Brad Pitt

• Born: December 18, 1963
• Place of Birth: Shawnee, Oklahoma

Beginning in the 1990s, Pitt proved himself to be among the most effective, conscientious, and versatile actors in Hollywood. He continued to remain in demand as an actor while contributing to behind-the-scenes production into the second decade of the twenty-first century.

Brad Pitt spent the 1990s consciously molding his career in ways that would reflect his extraordinary acting ability. Driven by a compelling work ethic, Pitt acted in several undistinguished films and a number of television shows before 1991, when he appeared for a fleeting fifteen minutes as J. D. in Thelma and Louise, which won an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay.

Although Pitt’s role was small, his performance, particularly his love scene with Geena Davis, projected his sexuality and charisma so authentically that he clearly established his star quality. Remarkably handsome, the blond-haired, blue-eyed Pitt with his perfect physique quickly became a sex symbol, but this is precisely what Pitt feared and struggled to thwart. He could have had a comfortable career playing shallow pretty-boy roles, but he was too serious an actor to do so.

In 1991, Pitt starred as a guitar-playing teen icon with his hair in a huge pompadour in Johnny Suede. Pitt attracted the attention of actor-director Robert Redford, who cast him in the role of Paul MacLean, a champion fly fisherman, in A River Runs Through It (1992). In the same year, Pitt played a police officer in the partially animated film Cool World. Critics thought that Pitt was the only saving grace in Johnny Suede and had little good to say about Cool World, a film with special effects that bewildered Pitt, who had won the role over more than two hundred auditioning actors. In all of these films, Pitt played drastically different roles, none of which emphasized his good looks. Pitt worked hard to bring authenticity to his roles, learning fly fishing for A River Runs Through It, and frequently ending up with fishhooks in his scalp.

In the 1990s, Pitt acted in several films, including Kalifornia (1993), Interview with the Vampire (1994), Legends of the Fall (1994), Seven Years in Tibet (1997), and Fight Club (1999). Each provided him with dramatic roles that advanced his acting accomplishments, and none were dependent upon his looks. He won the Golden Globe Award for Twelve Monkeys (1995), which also earned him an Oscar nomination.

Ever the consummate professional, Pitt did most of his stunts himself. In 1995, his role as a homicide detective in Seven was much heralded. In doing his own stunts in that movie, he fell through the windshield of a car and badly injured his arm, but the filming went on. The following year, People magazine named Pitt the Sexiest Man Alive. A cottage industry sprang up around tracking his romances.

The first decades of the twenty-first century saw Pitt continue to land acting roles while also developing his talents as a producer. After appearing as part of an ensemble cast in the crime-thriller Ocean's Eleven (2001) and playing the mythic Greek warrior Achilles in Troy (2004), he starred opposite Angelina Jolie as a professional assassin in Mr. and Mrs. Smith (2005). He then portrayed the title character in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008), the film adaptation of an F. Scott Fitzgerald short story, a role that subsequently earned him an Oscar nod for Best Actor and had a leading role as a US soldier in the World War II film Inglourious Basterds (2009). At the same time, he had begun taking on the role of producer, contributing to such films as The Departed (2006), Year of the Dog (2007), and The Time Traveler's Wife (2009). While he also starred in and produced the biographical drama Moneyball (2011) as well as the action-horror film World War Z (2013), he did not earn an Oscar until 2014, when he was part of the production crew that received the award for Best Picture for 2013's 12 Years a Slave. Over the following years, he both acted in and served as a producer for the films Fury (2014), By the Sea (2015), The Big Short (2015), War Machine (2017), and Ad Astra (2019). During that time his production company also had a part in such features as Selma (2014); Moonlight (2016), which won the 2017 Oscar for Best Picture; If Beale Street Could Talk (2018), and The King (2019). In 2020, he received his first Oscar trophy for Best Supporting Actor, as well as an Academy Award under the same category, for his part in Once upon a Time . . . in Hollywood (2019). He also starred in Ad Astra (2019), a futuristic drama, with Tommy Lee Jones. In 2022, Pitt's notable roles included The Lost City, Bullet Train, and Babylon. Pitt started again with Clooney in Wolves, a film for Apple TV scheduled to be released in the fall of 2024. Pitt also produced several films in 2023 and 2024.

Impact

Brad Pitt set a high standard for professionalism in the film industry. Versatility distinguished his stellar career in the 1990s and beyond. He also has an interest in art, and in 2022, several of his sculptures were displayed at the Sara Hilden Art Museum in Finland.

Bibliography

Buchanan, Kyle. "The Planets, the Stars and Brad Pitt." The New York Times, 8 Sept. 2019, www.nytimes.com/2019/09/04/movies/brad-pitt-ad-astra.html. Accessed 22 May 2024.

Dempsey, Amy. Brad Pitt. Chelsea House, 1998.

Robb, Brian J. Brad Pitt: The Rise to Stardom. rev. ed. Plexus, 2002.

Schultz, Katie. "The Brad Pitt Sculptures You’ve Read So Much About Are Finally on Display." Architectural Digest, 21 Sept. 2022, www.architecturaldigest.com/story/brad-pitt-sculptures-on-display. Accessed 22 May 2024.