Background

Ethnicity: Robert Downey Jr.’s father is of one half Lithuanian Jewish, one quarter Irish, and one quarter Hungarian Jewish, ancestry. Robert’s mother had Scottish, English, German, and Swiss-German ancestry.

Robert Downey Jr. was born on April 4, 1965, in New York City, New York, the United States. His father is the avant-garde filmmaker Robert Downey Sr., who is best known for the 1969 film Putney Swope. His mother, Elsie, was an actress who instilled in her son a love of performing. Downey was raised in an artistic household in New York City’s Greenwich Village and began acting as a young child.

Downey's parents divorced when he was 13, and the young actor ended up living in Los Angeles with his father.

Education

Robert and his sister, Allyson Downey, were immersed in film and the performing arts from a very young age, leading Downey Jr. to study at the Stagedoor Manor Performing Arts Training Center in upstate New York, before moving to California with his father. At the age of 10, while living in London, Robert attended the Perry House School in Chelsea and studied classical ballet. At the age of 16, however, he dropped out of Santa Monica High School and was on the move again, relocating to New York to live with his mother.

Career

Downey Jr. made his debut as an actor at the age of five in the film Pound (1970), written and directed by his father, Robert Downey Sr. When he was 17, Robert Downey Jr. dropped out of Santa Monica High School in California to pursue a future in acting. He moved to New York and struggled through part-time jobs while looking for an acting gig. He bused tables, performed in off-Broadway shows and was once hired as a piece of living art in a SoHo nightclub in New York City.

Downey made his earliest feature film appearances in such films as Baby, It's You (1983), Firstborn (1984), and Back to School (1986). Supporting roles in several movies, including the cult hit Weird Science (1985), led to a stint (1985-1986) on the television comedy sketch show Saturday Night Live.

With his boyish looks and raffish charm, Downey got his first leading role on the big screen. He was a charming womanizer in The Pick-up Artist (1987), a romantic comedy co-starring Molly Ringwald that was written and directed by James Toback. His breakthrough performance came in 1987 with Less Than Zero (1987), in which he co-starred with Andrew McCarthy. Downey played the party-loving, cocaine-addicted Julian Wells in the film.

Steady work followed, but much of it went unnoticed until Downey’s appearance in 1992 as the title character in Richard Attenborough’s Chaplin biopic, which earned him numerous plaudits and an Academy Award nomination for best actor. In the highly acclaimed film, which didn't go over nearly as well with audiences as with critics, Downey nimbly portrayed the legendary Charlie Chaplin from ages 19 to 83. The role displayed his dramatic range as well as his considerable talent for physical comedy. By this time, the 27-year-old Downey had come to be seen as one of the most gifted actors of his generation, but he had also earned a reputation as a troubled and controversial figure in Hollywood.

By this time, however, Downey had developed a substance-abuse problem, and, despite impressive turns in films ranging from the violent media satire Natural Born Killers (1994) to the costume drama Restoration (1995), his frequent skirmishes with the law and his public struggle with drug addiction often overshadowed his on-screen successes. He also appeared in an updated film version of Richard III (1995), co-starring Ian McKellen and Annette Bening; and the Jodie Foster-directed Home for the Holidays, also starring Holly Hunter. He reached a low point in 1999 when he was sentenced to three years in prison for having violated parole from an earlier arrest.

Despite his personal turmoil in the early 2000s, Downey continued working. He gave a memorable performance in Wonder Boys (2000) and had roles in several other films, including Auto Motives and Lethargy. In 2000, after being granted an early release, Downey was cast in a recurring role on the television series Ally McBeal, and he won a Golden Globe Award for his work on the show. His drug problems continued, however, and he was arrested several times. But Downey's increasingly complicated personal life pressed his employer's patience. After that second arrest in April 2001, Downey's tenure on Ally McBeal came to an end; producers had decided to wrap production of the final episodes of the season without the actor.

In 2003 Downey seemed to turn his life and career around, and he thrust himself into his work, appearing in 13 feature films over the next five years. Working his way back to prominence, Downey in 2003 starred opposite Halle Berry in Gothika, which fared better at the box office than it did with the critics. He continued to dedicate himself to his craft, playing a supporting role in the critically acclaimed Good Night, and Good Luck (2005) and the lead in the independent drama A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints (2006), which he also co-produced. In Zodiac (2007), Downey played a journalist who gets wrapped up in the hunt for the infamous Zodiac Killer.

In 2008 Downey won acclaim for his roles in two summer blockbusters. In Iron Man he portrayed Tony Stark, a billionaire inventor with a superhero alter ego. Iron Man grossed more than $318 million domestically and led to the release of sequels in 2010 and 2013. Taking a huge risk, Downey also starred in the comedy Tropic Thunder (2008) with Ben Stiller and Jack Black; he played a white actor pretending to be a black actor in this war movie spoof. In Tropic Thunder, he starred as a self-important movie star who dons blackface to land the role of an African American soldier in the Vietnam War.

Downey went on to share top billing with Jamie Foxx in The Soloist (2009), which tells the story about the friendship between a Los Angeles journalist (Downey) and a homeless Juilliard-trained musician (Foxx). The film registered a respectable showing at the box-office and earned the praise from critics, who lauded Downey and Foxx for their performances.

Demonstrating he isn't afraid of blockbusters (or English accents), Downey co-starred in the Guy Ritchie directed Sherlock Holmes in 2009, alongside Jude Law as Dr. John Watson. The duo teamed up again for the 2011 sequel, Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows.

The crime-fighting picked up again in 2012 when Downey's Iron Man character was back in action in The Avengers, a movie that featured a bevy of Hollywood talent, including Don Cheadle (Colonel James "Rhodey" Rhodes), Mark Ruffalo (Hulk), Samuel Jackson (Nick Fury) and Scarlett Johansson (Black Widow), among others.

After a turn as sharp city lawyer Hank Palmer opposite Robert Duvall in the drama The Judge (2014), Downey reprised his Tony Stark/Iron Man dual role for Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015); Captain America: Civil War (2016); Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017); Avengers: Infinity War (2018) and Avengers: Endgame (2019).

Some of Downey's upcoming projects include the sports comedy-drama All-Star Weekend and Dolittle, based on the classic children's book series by British author Hugh Lofting. According to Deadline, he will also be seen in Black Widow (2020). Downey will reprise his role as Holmes in a third film, scheduled for release on December 25, 2020.

Achievements

• 

  Downey’s characterization of Tony Stark in Iron Man (2008), Iron Man 2 (2010) and Iron Man 3 (2013) has made him into a huge blockbuster phenomenon. His quirky and nonchalant personality in real life reflects in Tony Stark which has made it so successful.
  
  Downey is the winner of a Golden Globe Award and Screen Guild Award for Ally McBeal (2001), BAFTA Award for Chaplin (1992), Golden Globe Award for Shorcuts (1994) and Sherlock Holmes (2009) and 2 People’s Choice Awards for The Avengers (2013).
  
  In 2008, Downey was named by Time magazine among the 100 most influential people in the world. From 2012 to 2015, Downey made #1 on Forbes’ list of the highest-paid actors in Hollywood. Not only that, as of 2017, Downey’s films have made over $14.4 billion worldwide. This makes Downey the second highest-grossing American box office star of all time.

Works

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  • Too Much Sun

    (In this riotous British satire, a conniving Catholic prie...)

    1991
  • Johnny Be Good

    (A comedy about a star high-school jock and how every majo...)

    1988
  • Home for the Holidays

    (After losing her job, making out with her soon to be ex-b...)

    1995
  • Baby, It's You

    (This romantic slice-of-life drama, set in the late 60s, f...)

    1983
  • The Singing Detective

    (Languishing in a hospital room with an immobilizing condi...)

    2003
  • Sherlock Holmes

    (Revealing fighting skills as lethal as his legendary inte...)

    2009
  • Tuff Turf

    (Morgan Hiller (James Spader), recently transplanted from ...)

    1985
  • A Scanner Darkly

    (Set in suburban Orange County, California, in a future wh...)

    2006
  • Avengers: Infinity War

    (With the powerful Thanos on the verge of raining destruct...)

    2018
  • Charlie Bartlett

    (Wealthy teenager Charlie Bartlett (Anton Yelchin) is fail...)

    2008
  • Chef

    (A head chef (Jon Favreau) quits his restaurant job and bu...)

    2014
  • Iron Man

    (After surviving an unexpected attack in enemy territory, ...)

    2008
  • Bowfinger

    (A hilariously resourceful producer shoots his dream movie...)

    1999
  • Two Girls And A Guy

    (A comedy/drama about a struggling New York actor who is c...)

    1997
  • U.S. Marshals

    (Chief Deputy Marshal Sam Gerard (Jones) chases a double-m...)

    1998
  • Zodiac

    (Based on the true story of the notorious serial killer an...)

    2007
  • Back To School

    (A jocular, rowdy and ribald self-made millionaire decides...)

    1986
  • Kiss Kiss Bang Bang

    (A petty thief posing as an actor is brought to Los Angele...)

    2005
  • Natural Born Killers

    (A young couple blast their way across the country - and i...)

    1994
  • Soapdish

    (An ambitious TV soap actress connives with her producer t...)

    1991
  • Spider-Man: Homecoming

    (Spider-Man [Tom Holland] begins to navigate his new ident...)

    2017
  • Wonder Boys

    (During a single hectic weekend, college professor Grady T...)

    2000
  • Weird Science

    (Two high school computer hackers bring to life the woman ...)

    1985
  • In Dreams

    (Claire Cooper (Annette Bening), has been having psychic v...)

    1999
  • The Gingerbread Man

    (A Savannah attorney is drawn into a complex web when he r...)

    1998
  • One Night Stand

    (Mike Figgis (Leaving Las Vegas) directs this erotically c...)

    1997
  • Black & White

    (A shy rookie cop finds himself in a passionate affair wit...)

    1999
  • Captain America: Civil War

    (When an incident involving the Avengers results in collat...)

    2016
  • Avengers: Endgame

    (The fourth installment in the Avengers saga is the culmin...)

    2019
  • Air America

    (A young pilot finds himself recruited into a covert and c...)

    1990
  • True Believer

    (James Woods enthralls as a jaded lawyer whose passion for...)

    1989
  • Firstborn

    (Touching drama involving a single mother of two boys who ...)

    1984
  • Less Than Zero

    (A college student's visit home opens his eyes to how deep...)

    1987
  • Chaplin

    ('Chaplin' is a loving, grand-scale portrait of the Little...)

    1992
  • The Shaggy Dog

    (A lawyer learns to be a better father after being transfo...)

    2006
  • The Avengers

    (Marvel makes cinematic history as it unites the superhero...)

    2012
  • Friends And Lovers

    (Featuring an all-star cast including Academy Award nomine...)

    1999
  • The Pick-up Artist

    (A slick ladies man with a gift for pick-up lines finally ...)

    1987
  • Avengers: Age of Ultron

    (Marvel Studios unleashes the epic follow-up to Marvel's T...)

    2015
  • Restoration

    (Robert Merivel (Downey) is a young man who seems to have ...)

    1997
  • Richard III

    (A Shakespearean classic reimagined in fictional, fascist ...)

    1995
  • Sherlock Holmes: A Game Of Shadows

    (Sherlock Holmes has always been the smartest man in the r...)

    2011
  • Gothika

    (A brilliant and respected criminal psychologist, Dr. Mira...)

    2003
  • The Soloist

    (Columnist Steve Lopez (Downey) is at a dead end. Then, on...)

    2009
  • Tropic Thunder

    (Ben Stiller, Jack Black, and Robert Downey Jr. lead an en...)

    2008
  • Chances Are

    (A reincarnated soul (Robert Downey, Jr.) falls in love wi...)

    1989
  • The Judge

    (Big-city lawyer Hank Palmer (Downey Jr.) returns to his c...)

    2014
  • Only You

    (Marisa Tomei and Robert Downey Jr. star as lovers destine...)

    1994
  • Hail Caesar!

    (Caesar is a would-be rock star. But for now, he works at ...)

    1994
  • Good Night, and Good Luck

    (Good Night, And, Good Luck. takes place during the early ...)

    2005
  • Heart and Souls

    (Robert Downey Jr. is a city-slicker type whose near-death...)

    1993
  • Iron Man 2

    (Robert Downey Jr. returns as billionaire Tony Stark in th...)

    2010

• moviee

  • Iron Man 3

    (Marvel Studios unleashes the must-own, best Iron Man adve...)

    2013

Religion

During a 2004 interview with the New York Times, Downey was asked if he was religious, because "many people find God as part of their recovery process." Downey answered the question, stating that he’s "not above it. But like Jung said about using religion to avoid a religious experience, I have managed handily to avoid a religious experience. I don’t know where I fall."

Still, Downey seems either confused about his own beliefs or satisfied with the ambiguity. His upbringing was both Jewish and Catholic and he credits much of his recovery from drugs and alcohol to Buddhist meditation. As a result, Downey’s beliefs are a hodge-podge of these three distinct faiths. He says: "I’m not above [religion]. But like Jung said about people using religion to avoid a religious experience, I have managed handily to avoid a religious experience. I don’t know where I fall. Spiritual Green Party? There were times when I was into the whole Hare Krishna thing, which is pretty far out. Now I would call myself a Jew-Bu, a Jewish-Buddhist. But there were many times [in prison] when Catholicism saved my butt."

Politics

Robert Downey Jr. attended a 2012 fundraiser for Barack Obama at George Clooney’s house, but stated: "I wouldn't say that I'm a Republican or a liberal or a Democrat."

He also starred in an Anti-Trump video back in 2016, during which he and Avengers co-stars Scarlett Johansson, Mark Ruffalo, and more urged people to get out and vote against a "racist, abusive coward who could permanently damage the fabric of our society," according to Don Cheadle.

Views

Speaking at Amazon's Re: MARS conference in Las Vegas, Robert Downey Jr. announced plans to start a foundation that would use robotics and nanotechnology to clean up the planet. The actor said he's concerned about the environment. The foundation is called the Footprint Coalition, and it'll reportedly launch in April 2020.

Downey serves on the board of the Anti-Recidivism Coalition. He is also a supporter of ALS Association, Stand Up To Cancer, Make-A-Wish Foundation, Communities in Schools, and many others.

Quotations: "My intent is to dominate the playing field for as long as I can, with my own challenges, with myself."

"Listen, smile, agree, and then do whatever the fuck you were gonna do anyway."

"I'm not a poster boy for good behavior and recovery in Hollywood, I'm just a guy who knows he has a lot to be grateful for."

Personality

Robert Downey Jr. is an avid collector of exotic watches including such brands as, Breitling, Omega, Jaeger-LeCoultre, Rolex, Patek Philippe, Baume & Mercier (his grandfather's), etc.

His father was a drug addict and so, Robert Jr. also used drugs at the age of six, when his father started to allow Downey to use marijuana. It was also revealed in the media that Downey was suffering from bipolar disorder for a very long period in his life. The actor's drug-related problems escalated from 1996 to 2001, leading to arrests, rehab visits, and incarcerations, and he was eventually fired from Ally McBeal (1997). Downey was arrested on various occasions on drug-related charges. In June 1996, the actor was stopped by police after driving naked in his Porsche on Sunset Boulevard and found not only to be without clothes but in possession of cocaine, heroin, and a .357 Magnum. He got into a fight with another inmate at the Los Angeles County Jail, where he was serving time for a probation violation and was treated for a cut over his nose.

Downey was sent to the California Substance Abuse Treatment Facility and State Prison, California, on a 3-year sentence in 1999. But he was released early as his collective time in confinement on various occasions had qualified him for an early release.

In the aftermath of his addictions nearly destroying his career, Downey began practicing the martial art known as Wing Chun. He credits his continued practice of it as a big reason why he has been able to stay sober.

Downey has stated several times that the actor Peter O’Toole is one of his idols. Rather ominously, both Downey and O’Toole were known for their abuse of substances.

Interests

• Wing Chun

• Philosophers & Thinkers

  Steven Forrest

• Writers

  Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes

• Sport & Clubs

  boxing

• Music & Bands

  Black Sabbath, AC/DC, Metallica, Pink Floyd, Iron Maiden, Van Halen, Kings of Leon.

Connections

Robert Downey Jr. and Sarah Jessica Parker dated in the past from 1984 until 1991 when she first met him during the filming of the drama movie Firstborn.

Actress and singer Deborah started dating Downey in April 1992. They married on May 29, 1992, after a 42-day courtship. The relationship saw an end in 2001 due to Robert’s drug and alcohol addiction. Their divorce was finalized on April 26, 2004. They have a son together - Indio Falconer Downey, who was born on September 7, 1993.

Susan Levin and Downey started dating in August 2003, when they both met during the filming of the film Gothika. Susan was a producer at that time, as she was an Executive Vice President of Production company, Silver Pictures. They engaged on November 6, 2003, and married in a Jewish ceremony at Amagansett, New York on August 27, 2005. Together, the couple has a son - Exton Elias Downey (born on February 7, 2012) and a daughter Avri Roel (born in November 2014).

Father:

Robert Downey Sr.

Downey Jr. has admitted that the problem with his drug addictions began at a startlingly early age. His father encouraged Downey to try THC and alcohol before he had entered his teens. He would go on to dabble in harder drugs.

Downey Jr. would also appear in his father’s films during his youth before beginning his career proper.

Mother:

Elsie Ann Ford

Spouse:

Susan Downey

Susan actually met the actor at one of the lowest points in his life, right after he spent close to a year in jail and had just finished court-ordered rehab for an addiction that often made headlines.

Robert could have lost his movie career for good, but then, in 2002, he talked his way into a role in a thriller called Gothika by agreeing to get most of his pay after shooting ended. The experience would change his life in more ways than one.

In 2009, Harper’s Bazaar asked Susan if she had been immediately attracted to her husband and she laughingly admitted, "Not even a little bit. The main thing I remember about meeting him was thinking how strange he was."

She added, "I thought he was a brilliant actor, but it didn’t go beyond that. I saw him more like a professor or someone’s older brother." Remembering the exact moment when she began to see the actor in a different light, she told Harper’s Bazaar, "one day [after filming], when we were on the treadmills, Robert goes, ‘Levin, you wanna go to dinner?’ and I said, ‘Eh, I’ll grab something to eat.’ So we agreed to go change and meet in the lobby and as he walked down the stairs toward me, I remember looking up at him and suddenly thinking, ‘He’s really cute.’"

ex-spouse:

Deborah Falconer

Son:

Indio Falconer Downey

Son:

Exton Elias Downey

Daughter:

Avri Roel Downey

Friend:

Keanu Reeves

colleague:

Winona Ryder

Winona was rumored to be dating Downey in 1988.

colleague:

Gwyneth Paltrow

References

• Robert Downey Jr on Twitter
• Robert Downey Jr. on Instagram
• Robert Downey on Facebook