Kurt Russell

In 1963 and for the first time on television, the world saw Kurt Vogel Russell appear in the western series The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters.

Born on March 17, 1951, in Springfield, Massachusetts, U.S, Kurt Russell rose to fame as an actor at age 12. He was raised by his parents Louise Julia Russell, a dancer, and Bing Russell, an actor in Thousand Oaks, California.  He graduated from Thousand Oaks High School in California in 1969, after which he continued his baseball and acting career.

Early in the 1970s, Kurt played minor league baseball. He played second base as a switch-hitter for the Bend Rainbows and Walla Walla Islanders of the Class A-Short Season Northwest League in 1972. He then advanced to Class AA with the El Paso Sun Kings of the Texas League in 1973. Before mid-season, Russell tore the rotator cuff in his right (throwing) shoulder when an oncoming runner at second base collided with him while he was in the field turning the pivot of a double play. Despite not going back to El Paso, he played late in the short season as a designated hitter with the independent Portland Mavericks in the Northwest League. Soon after Russell returned to acting.

He married Season Hubley, the actress who played Priscilla Presley in the movie Elvis (1979) when he delivered a legendary performance as Elvis Presley. For this part, he received an Emmy Award nomination. He then played in several well-received movies, such as Used Cars (1980) and Silkwood (1983), for which he was nominated for a Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actor - Motion Picture.

He appeared in several of director John Carpenter's movies during the 1980s; these movies gave birth to some of his most well-known characters, such as the infamous anti-hero Snake Plissken in the futuristic action movie Escape from New York (1981) and later in its 1996 sequel Escape from L.A., Antarctic helicopter pilot R.J. MacReady in the horror movie The Thing (1982), and Jack Burton in the fantasy movie Big Trouble in Little China (1986), all of which have since become period pieces.

In 1983, he collaborated with Goldie Hawn on Swing Shift, during which he reconnected with the actress after their 1968 appearance in The One and Only, Genuine, Original Family Band (1984). Ever since the two have shared a home but have never married. Together, they produced Overboard, a comedy by Garry Marshall (1987). His other works from the 1980s include Tango & Cash, Winter People, Tequila Sunrise, and The Best of Times.

FAA-licensed private pilot Kurt featured as Wyatt Earp in the Western movie Tombstone (1993), played Colonel Jack O'Neil in the science fiction movie Stargate, and was the hero of the firefighting drama Backdraft (1991). His performance of U.S. Olympic hockey coach Herb Brooks in Miracle (2004) garnered plaudits from critics in the middle of the 2000s. He made appearances in the catastrophe drama Poseidon (2006) and the Grindhouse (2007) episode Death Proof directed by Quentin Tarantino, respectively (2007). Russell also made an appearance in the 2014 Sundance Film Festival premiere of the baseball-themed documentary The Battered Bastards of Baseball, which featured his father and the Portland Mavericks. Russell had a starring role in the drama Deepwater Horizon and played in the Western movies Bone Tomahawk (2015) and The Hateful Eight (2015). In the 2015 and 2017 action sequels Furious 7 and The Fate of the Furious, he again had a supporting role. Kurt will star in Fast X, a sequel to F9 and the eleventh feature film in the Fast & Furious franchise.

Kurt, a hunter, a strong Libertarian, and a gun rights supporter is a father to two sons, Boston (from his marriage to Hubley) and Wyatt (with Hawn). He is also a father to Hawn’s two children, Oliver and Kate Hudson.