Biography
American actor with several appointments to annual
Best-dressed, Most Stylish, Most Eligible and Sexiest Man Alive lists. A
good-looking guy, Clooney is also noted as being courteous, polite and
well-mannered – when he’s not fooling around with practical jokes, rowdy
pranks and good humor or not righting a perceived injustice. Julianna
Margulies, his friend and former ER costar, remarks, "George is a
grown-up with a kid's heart."
The son of journalist and TV personality Nick Clooney, George grew up
around sound stages. He was interested in baseball as a kid but did not
make the team when he tried out for the Cincinnati Reds. Then his uncle,
actor Jose Ferrer, along with two of his sons – Miguel and Rafael – came
to Kentucky to make a film about horse racing, and George was given a
minor role in the movie. The movie never made it to the screen, but
George was captivated. He took off for Hollywood in 1982, driving a
rusty 1976 Monte Carlo and $300 in his pocket to visit his aunt,
Rosemary Clooney. She gave him lodging and a job as her chauffeur.
Hollywood was tough. He moved into little more than a closet-sized room
with a fellow aspirant, Tom Matthews, and worked construction jobs while
doing a few commercials, auditioning and taking acting classes. He began
to get bit parts on various series such as "The Golden Girls," "Hunter,
"Riptide," and a role in "Return of the Killer Tomatoes," 1988. He
appeared in fifteen failed television pilots and was a semi-regular on
several series, including sitcoms such as "The Facts of Life" and
"Roseanne" and the weekly drama "Sisters." Clooney’s big break was on
TV. In 1994 he started his role as Dr. Ross on "ER," where he stayed for
five seasons. During that time, starting in 1995, Clooney and fellow
cast members took four consecutive Screen Actors' Guild ensemble awards.
He always said that ER, the show itself, was the real star – he was just
lucky enough to be part of it.
The credits began to accumulate: "One Fine Day," 1996, "Batman & Robin,"
1997, "The Perfect Storm," 1999, "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" 2000. For
the latter, he was awarded the 2000 Golden Globe’s Best Actor in a
Comedy.
On December 15, 1989, Clooney married actress Talia Balsam and they were
together until 1992. He revealed in an interview that he felt
"cornered," and by the end of the marriage he'd put on 25 pounds and
developed a stomach ulcer. He swore that he would never marry again and
that he had no desire for kids. His most serious romance, a three-year
live-in relationship with French model Céline Balitran, 26, ended when
she moved out in 1999, citing his lack of commitment. His close friend,
actor and writer Mark Adler reveals that "the longest, probably most
well-nurtured relationship in George's life was with Max "the 150-pound
potbellied pig Clooney parented from the mid-'80s until the pig’s death
in early December 2006. Adler shared Clooney’s eight-bedroom house in
the Hollywood Hills for two years after his own marriage broke up in
1995. "His idea of a great day is playing basketball with his friends,
having a barbecue… and watching a basketball game that night," says
Adler. A real guy's guy, his circle consists of eight long-time friends
who hang out together. Always helpful with his friends, Clooney also
actively supports Project ALS. His art-work drawing put $1,725 into the
ALS coffers in an AOL sponsored auction in November 2000. With a strong
social conscience and political awareness, he put together a fund-raiser
for the victims of 9-11, has been an outspoken critic of the Iraq War
and the Bush administration, and in September 2006 appeared at the
United Nations Security Council to lobby on behalf of war-ravaged Darfur.
Though Southern California has been his home, Clooney is still terrified
of earthquakes. He bought a villa in the lakes region of Italy where he
lives much of the time. He is adamant about his privacy, "I don't like
to share my personal life... It wouldn't be personal if I shared it."
The end of 2004 was not kind to the actor or his family. On October 11,
2004, his sister’s husband died unexpectedly of a heart attack. On
November 2, 2004, his father Nick lost his bid for election to Congress
as a Democrat from Kentucky. A few weeks later, the handsome actor
himself ruptured a disk in his back and had to cancel appearances to
promote his newest movie, “Ocean’s Twelve.”
On March 5, 2006, the actor picked up an Academy Award for Best
Supporting Actor for his role in “Syriana.” Clooney had also been
nominated for Best Director and was co-nominee for Best Original
Screenplay of “Good Night, and Good Luck,” and the movie received a
nomination for Best Picture. His latest work is a film-noir about a
journalist in Germany in the immediate aftermath of World War II. “The
Good German” had its premier in early December 2006.
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