Ethan Hawke Biography And Filmography:

Having both good looks and an attractive air of honesty, Ethan Hawke began taking acting classes at Princeton University's McCarter Theater, and had his stage debut there at age thirteen in "St. Joan". Hawke's interest in movies then led to a successful audition for "Explorers" (1985) with River Phoenix, Joe Dante's young teen sci-fi movie. The film tanked, and Hawke, encouraged by his mother, left acting for many years before returning.

Ethan Hawke roared back to life with a role as a withdrawn, vulnerable school student in Peter Weir's "Dead Poets Society" (1989) starring Robin Williams, followed quickly that same year by "Dad", about an overworked business type (Ted Danson), who rushes home to be with his father (Jack Lemmon) after his mother (Olympia Dukakis) has a heart attack. He helps his dad learn to live more independently and this ends up affecting the estranged relationship he has with his college aged son.

Ethan Hawke's early movies had always cast him in young teen, coming-of-age roles, and while Hawke gave a good performance as a young prospector in the Disney version of Jack London's adventure "White Fang" (1991), he also took a dark comedy role in "Mystery Date" (1991), even knowing the script had problems. Ethan made his Off-Broadway debut in the New York Shakespeare Festival production of "Casanova" that year before returning for a role in "Waterland" (1992), an eye-catching British movie about a distressed high school history teacher (Jeremy Irons) trapped by his past. 

Hawke was also believable as the narrator and unenthusiastic squad leader in the drama "A Midnight Clear" (1992), adapted from the WWII-era book by William Wharton. With a busy 1993, Hawke was seen in three movies. Most notably was "Alive", an upbeat story about survival after a plane crash in the Andes. Ethan then had a high profile lead role as Winona Ryder's grimy, sarcastic boyfriend in the smash hit comedy "Reality Bites" (1994), with Ben Stiller and Renee Zellweger, where generation X graduates face life after college with a filmmaker looking for work and love in Houston. 

After enduring an extreme exercise routine with a personal trainer, Ethan Hawke returned to the movie screen looking very muscular for his first "adult" role in the futuristic thriller "Gattaca" (1997) with Uma Thurman, his biggest budget movie yet. Hawke gave a strong performance as a genetically inferior man who takes the identity of an athlete in order to see his dream of space flight. Hawke also got the girl both on screen and off, later marrying co-star Uma Thurman. Next was "Great Expectations" (1997) that joined him romantically with Gwyneth Paltrow and gave him the opportunity to work with Robert De Niro, though the box office numbers were lackluster. He then teamed with Matthew McConaughey, Skeet Ulrich and Vincent D'Onofrio for the story of the bank robbing "The Newton Boys" (1998), playing Jess Newton. Hawke also had small roles in "The Velocity of Gary" (1999) with Salma Hayek, which teamed him with executive producer and star D'Onofrio, and in "Joe the King" (1999) with Val Kilmer, about a destitute 14 year old (Noah Fleiss) who struggles to keep his life together despite the harsh abuse at his mother's (Karen Young) hands. 

Ethan Hawke had a big role as star of Scott Hicks' "Snow Falling on Cedars" (1999), playing an American journalist in an ill-fated interracial love affair. The actor then took on the role as Bard in "Hamlet" (2000), giving the enduring "To be or not to be" monologue in the aisles of a Blockbuster video store. The youngest actor to ever play the role onscreen, Hawke's character came across a bit weak, allowing supporting players Sam Shepard (as the ghost of Hamlet's father) and Kyle MacLachlan (as the usurping Claudius) to steal the show. Ethan again partnered with Julie Delpy for one scene in Richard Linklater's animated feature "Waking Life" (2001), and then starred with his wife, Uma Thurman, and Robert Sean Leonard in Linklater's movie "Tape" (2001). 

That same year, Hawke did well opposite Denzel Washington playing a rookie L.A. policeman paired with a unpredictable partner who plays by his own rules in "Training Day" with Eva Mendes. While Denzel Washington won most of the critical acclaim, Academy Award voters didn't overlook the younger actor's performance and gave Hawke a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nomination.

Hawke then had a starring role in the movie "The Jimmy Show" (2002) and found time to write and publish a second novel, "Ash Wednesday" (2002). His next project, which came on the heels of his highly publicized divorce from Uma Thurman among allegations of infidelity on his part, was the erotic thriller "Taking Lives" (2004) starring Angelina Jolie and Kiefer Sutherland. Ethan did better in the remake of the police thriller "Assault on Precinct 13" (2005), playing a desk sergeant grieving the death of two partners who must defend his precinct house against a violent invasion to free a drug lord.

Hawke then appeared in the dramatic "Fast Food Nation" (2006), an ensemble piece examining the health risks involved in the fast food industry and its environmental and social consequences as well. Next was the dramatic "The Hottest State" (2006) about a young actor from Texas who tries to make it in New York while struggling in his relationship with a beautiful singer and songwriter. Ethan was then hired and cast in a starring role along side Academy Award winner Philip Seymour Hoffman in the crime thriller "Before the Devil Knows You're Dead" (2006), where two brothers organize the robbery of their parents' jewelry store and the job goes horribly wrong, triggering a series of events that sends them, their father and one brother's wife hurtling towards a shattering climax.

Ethan Hawke had no less then five movie projects during 2008. The first was the dramatic "Tonight at Noon" (2008) about a group of New Yorkers who experience random encounters that redefine their lives. Hawkes' second movie was the action thriller "Daybreakers" (2008), where in the year 2017, a plague has transformed most every human into vampires. Faced with a dwindling blood supply, the fractured dominant race plots their survival; meanwhile, a researcher works with a covert band of vamps on a way to save humankind. Hawkes' third project that year was the strange, multi-part movie "New York, I Love You" with an all-star cast of players that incuded Shia Labeouf, Natalie Portman, Orlando Bloom, Hayden Christensen and Kevin Bacon, an anthology film joining several love stories set in one of the most loved cities of the world, New York. Next was the crime drama "Real Men Cry" (2008) about two childhood friends from South Boston who turn to crime as a way to get by, ultimately causing a strain in their personal lives and their friendship.

Ethan Hawkes' last project for that year was the dramatic "Staten Island" (2008) about the lives of three residents of New York's Staten Island who intersect as they struggle to get ahead. Ethan's next project was the crime drama "Brooklyn's Finest" (2009) with Richard Gere and Wesley Snipes. Hawke wrapped his year starring with Patricia Arquette in "Boyhood" (2009), directed by Richard Linklater, about the actual "growing up" of a child and seeing the changes in both him and his parents as it is literally filmed each year. 

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