Background

Jeffrey Leon Bridges, known as Jeff Bridges, was born on December 4, 1949 in Los Angeles, California, United States. He is a son of the actor Lloyd Bridges and actress and writer Dorothy Bridges (née Simpson). Bridges also has a brother and a sister.

Education

Jeff Bridges studied at University High School Charter. He graduated in 1967 and moved to New York City where he studied acting at the Herbert Berghof Studio.

Career

Jeff Bridges made his acting debut at age eight in Sea Hunt, a television series in which his father starred. In 1967 he started his service in the United States Coast Guard Reserve as a Boatswain's mate. He ended his service in 1975. During this time he appeared in the 1971 American drama film The Last Picture Show where he played a supporting role. He also starred in such films as Fat City, The Last American Hero and Thunderbolt and Lightfoot. In 1976, Bridges appeared in King Kong, a well-known monster thriller film. In 1982, he starred in science fiction film Tron, where he played Kevin Flynn, a video game programmer. After that he played in the film Starman. He continued playing dreamers and likably flawed heroes, as he did so effectively in such films as Tucker: The Man and His Dream and The Fabulous Baker Boys.

In 1990, it seemed that his career had come full circle when he played an older, wiser, more portly Duane Jackson in Texasville, a sequel to The Last Picture Show. But at the same time, as he has aged, Bridges has gone on to diversify his career even more, taking on challenging roles. Bridges starred in such films as Fearless, The Fisher King and American Heart. In 1993, Bridges starred in The Vanishing where he gives a forceful performance as a crafty kidnapper who reveals himself to the boyfriend of the woman he abducted. After that he starred as Lt. Jimmy Dove in the action film Blown Away, opposite Tommy Lee Jones and Forest Whitaker. In 1998, Bridges starred as what is arguably his most famous role, The Dude, in the Coen brothers' film The Big Lebowski. The film became a cult classic, and Bridges earned excellent reviews for his convincing performance.

In 2000, Jeff Bridges starred in the political drama The Contender. The film, which was written and directed by Rod Lurie, focused on the Lewinsky scandal, which arose during the presidency of Bill Clinton. Later he appeared in such films as Seabiscuit, Stick It and Iron Man. In 2009, Bridges starred with George Clooney in The Men Who Stare at Goats. He followed that success with the sequel TRON: Legacy, in which he reprised his original role. He also performed as the ornery U.S. marshal Rooster Cogburn in the Coen brothers’ western True Grit in 2010. In 2013, Bridges starred in the action comedy R.I.P.D. and one year after he played the title character in The Giver. He did voice acting for The Little Prince, a 2015 animated adventure fantasy film. In 2016, Bridges appeared in the film Hell or High Water. He also had roles in the spy movie Kingsman: The Golden Circle and the dramedy The Only Living Boy in New York. He then played an Irish priest staying at a hotel that has a storied past in Bad Times at the El Royale in 2018.

In addition to his acting career, Jeff Bridges wrote and performed songs, often accompanying himself on guitar. He recorded the roots-oriented albums Be Here Soon in 2000 and Jeff Bridges in 2011. In February 2010, Bridges was among the nearly 80 musicians to sing on the charity-single remake of We Are the World. In the same year, he appeared at Neil Young's annual Bridge School Benefit concert and played a set with singer-songwriter Neko Case. In 2015, he released an album entitled Sleeping Tapes.

Jeff Bridges also wrote the book The Dude and the Zen Master with Bernie Glassman. He narrated the documentary Lost in La Mancha. He also narrated the documentaries National Geographic's Lewis & Clark: Great Journey West, Discovery Channel's Raising the Mammoth, and ABC's Heroes of Rock and Roll.

Achievements

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  Jeff Bridges is an American actor, producer, and singer who is famous for his roles in such films as Crazy Heart, Heaven’s Gate, The Big Lebowski and True Grit. He was nominated for the Academy Award and won it in 2010 for his role as Otis "Bad" Blake in the 2009 film Crazy Heart. He has been nominated for five Golden Globes and won once again for Crazy Heart. Bridges received the Screen Actors Guild Award and the Stanley Kubrick Britannia Award. In 2013, he received the Original Dude Award. Bridges was awarded the Riviera Award in 2017. He also received the Satellite Award and Saturn Award.

Works

More photos

• book

  • The Dude and the Zen Master

    (The perfect gift for fans of The Big Lebowski, Jeff Bridg...)

    2012

• movie

  • Morning After

    (Failed actress Alex Sternbergen (Jane Fonda) wakes up hun...)

    1986
  • Heaven's Gate

    (James Averill, the sheriff of Jackson County in Wyoming, ...)

    1980
  • R.I.P.D.

    (In the afterlife, Nick Walker, a detective who used to wo...)

    2013
  • White Squall

    (Captain Christopher Sheldon takes a bunch of teenage boys...)

    1996
  • Stay Hungry

    (A dishonest businessman asks rich layabout Craig Blake (J...)

    1976
  • Rancho Deluxe

    (Cattle rustlers Jack McKee (Jeff Bridges) and Cecil Colso...)

    1975
  • The Fabulous Baker Boys

    (Frank (Beau Bridges) and Jack Baker (Jeff Bridges) are br...)

    1989
  • Tron: Legacy

    (Sam misses his father, a virtual world designer, and ente...)

    2010
  • Hearts Of The West

    (Enjoyable off-beat comedy with Jeff Bridges as a would-be...)

    1975
  • Kiss Me Goodbye

    (Kay (Sally Field) is a widow who's met a handsome but oth...)

    1982
  • The Last American Hero

    (Junior Jackson (Jeff Bridges) is a Southern boy with a pe...)

    1973
  • Starman

    (Answering a NASA message intended for aliens, a space bei...)

    1984
  • Winter Kills

    (Years after President Kegan's assassination, Nick, his yo...)

    1979
  • Hell Or High Water

    (Toby and his brother Tanner, an ex-convict, resort to rob...)

    2016
  • Simpatico

    (Carter receives a collect call from Vinnie, and a dark ev...)

    1999
  • The Last Picture Show

    (High school seniors and best friends, Sonny (Timothy Bott...)

    1971
  • Tron

    (Kevin, a software programmer, is dragged into the virtual...)

    1982
  • K-Pax

    (Robert, a mentally unstable man, tries to convince the ho...)

    2001
  • The Fisher King

    (When provocation by Jack, a radio jockey, causes an unsta...)

    1991
  • King Kong

    (Jack Prescott, a primate palaeontologist, sets out to exp...)

    1976
  • Iron Man

    (When Tony Stark, an industrialist, is captured, he constr...)

    2008
  • American Heart

    (An ex-convict moves to Alaska to start a new life with hi...)

    1992
  • The Giver

    (Jonas (Brenton Thwaites) lives in a seemingly idyllic wor...)

    2014
  • Fat City

    (The story revolves around a washed-up boxer who tries to ...)

    1972
  • The Big Lebowski

    (Two goons mistake 'the Dude' Lebowski for a millionaire L...)

    1998
  • Fearless

    (Max Klein, a survivor of a plane crash, is unable to rela...)

    1993
  • The Vanishing

    (Barney (Jeff Bridges) is a disturbed man intent on abduct...)

    1993
  • Nadine

    (Nadine comes into possession of plans for a proposed road...)

    1987

• music

  • Be Here Soon 2000
  • Jeff Bridges 2011

Religion

Jeff Bridges has studied Buddhism. However, he is incapable of limiting himself to one religion. Bridges said that all religions are good, Christians or Buddhism or Judaism, but to be kind, is his personal religion.

Politics

Jeff Bridges is well known for his liberal political views. He thinks that there are some people on board with the ideas and some people that aren’t. As for him, the people that aren’t are inspiring him to get busy and put out his vision of how he thinks the world should be.

Views

Jeff Bridges supports children from poor families. He is the co-founder of the End Hunger Network aimed at encouraging, stimulating and supporting action to end childhood hunger. He also supported President Obama's initiative to End Childhood Hunger by 2015. In November 2010, Bridges became a spokesman for the No Kid Hungry campaign of the organization Share our Strength. Bridges also supports environmental causes and organizations such as the Amazon Conservation Team.

Quotations: "As far as the lack of hits goes, I think perhaps it's because I've played a lot of different roles and have not created a persona that the public can latch on to. I have played everything from psychopathic killers to romantic leading men, and in picking such diverse roles I have avoided typecasting."

"I don't think I ever went down that movie star path. I always enjoy taking a 90-degree turn from the last thing I did."

"Basically, one of the hardest things about being an actor is getting your first break. I'm a product of nepotism. The doors were open to me. I'd done several movies before I decided what I wanted to do. There was a certain amount of guilt and worry about whether I really had what it takes. I thought I'd spare my girls that."

"A large part of acting is just pretending. You get to work with these other great make-believers, all making believe as hard as they can. What I learned most from my father wasn't anything he said; it was just the way he behaved. He loved his work so much that, whenever he came on set, he brought that with him, and other people rose to it."

"When you start to engage with your creative processes, it shakes up all your impulses, and they all kind of inform one another."

"I'm glad I survived the '60s. They were dangerous. Fun, too. Everything in your life teaches you something."

"It's a very tricky situation we find ourselves in. It's kind of like the expression ... the cows are out of the gate. There are so many guns in our society already. Do we really need to arm our citizens with machine guns or semiautomatic weapons? And don't we need to make sure that people who do own guns are qualified to own them? Those are simple steps leading us in the right direction."

Personality

Jeff Bridges is a kind person who encourages others to find ways to help those less fortunate, just as he has made hungry kids in America his cause. He says that putting himself in others’ shoes is what he does for a living, but he finds that it helps him empathize with others.

Those who know Jeff Bridges said that he has an ability to play and be completely open and to live in your imagination. He's a very serious actor, but he had a great sense of humour and he knew how to use that.

Quotes from others about the person

• Loyd Catlett: "We've acted together a lot over the years and Jeff's really a soothing presence to share a scene with. He can have a very calming effect on his fellow actors. He has always had great insights to share with me about the acting process – to be real and not to push it."
  
  Martin Bell: "I never understood why it took so long for Jeff to get an Oscar. He should have got one so much earlier. He'd already given so many wonderful performances, and he was really being overlooked by a lotta people. I don't know why. Maybe it's because he makes it look so easy, or because he has such range. He's a real chameleon."

Interests

• Ceramics, photography, composing songs

Connections

Jeff Bridges met Susan Geston while filming Rancho Deluxe, on a ranch where Geston was working as a waitress. They married in 1977. The marriage produced three daughters.

Father:

Lloyd Bridges

Lloyd Bridges was an American film, stage and television actor.

Mother:

Dorothy Bridges

Dorothy Bridges was an American actress and poet.

Brother:

Beau Bridges

Beau Bridges is an American actor and director.

Sister:

Cindy Bridges

Wife:

Susan Geston

Daughter:

Isabelle Bridges

Daughter:

Haley Roselouise Bridges

Daughter:

Jessica Lily Bridges

colleague:

Kurt Russell

colleague:

Steve Buscemi