James Woods(I)

James Howard Woods was born on April 18, 1947 in Vernal, Utah, the son of Martha A. (Smith) and Gail Peyton Woods, a U.S. Army intelligence officer who died during Woods' childhood. James is of Irish, English, and German descent. He grew up in Warwick, Rhode Island, with his mother and stepfather Thomas E. Dixon. He graduated from Pilgrim High School in 1965, near the top of his class. James earned a scholarship to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; dropping out during his senior year in 1969, he then headed off to New York with his fraternity brother Martin Donovan to pursue aspirations to appear on the stage. After appearing in a handful of New York City theater productions, Woods scored his first film role inAll the Way Home (1971)and followed that up with meager supporting roles inThe Way We Were (1973)andThe Choirboys (1977).

However, it was Woods' cold-blooded performance as the cop killer inThe Onion Field (1979),based on aJoseph Wambaughnovel, that seized the attention of movie-goers to his on-screen power. Woods quickly followed up with another role in anotherJoseph Wambaughfilm adaptation,The Black Marble (1980),as a sleazy and unstable cable-T.V.-station owner inDavid Cronenberg's mind-bending and propheticVideodrome (1983),as gangster Max Bercovicz inSergio Leones mammoth epicOnce Upon a Time in America (1984),and scored a best actor Academy Award nomination as abrasive journalist Richard Boyle inOliver Stone's gritty and unsettlingSalvador (1986).

There seemed to be no stopping the rise of this star as he continued to amaze movie-goers with his remarkable versatility and his ability to create such intense, memorable characters. The decade of the 1990s started off strongly with high praise for his role as Roy Cohn in the television production ofCitizen Cohn (1992).Woods was equally impressive as sneaky hustler Lester Diamond who consSharon StoneinCasino (1995),made a tremendous H.R. Haldeman inNixon (1995),portrayed serial killer Carl Panzram inKiller: A Journal of Murder (1995),and then as accused civil rights assassin Byron De La Beckwith inGhosts of Mississippi (1996).

Not to be typecast solely as hostile hoodlums, Woods has further expanded his range to encompass providing voice-overs for animated productions includingHercules (1997),Hooves of Fire (1999),andStuart Little 2 (2002).Woods also appeared in the critically praisedThe Virgin Suicides (1999),in the coming-of-age movieRiding in Cars with Boys (2001),as a corrupt medico inAny Given Sunday (1999),and in the comedy-horror spoofScary Movie 2 (2001).A remarkable performer with an incredibly diverse range of acting talent, Woods remains one of Hollywood's outstanding leading men.