Kevin Spacey

Auditioned for "The Gong Show" in 1978 and was rejected.

Attended Chatsworth High School with Val Kilmer.

His mother was his date for the Oscars the night he won.

Was co-valedictorian of his high school class at Chatsworth High School in 1977.

Was paid 225 pounds per week for appearing in "The Iceman Cometh" at the Almeida Theatre in London.

In October 1997 he was ranked #56 in Empire magazines "The Top 100 Movie Stars of All Time" list.

Went to Chatsworth High School in Los Angeles with Mare Winningham. During their senior year he played von Trapp and she played Maria in a school production of "The Sound of Music". Upon hearing of their Oscar nominations in 1996, Winningham sent a telegram to Spacey saying: "Captain von Trapp--congratulations on your nomination--Maria".

In May 1999 he was voted greatest actor of the decade by Empire Magazine.

Burned his sisters treehouse down when they were children. This caused his parents to opt for military school, which he promptly left for Chatsworth High School.

Was the first choice to play the role of Lester Burnham in American Beauty .

In February 2001 he appears twice in Total Films (U.K) 10 Greatest Villains of All Time poll. His "John Doe", from Se7en , reached #10, while his character in The Usual Suspects was voted #5.

Listed as one of "Entertainment Weeklys 25 Best Actors.

In September 2000 he made Peoples Best-Dressed list.

Studied drama at Juilliard School for two years.

Was expelled from Northridge Military Academy for throwing a tire at a classmate.

His Labrador dogs name is Legacy.

Was the first Academy Award winner to be on "The Daily Show" .

During his appearance on BBC TVs "Parkinson" in March 2002, he did impressions of Jack Lemmon , Bill Clinton , Judi Dench , Katharine Hepburn , Al Pacino , Ian McKellen , Peter OToole and James Stewart.

Supporter of Londons Old Vic Theater, co-hosting fund-raiser for it in NYC, April 2002.

Owns a Mini-Cooper.

Dedicated the Oscar that he won for Best Actor in American Beauty to Jack Lemmon. Spacey has said in interviews that he based his performance of Lester Burnham on Lemmons C.C. Baxter in The Apartment . Appropriately, there is also a family connection between those films: Lemmons love interest was Shirley MacLaine , whose sister-in-law, Annette Bening played Spaceys wife.

His production company, TriggerStreet, is named after an actual street in the San Fernando Valley where he grew up and dreamed of building a theatre and making movies. The late cowboy star Roy Rogers once owned a ranch on the land and named the street for his horse Trigger.

Named Artistic Director of the Old Vic Theatre in London, England, UK.

On 10/2/02 he attended the UK Labour Party Conference with former US President Bill Clinton.

Has an older brother, Randall, and an older sister, Julie Ann. Has a nephew and a niece.

His father was a technical writer.

When they were both performing on Broadway in 1998, he would often meet Dame Judi Dench during intermission or between shows.

On 4/17/04 he suffered a head injury in London after tripping over his dog while pursuing a young man who had stolen his cell phone. Initially he reported that the injury was the result of a mugging, but later admitted the truth and stated that he was embarrassed by the situation.

His Oscar-winning performance as Verbal Kint from his film The Usual Suspects was ranked #48 on the American Film Institutes Villains list in their compilation of the 100 years of The Greatest Screen Heroes and Villains.

Has said that working with Jack Lemmon on a stage production of Long Days Journey Into Night changed his life. Previously possessive of a reckless ambition, he said he was amazed at how Lemmon was both a great actor and generous to a fault as both a co-star and a human being, teaching him that being a good person and a good actor were not mutually exclusive. He still considers Lemmon his role model.

Spencer Tracy , Henry Fonda , James Stewart , Jack Lemmon , Al Pacino , and Jason Robards are his idols.

Father Thomas Fowler died in 1992. Mother Kathleen died of a brain tumor in 2003.

His guest appearance in "Crime Story" {The Senator, the Movie Star, and the Mob (#2.1)} was his first major television appearance.

His performance as "Verbal Kint" in The Usual Suspects is ranked #100 on Premiere Magazines 100 Greatest Movie Characters of All Time.

Parodied a mad bald man, "Dr. Evil", in Austin Powers in Goldmember while portraying a sinister bald man, "Lex Luthor", in Superman Returns .

Has twice shaved his head completely bald to play the villain in movies. He did it to play "John Doe" in Se7en and "Lex Luthor" in Superman Returns .

The character Deadshot from "Justice League" had his voice and personality based on Spacey.

As part of his research for the role of Bobby Darin in Beyond the Sea , he watched several of Michael Bubl s performances.

In April 2000 the "Los Angeles Times" reported that he was being considered for the role of Inspector Clouseau in The Pink Panther . The following month he denied he was in negotiations for the role. He said hed only had two conversations with MGM about the part, but that since the announcement claiming he was in the running for it, hed had to answer "8000" Pink Panther questions.

Has a black mongrel terrier called Mini. "She is named after the car.".

Huge fan of professional wrestling.

His older brother, Randy Fowler, makes a living as a Rod Stewart impersonator and limo driver based in Boise, Idaho.

As of 2013 he is only one of six actors who have a 2-0 winning record when nominated for an acting Oscar. The others are Luise Rainer for The Great Ziegfeld and The Good Earth ; Vivien Leigh for Gone with the Wind and A Streetcar Named Desire ; Helen Hayes for The Sin of Madelon Claudet and Airport ; Hilary Swank for Boys Dont Cry and Million Dollar Baby ; and Christoph Waltz for Inglourious Basterds and Django Unchained ..

Ranked #10 in the 2008 Telegraphs list "the 100 most powerful people in British culture".

To pay his way through Juilliard, he worked in Juilliards admin office.

Co-hosted the Nobel Peace Prize concert for Al Gore because Tommy Lee Jones had to drop out at the last minute.

In 1970 he attended Northridge Military Academy in Northridge, CA, with producer/director Thomas R. Bond II.

In February of 2008 he visited Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, for Carneval.

Has never married or had children.

Thanked by the band Matchbox Twenty in the liner notes of their album "Yourself or Someone Like You".

Lives in Los Angeles and New York City.

In November of 2010 Prince Charles presented him with an award for his services to drama. He was named an honorary Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in recognition for his work at Londons Old Vic theatre, where he has been Artistic Director since 2003.

Divides his time between London (England) Los Angeles.

Was the first Hollywood star to be cast as a lead actor in a fully Chinese-financed film: Dayyan Eng s Xing ying bu li .

In Total Films Top 100 Greatest Movie Villains, he ranked 65 for his role as Buddy Ackerman in Swimming with Sharks . His Keiser Soze in The Usual Suspects was ranked 52 and his John Doe in Se7en was ranked 13.

In a Butterfields L.A. auction on September 10, 2001, the Oscar won by George Stoll for Anchors Aweigh was being auctioned for $157,000. He bought it and returned it to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Voted Man of the Year in Theater by GQ Magazine in 1999.

A guest at Simon Cowell s 50th birthday party.

His maternal grandfather was the son of Swedish parents. Kevins other ancestry includes English and Welsh.

After he dropped out of Julliard, he worked as a shoe salesman and a superintendent in his apartment building.

Credits Mel Profitt on "Wiseguy" as being his "breakthrough role.".

Was in "Rolling Stone?s "Hot" issue as "Hot Character" twice, in 1988 and 1995.

In February of 2003 he announced on "Live with Regis and Kathie Lee" that he will be directing and starring in a pic about singer Bobby Darin. He will also be singing.

(October 2011) San Francisco, United States: Playing Richard 111 as part of The Bridge Project

(August 2011) Epidavros, Greece: Playing Richard 111 as part of The Bridge Project

(September 2005) Played the lead in Richard II at The Old Vic.

(June 2008) Slated to teach the theater course at Oxford University in the fall

(July 2011) London, England: Starring in "Richard III" at the Old Vic Theatre

Performed opposite Jeff Goldblum in "Speed-The-Plow" at The Old Vic, London.

(September 2006) Being Artistic Director of the Old Vic, he currently plays "A Moon for the Misbegotten", by Eugene ONeill , opposite Eve Best.

As of 2014, has appeared in three films that were nominated for the Best Picture Oscar: Working Girl , L.A. Confidential and American Beauty , with the latter winning in the category.

Was the first choice to play President Whitmore in Independence Day , but an executive at 20th Century Fox refused to let producer Dean Devlin cast him in the role, feeling he didnt have the potential to be a big-time movie star. Ten months later, Spacey won his first Academy Award. Independence Day was about aliens attacking Earth. He would later play an alien visiting the Earth in K-PAX .

He was considered for the role of Silva in Skyfall .

He was awarded an honorary CBE (Commander of the Order of the British Empire) in the 2010 Queens Birthday Honours List for his services to drama. He was awarded an honorary Knight Bachelor of the Order of the British Empire in the 2015 Queens Birthday Honours List for his services to drama and theatre especially as artistic director of the Old Vic Theatre in London, England.

Shares the role of Lex Luthor with Gene Hackman , Michael Rosenbaum and Jesse Eisenberg. He and Rosenbaum appeared together in Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil for director Clint Eastwood , who also directed Hackman in Unforgiven and Absolute Power . Spacey and Hackman have also both won an Oscar for Best Actor and Supporting Actor. After winning Best Supporting Actor, they each appeared in a John Grisham adaptation: The Firm and A Time to Kill . Spacey also produced The Social Network , which Eisenberg appeared in.

He was nominated for the 2016 New Jersey Hall of Fame in the Performance Arts category.

Does spot-on impersonations of Jack Lemmon , Katharine Hepburn , Clint Eastwood and Christopher Walken , among others.

He is a supporter of the U.S. Democratic Party.

In October 2017, he publicly revealed that he is homosexual after many years of media speculation about his personal life.

When Spacey played James Tyrone, Jr. on Broadway in Eugene ONeills Moon For the Misbegotten in 2007 (the same role he played in ONeills Long Days Journey Into Night in 1986), every time he smoked a cigarette onstage he kept switching it from one hand to the other, an homage to the dual roles he played in the film The Usual Suspects, one of whom is right-handed and the other left-handed.

[on winning the Best Actor Oscar for his performance in,American Beauty (1999) )] This has definitely been the highlight,of my day.

[on American Beauty (1999) ] I read the screenplay and nearly fell,out of bed. I thought I better meet him quick before someone else read,it.

The less you know about me, the easier it is to convince you that I am,that character on screen. It allows an audience to come into a movie,theatre and believe I am that person.

Success is like death. The more successful you become, the higher the,houses in the hills get and the higher the fences get.

The movies are not my first priority--the theater is.

[on Albino Alligator (1996) ] Directing a film was something I was,yearning to do. I always wanted to see if I had the capacity to be a,good storyteller.

Sometimes the person who is the most logical is the person whom we call,insane.

[on Horrible Bosses 2 (2014) ] I think it is a little bit crazier.

I am one of these actors where I believe very strongly that if you want,to get a part, you have to do anything within reason to get that part.

We gotta be willing to let it hurt. You know, all this notion that acting is “yeah it’s pretend” and yes we enjoy it and yeah we can have a good time with it. But if you wanna LAND, you wanna make an impact, you want those FUCKERS TO REMEMBER YOU! Then you have to let it hurt sometimes. You gotta get there because that’s all an audience ever wants. Is for you to open up your chest and show them that you have a fucking heart. That’s all we want. A heart. A human being. Not an affectation.

After graduation, I was floundering in L. A.

doing stand-up comedy and working in a shoe store in the Valley.

I certainly identify with the role of mentor and, to some degree, maybe teacher. I do a lot of work with kids at the Old Vic.

Success is like death. The more successful you become, the higher the houses in the hills get and the higher the fences get.

My mother was sarcastic and delightful and, trust me, quite remarkable.

Partisan rancour and party politics and ideology have got in the way of compromise - and compromise is the only thing that has ever made politics successful.

I find it sad that by not talking about who I sleep with, that makes me mysterious. There was a time when I would have been called a gentleman.

Storytelling helps us understand each other, translate the issues of our times, and the tools of theater and film can be powerful in helping young people to develop communication/collaboration skills, let alone improving their own confidence. .