NIcolas Cage

Nicolas Cage (born January 7, 1964) is an Academy Award-winning American actor and an exemplar of method acting. He has also worked as a director and producer, through his production company Saturn Films.^[1] As of 2007, Cage has been nominated twice for an Academy Award as Best Actor in a Leading Role, winning the award for his performance in Leaving Las Vegas.

Early life

Cage was born Nicolas Kim Coppola in Long Beach, California. His father, August Coppola, is a professor of literature, while Cage's mother, Joy Vogelsang, is a dancer and choreographer. Cage was born into a Roman Catholic household and remains one to this day. He also dropped out of Beverly Hills High School. His mother suffered from chronic depression.^[2][3] The two divorced in 1976. Cage's mother is of German descent and his father is Italian American, with his paternal grandparents being Carmine Coppola and Italia Pennino, an actress. Through his father, Cage is the nephew of director Francis Ford Coppola and actress Talia Shire, as well as the cousin of director Sofia Coppola and actors Robert Carmine and Jason Schwartzman. Cage's two brothers are Christopher Coppola, a director, and Marc "The Cope" Coppola, a New York radio personality.^[4]

Cage, who went to Beverly Hills High School (the same high school as fellow entertainers Albert Brooks, Angelina Jolie, Lenny Kravitz, Slash, Rob Reiner, Bonnie Franklin and David Schwimmer), aspired to act from an early age. His first (non-cinematic) acting experience was in a school production of Golden Boy. He is also good friends with fellow actor Johnny Depp, whom he advised to get into acting.

Career

In order to avoid cries of nepotism as the nephew of Francis Ford Coppola, he changed his name from Nicholas Coppola to Nicolas Cage early in his career.^[5] The assumed surname is inspired by Marvel Comics character Luke Cage, a streetwise superhero. Since his feature film debut in Fast Times at Ridgemont High, in which he had a minute role opposite Sean Penn, Cage has appeared in a wide range of films, both mainstream and offbeat.He even wished for the role of Dallas Winston in his uncle's film The Outsiders, based on S.E. Hinton's novel, but lost to Matt Dillon.

He has been nominated twice for an Academy Award, and won once, for his performance as a suicidal alcoholic in Leaving Las Vegas. His other nomination was for playing real-life screenwriter Charlie Kaufman and Kaufman's fictional twin Donald in Adaptation.. Despite these successes, most of his lower-profile films have performed poorly at the box office compared with his more mainstream, action-filled efforts. In 2005, for example, audiences ignored two offbeat, non-mainstream films he headlined, Lord of War and The Weather Man. Despite good reviews for his acting and nationwide releases for both films, neither found a significant audience. Poor reviews for the film The Wicker Man did not, inversely, create a hit; to further buck the trend, the critically-panned Ghost Rider (2007) was a significant hit, earning more than $45 million during its opening weekend (landing in the top spot) and over $208 million worldwide through the weekend ending on 25 March 2007. More recently he also starred in the 2007 movie Next, which shares the concept of a glimpse into an alternate time track with The Family Man (2000). Most of his financial successes have come from his forays into the action-adventure genre. In his second highest grossing film to date, National Treasure, he played an eccentric historian who goes on a dangerous adventure to find treasure hidden by the Founding Fathers of the United States. Other action hits in which Cage has starred include The Rock, in which he played a young FBI chemical weapons expert who infiltrates Alcatraz Island in hopes of neutralizing a terrorist threat, Face/Off, a John Woo film where he played both a hero and a villain, and World Trade Center, director Oliver Stone's film regarding the September 11, 2001 attacks. He also had a small but notable role as the Chinese criminal mastermind Dr. Fu Manchu in Rob Zombie's fake trailer Werewolf Women of the S.S. from the critically-acclaimed B-movie double feature Grindhouse.

In recent years, Cage has experimented in other film-related fields besides acting. He made his directorial debut with Sonny, a low-budget drama starring James Franco as a male prostitute whose mother (Brenda Blethyn) serves as his pimp.^[1] Cage had a small role in the grim film, which received poor reviews and a short run in a limited number of theatres.

Cage's producing career has also seen success. Shadow of the Vampire, the first film produced by Saturn Films,^[1] the company he founded with partner Jeff Levine, was nominated for an Academy Award. He also produced The Life of David Gale, a death penalty-themed thriller with Kevin Spacey and Kate Winslet.

In early December 2006, Cage announced at the Bahamas International Film Festival that he planned to curtail his future acting endeavors in order to pursue other interests. Cage said, "I feel I've made a lot of movies already and I want to start exploring other opportunities that I can apply myself to, whether it's writing or other interests that I may develop".^[6] Cage is listed as the executive producer of the The Dresden Files on the Sci-Fi Channel. Interestingly, he is often said to be credited as an executive producer in The Godfather Part III, while it's actually Nicholas Gage, who produced the movie and got a credit for it.

In November 2007, Cage was spotted backstage at a Ring of Honor wrestling show in New York City researching his role for the upcoming movie "The Wrestler".^[7]

Nicholas Cage will star in a Sci-Fi Thriller film titled "Knowing", which begins production on March 17 2008, in Melbourne, Australia. Cage will play a teacher who examines the contents of a time capsule unearthed at his son's elementary school. Startling predictions in the time capsule that have already come true lead him to believe the world is going to end at the close of the week and that he and his son are somehow involved in the destruction.

Personal life

In his early 20s, he dated actress Elizabeth Daily for two years, and was later involved with Uma Thurman. In 1988, Cage began dating Christina Fulton, mother of their son, Weston Coppola Cage (b. 26 December 1990); Weston appeared in Cage's film Lord of War as Vladimir, a young Ukrainian mechanic who quickly disarms a Mil Mi-24 helicopter.

Cage has been married three times:

• Patricia Arquette (married on April 8, 1995 – divorce finalized May 18, 2001) Cage proposed to her on the day he met her in the early 80s. Arquette thought he was strange, but played along with his antics by creating a list of things Cage would have to do to "win her hand", including obtaining the autograph of reclusive author J.D. Salinger. However, when he seriously started working through the list of demands, Arquette became scared and avoided him. They met again many years later and went on to marry.
• Lisa Marie Presley (married on August 10, 2002 and separated after four months in December 2002; their divorce was finalized on May 16, 2004) — the daughter of Elvis Presley, of whom Cage is a fan and based his performance in Wild at Heart on. He later said they shouldn't have been married in the first place.
• Alice Kim, a former waitress who previously worked at the Los Angeles restaurant Kabuki, met Cage at Los Angeles based Korean Nightclub, Le Privé. She is mother to his son, Kal-El (born October 3, 2005). She had a minor role in the 2007 movie Next which he produced. They were married in an island off the coast of New Zealand.

Cage had a Malibu home where he and Alice lived, but in 2004 he bought a property on Paradise Island, Bahamas. In 2005, he sold his Malibu home for $10 million. In May 2006, he bought a 40-acre island in the Exuma archipelago which had been on the market for $3 million, some 85 miles southeast of Nassau and close to a similar island owned by Faith Hill and Tim McGraw.^[8]

On July 19, 2006, Cage bought the old medieval castle of Schloss Neidstein (see de:Schloss Neidstein) in the Oberpfalz region in Germany. His grandmother was German, living in Cochem an der Mosel.^[9]

In August 2007, Cage purchased a home in Middletown, Rhode Island. The 24,000-square foot, brick-and-stone country manor, on 26 secluded acres, has 12 bedrooms, 10 full bathrooms and sweeping views of the Atlantic Ocean from its perch bordering the Norman Bird Sanctuary. Cage sale ranks in the state’s most expensive residential purchases, eclipsed by the $17.15 million sale last December of the Miramar mansion on Bellevue Avenue in Newport. Also in 2007 he purchased Midford Castle in Somerset, England.

The name of his son, Kal El, was also the name of his dog, a Labradoodle given to him on his 10th birthday. The name Kal El comes from the Superman comic books.Kal El is Superman's birthname on the planet Krypton. He was once attached to play Superman in a film to be directed by Tim Burton.

Nicolas was director Sam Raimi's first choice to play Norman Osborn/Green Goblin in the movie Spider-Man. He has even created a comic book, with his son Weston, called Voodoo Child, which is published by Virgin Comics.

Filmography

· Electric God (2009) (announced)

· The Dance (2008) (announced) .... Billy 'The Kid' Roth

· Amarillo Slim (2008) (pre-production)

· Knowing (2008) (pre-production)

· G-Force (2009) (filming)(voice) .... Speckles

· Bangkok Dangerous (2008) (Completed) .... Joe

· National Treasure: Book of Secrets (2007) .... Ben Gates
... aka National Treasure 2: Book of Secrets (USA: DVD box title)

· Next (2007) .... Cris Johnson

· Grindhouse (2007) .... Fu Manchu (segment "Werewolf Women of the SS")

· Ghost Rider (2007) .... Johnny Blaze / Ghost Rider
... aka Spirited Racer (Philippines: English title: review title)

· The Wicker Man (2006) .... Edward Malus

· World Trade Center (2006) .... John McLoughlin

· The Ant Bully (2006) (voice) .... Zoc

· The Weather Man (2005) .... David Spritz

· Lord of War (2005) .... Yuri Orlov

· National Treasure (2004) .... Ben Gates
... aka Sonomo (Philippines: English title: review title)

· Matchstick Men (2003) .... Roy Waller

· Adaptation. (2002) .... Charlie Kaufman / Donald Kaufman

· Sonny (2002) .... Acid Yellow

· Windtalkers (2002) .... Sergeant Joe Enders

· Christmas Carol: The Movie (2001) (voice) .... Jacob Marley
... aka Weihnachtsmärchen, Ein (Germany)

· Captain Corelli's Mandolin (2001) .... Captain Antonio Corelli
... aka Capitaine Corelli (France)

· The Family Man (2000) .... Jack Campbell

· Gone in Sixty Seconds (2000) .... Randall 'Memphis' Raines

· Bringing Out the Dead (1999) .... Frank Pierce

· 8MM (1999) .... Tom Welles
... aka 8mm - Acht Millimeter (Germany)

· Snake Eyes (1998) .... Rick Santoro

· City of Angels (1998) .... Seth
... aka Stadt der Engel (Germany)

· Face/Off (1997) .... Castor Troy / Sean Archer
... aka Face Off

· Con Air (1997) .... Cameron Poe

· The Rock (1996) .... Dr. Stanley Goodspeed

· Leaving Las Vegas (1995) .... Ben Sanderson
... aka Leaving Las Vegas (France)

· Kiss of Death (1995/I) .... Little Junior Brown

· Trapped in Paradise (1994) .... Bill Firpo

· It Could Happen to You (1994) .... Charlie Lang

· Guarding Tess (1994) .... Doug Chesnic

· Amos & Andrew (1993) .... Amos Odell

· Deadfall (1993) .... Eddie

· Honeymoon in Vegas (1992) .... Jack Singer

· Red Rock West (1992) .... Michael Williams

· Tempo di uccidere (1991) .... Enrico Silvestri
... aka Raccourci, Le (France)
... aka The Short Cut
... aka Time to Kill

· Zandalee (1991) .... Johnny Collins

· Wild at Heart (1990) .... Sailor Ripley
... aka David Lynch's Wild at Heart (USA)

· Fire Birds (1990) .... Jake Preston
... aka Wings of the Apache

· Industrial Symphony No. 1: The Dream of the Broken Hearted (1990) (TV) .... Heartbreaker

· Vampire's Kiss (1989) .... Peter Loew

· Never on Tuesday (1988) (uncredited) .... Man in Red Sports Car

· Moonstruck (1987) .... Ronny Cammareri

· Raising Arizona (1987) .... H.I. McDunnough

· Peggy Sue Got Married (1986) .... Charlie Bodell

· The Boy in Blue (1986) .... Ned Hanlan
... aka Race des champions, La (Canada: French title)

· Birdy (1984) .... Sergeant Al Columbato

· The Cotton Club (1984) .... Vincent Dwyer

· Racing with the Moon (1984) .... Nicky/Bud

· Rumble Fish (1983) .... Smokey

· Valley Girl (1983) .... Randy
... aka Bad Boyz
... aka College Lovers (Philippines: English title)
... aka Rebel Dreams (video title)

· Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982) (as Nicolas Coppola) .... Brad's Bud
... aka Fast Times at Ridgemont High (International: English title: informal short title) (UK: video title)
... aka Fast Times (Australia: poster title)

· Best of Times (1981) (TV) .... Nicholas