Alec Baldwin Biography
Born: April 3, 1958
Equally at home playing leads and character roles, actor Alec Baldwin is known for his work in just about every genre, from action thrillers to comedies to dramas. Born April 3, 1958, in Massapequa, Long Island, he was the second of six children (brothers William, Daniel, and Stephen would also become actors). Baldwin was a political science major at George Washington University before he decided to become an actor; following his change in vocation, he studied drama at NYU and the Lee Strasberg Theatre Institute.
Early in his career, Baldwin was a busy man, simultaneously playing a role on the TV daytime drama The_Doctors and performing in Shakespeare's -A Midsummer Night's Dream on-stage in the evenings. A few years after making his 1980 Broadway debut, the actor moved to Los Angeles, where he landed a part in the television series Knots_Landing. He made his film debut in 1987 with a starring role in Forever,_Lulu, which led to work in a number of major films. From 1988 to 1989 alone, Baldwin appeared in no less than seven films, including Tim_Burton's black comedy Beetlejuice, Mike_Nichols' Working_Girl, Jonathan_Demme's Married to the Mob, and Oliver_Stone's Talk_Radio.
In 1990, Baldwin achieved big-budget success playing ace CIA agent Jack Ryan in the undersea thriller The Hunt for Red October. The film's popularity won him acclaim, so Baldwin surprised many by foregoing the opportunity to reprise his role in the sequel Patriot_Games (he was replaced by Harrison_Ford) in favor of returning to Broadway to star as Stanley Kowalski in +A Streetcar Named Desire. Although his decision paid off -- he received a Tony nomination for his performance -- it also marked the point at which Baldwin's star wattage began to flicker. His 1991 film, The_Marrying_Man proved to be an all-out flop (although it did provide him an introduction to co-star Kim_Basinger, whom he would marry in 1993), and the critical success of his next two films, Prelude to a Kiss and Glengarry_Glen_Ross was overshadowed by a subsequent string of flops, including Malice (1993), The_Getaway (1994), and The_Juror (1996).
The actor rebounded a bit with his role in Al_Pacino's acclaimed documentary Looking for Richard (1996) but then had the unfortunate luck of starring in the 1998 Bruce_Willis disaster Mercury_Rising. However, the following year proved more fortuitous for Baldwin, as he starred in the coming-of-age comedy Outside_Providence, as well as in the crime drama Thick_As_Thieves and the ethical drama The_Confession, appearing alongside Amy_Irving and Ben_Kingsley. In addition, the actor made an uncredited appearance in Notting_Hill, sending up his macho Hollywood persona as Julia_Roberts' piggish actor boyfriend.
Baldwin started off the 2000s by re-teaming with David_Mamet on the Hollywood satire State and Main as a lecherous leading man with a weakness for underage girls. He provided narration for Wes_Anderson's The_Royal_Tenenbaums, and was one of the few people to escape unscathed from Michael_Bay's Pearl_Harbor.
Although he continued to make headlines because of his politics, as well as his ongoing legal scuffles with now ex-wife Kim_Basinger, Baldwin continued to do strong work in the comedies Along_Came_Polly (2004) and Fun with Dick and Jane (2005), and scored his first-ever Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor playing a menacing casino manager in 2003's The_Cooler. He became a part of Martin_Scorsese's stock company playing Juan Trippe in 2004's The_Aviator, following it up as a federal agent in love with the Patriot Act in 2006's The_Departed.
Baldwin's longstanding association with the venerable sketch comedy show Saturday_Night_Live (he has hosted over ten times) paid great dividends when he was hired to play the part of the boss on former SNL head writer Tina_Fey's fall 2006 sitcom 30_Rock. He earned universal raves for his work on the show, and would earn a Golden Globe nomination every single year of the show's run, winning the award three times. He'd also pick up no less than five Emmy nods, winning that award twice as well. Baldwin was positively beloved on the series, but he would also continue to work in film as well, most notably in the 2009 romcom It's Complicated, which he starred in with Meryl Streep, and the 2012 Woody Allen ensmeble film To Rome with Love. Rebecca Flint Marx, Rovi
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