in Phoenix. At Eastern Arizona, Nolte lettered in football as a tight end and defensive end, in basketball as a forward, and as a catcher on the baseball team. Poor grades eventually ended his studies, at which point his career in theatre began in earnest. While in college, Nolte worked for the Falstaff Brewery in Omaha. In 1965, he was arrested for selling counterfeit documents and was given a 45-year jail sentence and a $75,000 fine, however the sentence was suspended.[4] This felony conviction prevented him from being eligible to join the military—at the time, he felt obliged to serve in the Vietnam War. As a result, Nolte says he felt incomplete as a young man for not going to Vietnam.[5] After stints at the Pasadena Playhouse and The Stella Adler Academy in Los Angeles, Nolte spent several years traveling the country and working in regional theaters. Career Modeling Nolte was a model in the late 1960s and early 1970s. In one national magazine advertisement in 1972, he appeared in jeans and an open jean shirt for Clairol's "Summer Blonde" hair lightener sitting on a log next to a blonde Sigourney Weaver.[citation needed] The pair also appeared on the packaging. Acting career Nolte first gained national attention and critical acclaim for his performance in Rich Man, Poor Man, a 1976 television miniseries based on Irwin Shaw's 1970 best-selling novel. Since then he's appeared in more than 40 films, playing a wide variety of characters. Diversity of character, and his trademark athleticism and gravelly voice, are signatures of Nolte's career. In 1973 he appeared in Lorne Greene's ABC crime drama Griff in the episode "Who Framed Billy the Kid?", in the role of Billy Randolph, a football player accused of murder. He co-starred alongside Andy Griffith in Winter Kill, a TV movie made as the pilot of a possible television series, and another one, Adams of Eagle Lake, but neither was picked up as a series. Nolte's first major film role was starring opposite Jacqueline Bisset and Robert Shaw in 1977's The Deep. He followed this with Who'll Stop the Rain in 1978 and North Dallas Forty, based on the Peter Gent novel, in 1979. The 1982 buddy cop/convict film 48 Hrs. strongly bolstered his film career and made his co-star Eddie Murphy a box-office sensation. He continued starring in films throughout the 1980s, including Under Fire (1983) with Gene Hackman, Down and Out in Beverly Hills (1986) with Richard Dreyfuss and Bette Midler, Extreme Prejudice (1987) and New York Stories (1989) under the direction of Martin Scorsese. Nick Nolte told Screen Comment’s Sam Weisberg about how he prepared for his role in Down and Out in Beverly Hills, a film he which he plays a homeless man: "I was hanging out around this homeless section, it was like Whorehouse Alley, and I was sleeping there for two days before I was supposed to get a bed in a mission shelter. It doesn’t take more than seven hours or so outside to turn into a space cadet. Your mind just gets nuts. And then I couldn’t get into the shelter. I didn’t have seniority." After that experience, Nolte delved further into the part by refusing to bathe for weeks. "[Co-star] Bette Midler was disgusted," Nolte chuckled. He began the 1990s working with Murphy again in the sequel Another 48 Hours. Nolte had perhaps his greatest box office success in 1991, starring in The Prince of Tides with Barbra Streisand, for which he received his first nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actor. Though he lost to Anthony Hopkins for The Silence of the Lambs, he won a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama. That same year he starred in Martin Scorsese's remake of Cape Fear with Robert De Niro and Jessica Lange. Nolte's solid work continued with Lorenzo's Oil (1992) opposite Susan Sarandon, Mulholland Falls (1996), and After Glow (1997) for which his co-star Julie Christie received her third Academy Award nomination. He received his second Academy Award nomination the same year for his work in Affliction, but lost to Roberto Benigni for Life Is Beautiful. However, Nolte's co-star, James Coburn, won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for playing the father of Nolte's character. That same year, Nolte starred in Terrence Malick's highly anticipated film The Thin Red Line. Nolte continued to work through the 2000s, taking smaller parts in Clean and Hotel Rwanda; both performances received positive reviews. He also played supporting roles in the 2006 drama Peaceful Warrior and the 2008 comedy Tropic Thunder. He will star opposite Dustin Hoffman in the HBO TV series Luck. Personal Life Nolte has been married and divorced three times. His ex-wives are Sheila Page, Sharyn Haddad and Rebecca Linger, with whom he has a son named Brawley Nolte (born June 20, 1986). His son is also an actor, having been prominently featured as Mel Gibson's kidnapped son in the 1996 film Ransom. Nolte was also involved with actresses Debra Winger and Vicki Lewis. On October 3, 2007, his longtime partner, Clytie Lane, gave birth to their daughter, Sophie Lane Nolte. Nolte currently resides in Malibu, California. On October 6, 2008, a fire, which started from a computer printer, burned a section of his home. Nolte escaped unharmed, but there was reportedly $1.5 million worth of damage. Legal Troubles In September 2002, he checked himself into Silver Hill Hospital in Connecticut for counseling after he was arrested on suspicion of drunken driving in Malibu a few days earlier. Tests later showed that he was under the influence of GHB. Nolte responded that he has "been taking it for four years and I've never been raped." On December 12, 2002 he pleaded no contest to charges of driving under the influence. He was given three years probation, with orders to undergo alcohol and drug counseling with random testing required. Awards 1991 – Los Angeles Film Critics Association: Best Actor, The Prince of Tides 1991 – Golden Globe: Best Actor in a Motion Picture (Drama), The Prince of Tides 1992 – Chosen as People Magazine's Sexiest Man Alive 1998 – New York Film Critics Circle – Best Actor, Affliction 1998 – National Society of Film Critics – Best Actor, Affliction