Birth name Charles Robert Redford Jr.
Height 5' 10" (1.78 m)
Mini biography
Born on August 18, 1936, in Santa Monica, California, to Charles Robert Redford, an accountant for Standard Oil, and Martha Redford, who died in 1955, the year he graduated from high school, Charles Robert Redford Jr. was a scrappy kid who stole hubcaps in high school and lost his college baseball scholarship at the University of Colorado because of drunkenness. After studying at the Pratt Institute of Art and living the painter's life in Europe, he studied acting in New York at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. Lola Redford Van Wagenen (consumer activist), born in 1940, dropped out of college to marry Redford on September 12, 1958. They divorced in 1985 after having four children, one of whom died of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS). Daughter Shauna Redford, born November 15, 1960, is a painter who married Eric Schlosser on October 5, 1985, in Provo, UT. Her first child, born in January 1991, made Redford a grandfather. Son James Redford, a.k.a. Jamie Redford, a screenwriter, was born May 5, 1962. Daughter Amy Redford, an actress; was born October 22, 1970. Redford has a brother named William.Television and stage experience coupled with all-American good looks led to movies and a breakthrough role as the Sundance Kid in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), when the actor was 32. The Way We Were (1973) and The Sting (1973), both in 1973, made Redford #1 at the box office for the next three years. Redford used his clout to advance environmental causes and his riches to acquire Utah property, which he transformed into a ranch and the Sundance ski resort. In 1980 he established the Sundance Institute for aspiring filmmakers. Its annual film festival has become one of the world's most influential. Redford's directorial debut, Ordinary People (1980), won him the Academy Award for Best Director in 1981. He waited eight years before getting behind the camera again, this time for the screen version of John Nichols' acclaimed novel of the Southwest, The Milagro Beanfield War (1988). He scored with critics and fans in 1992 with the Brad Pitt film A River Runs Through It (1992), and again, in 1994, with Quiz Show (1994), which earned him yet another Best Director nomination.
IMDb mini-biography by
Gustaf Molin
Spouse
Lola Van Wagenen
(12 September 1958 - 1985) (divorced) 4 children
Trivia
Ranked #29 in Empire (UK) magazine's "The Top 100 Movie Stars of All Time" list. [October 1997]
Chosen by Empire magazine as one of the 100 Sexiest Stars in film history (#4). [1995]
Father of Shauna Redford, Amy Redford, and James Redford.
Dating German painter Sibylle Szaggars. [1999-present]
Was considered for the role of Michael Corleone in The Godfather (1972).
Named an Officer of the French Ordre des Arts et des Lettres.
Left-handed.
Mentioned in the theme song of the 1980s TV hit "The Fall Guy" (1981).
Turned down the role of Ben Braddock in The Graduate (1967) because he didn't feel he could project the right amount of naivite.
In the early 1970s, Paramount had plans that were unrealized to remake Double Indemnity (1944) with Redford in the Fred MacMurray role.
Graduated from Van Nuys High School (Los Angeles) in 1954.
Is a National Member of Kappa Sigma Fraternity (brothers include Cory Poccia and Michael C. Williams)
Was a pitcher on The University of Colorado baseball team in the mid 1950s
Has done eleven period pieces including the hits: Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), The Sting (1973), The Natural (1984) and Out of Africa (1985).
He is the founder of 'The Sundance Film Festival' which he named after his character 'The Sundance Kid' from the movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969).
He and Baseball pitcher Don Drysdale were in the same High School graduation class together.
Has appeared in seven movies dealing with adultery in some form or another: The Way We Were (1973), The Great Gatsby (1974), Out of Africa (1985), _Havana (1990)_ , Indecent Proposal (1993), The Horse Whisperer (1998), and The Clearing (2004).
In addition to being the graduation speaker for Bard College's 144th Commencement (class of 2004), he also received an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from the college.
Was given a fishing rod in lieu of the agreed $75 payment for his first professional acting appearance, on a TV game show.
He was voted the 30th Greatest Movie Star of all time by Entertainment Weekly.
Alumni of The American Academy of Dramatic Arts (AADA)
Is of mostly Irish descent
Was originally attached to "The Verdict" (1982), but dropped out prior to production. The role of Frank Galvin was taken over by his friend Paul Newman, who won an Oscar nomination.
After his suggestions of Warren Beatty, Alain Delon and Burt Reynolds to play the role of Michael Corleone in "The Godfather" were rejected by Francis Ford Coppola, Paramount production chief Robert Evans suggested Robert Redford. When Coppola demurred, preferring his first choice of Tony Awar-winning Broadway actor Al Pacino, Evans explained that Redford could fit the role as he could be perceived as "northern Italian." Evans lost the struggle, Pacino was cast, and a star was born.
Dislikes watching his own films. The only film in which he was completely satisfied with his own performance was The Sting.
Long-time girlfriend is German artist, Sibylle Szaggars.
Premiere Magazine ranked him as #17 on a list of the Greatest Movie Stars of All Time in their Stars in Our Constellation feature (2005).
He is an environmental conservationist and often advocates and supports natural causes.
Along with Warren Beatty, Clint Eastwood, Mel Gibson, Richard Attenborough and Kevin Costner one of 6 people to win and Academy Award for "Best Director", though they are mainly known as actors.
Attended Van Nuys High School at the same time as Natalie Wood, who was already a star. Later in life, they starred together in "Inside Daisy Clover" and became good friends.
Recipient of the 2005 Kennedy Center Honors. Other recipients were Tina Turner, Tony Bennett, Suzanne Farrell, and Julie Harris.
He was awarded the American National Medal of the Arts in 1996 by the National Endowment of the Arts in Washington D.C.
His performance as the Sundance Kid in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969) is ranked #20 on the American Film Institute's 100 Heroes & Villains. This is a ranking he shares with Paul Newman, who portrayed Butch Cassidy.
His performance as Bob Woodward in All the President's Men (1976) is ranked #27 on the American Film Institute's 100 Heroes & Villains. This is a ranking he shares with Dustin Hoffman, who portrayed Carl Bernstein.
In Germany he shares his dubbing voice with Patrick Stewart and Sir Anthony Hopkins.
Considered a U.S. Senate run from Utah in the 1970s.
He often did his own stunts in action sequences, but then paid the stunt guild accordingly, so as not to put anyone out of work.
Turned down the leading roles in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966), The Graduate (1967), Rosemary's Baby (1968), Love Story (1970) and The Day of the Jackal (1973).
He set up the Sundance Film Institute in Utah for independent filmmakers and in 1997 announced the creation of Sundance Cinemas, a venture with a major distributer to set up a chain of cinemas for the screening of independent films.
He was awarded an honorary Academy Award for lifetime achievement in 2002 as "creator of Sundance, inspiration to independent and innovative filmmakers everywhere.".
Personal quotes
On his appearance in Havana: "All everyone talked about was aging. It took me by surprise because I have not thought of myself that way. I assumed I would age naturally, as time went on."
"As a director, I wouldn't like me as an actor. As an actor, I wouldn't like me as a director."
"I am perhaps the best looking grandfather around, apart from Marlon Brando of course!"
"Some people have analysis. I have Utah."
[On refusing the role of Benjamin Braddock in "The Graduate," the role that made Dustin Hoffman a star seven years before Redford obtained super-star status himself] "I never did look like a 21-year old just out of college who'd never been laid."
"I used to feel competitive about a career, but now the only things I'm really passionate about are my family, the environment and Indians."-- quoted by Robert Osbourne, "Academy Awards 1974 Oscar Annual"
"I learned early that you'd better know what you're talking about. You'd better realize that certain issues are going to be so hot - no matter what reason, what logic you apply to it - you're going to be met with an opposition just because their viewpoint is different, and there's no way they're going to accept your reasoning. Furthermore, they're going to attack you because you will be portrayed as not being credible: "You're an actor. What do you know?""
"You should prepare when you go to a public event to be public. That's when I will sign autographs. But not when you're going about your normal business."
"I have to be human, of course, to be flattered by attentions from the public. How could you not be? But it gets pretty intense when people are going after your clothes, and mobbing you in the streets, and you have to hide. That's kind of amusing, and kind of mind-boggling when it happens - you kind of go with it and have fun with it. Then it gets tiring, and then it gets worse when you realize you're being robbed of a vital part of your life, which is your privacy. And you also know what's coming your way is artificial, because those people are reacting to something they saw on the screen, not you as a person."
"When we made the movies nobody used the word 'chemistry'. Nobody used the word 'bonding'. It was just: 'Get up there and do your job!' " - on his relationship with Paul Newman.
"There are certain friendships that are sometimes too good and too strong to talk about." - on his friendship with Paul Newman.
"I got a review when I was starting in live television. This guy Jack O'Brian called me 'hammy and overwrought'. Now I'm looking back on it, I'd like to hold on to those reviews. It keeps you in perspective. It really does. Part of you says: 'You know, I never ever really got over that.' And what I think you learn very early on is not to believe your own press clippings. One way or another, just do your work. Because you're your own tough critic. If you focus on doing the work, you'll get to a place of refinement where those reviews which are often hyped up too much to the negative or the positive fall away."
"I've bought hundreds of acres around my home. That's why I moved here from the coast. There's plenty of room to roam and be alone with nature. That's living. The city life is merely existing."
"I often feel I'll just opt out of this rat race and buy another hunk of Utah."
"A lot of what acting is, is paying attention."
"All my life I've been dogged by guilt because I feel there is this difference between the way I look and the way I feel inside."
Salary
The Last Castle (2001)
$11,000,000
A Bridge Too Far (1977)
$2m
The Sting (1973)
$500,000
War Hunt (1962)
$500.00
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