| What's going on here?
Flixster members are collaborating to create the definitive resource for Val Kilmer information on the Internet. We're adding all the images, info, and ideas that best tell this actor's unique story. To add your knowledge of Val Kilmer, just log in and click the EasyEdit button at the top of the wiki pages. (Click here for help.) |
Val Kilmer mini-bio:
Born New Year's Eve 1959 in Los Angeles, California, to Eugene and Gladys Kilmer, Val's early life was spent with his older brother Mark and younger brother Wesley on the ranch once owned by the cowboy legend Roy Rogers. Val caught the acting bug early as the Kilmer boys often spent their summer vacations entertaining visitors of the guest ranch his parents once owned in Arizona. After filming his first TV commercial at age 12 for a fast food company, Val pursued his acting dream, first at Chatsworth High School (with fellow classmates Kevin Spacey & Mare Winningham), then for senior year, the Hollywood Professional School.
He completed his formal training at the Juilliard School of Performing Arts, where,
at age 17, Kilmer was the youngest student ever admitted to the Drama department. After spending some time perfecting his skills on New York stages with notable
performances in How it All Began(a production he co-wrote with Julliard classmates)and The Slab Boys (with future stars Sean Penn & Kevin Bacon), Kilmer got his
first film role in the comedy spoof Top Secret! in 1984. The next few years were a
mix of feature films and tv specials, gaining attention in 1986's Top Gun and 1988's Willow. But it was Val's eerily dead-on portrayal as doomed rock star Jim Morrison for
director Oliver Stone's The Doors (1991) and his tubercular dandy Doc Holliday in
Tombstone (1993) which solidified his place in Hollywood's A-list.
Kilmer performed all of the concert pieces. Since then, he has played two more
American legends, Elvis Presley in True Romance (1993) and Doc Holliday in
Tombstone (1993). In July 1994, Kilmer took over the role of Batman/Bruce Wayne from Michael Keaton. |
| VITAL STATS | | | Eye color: Brown | | Height: 6' (1.83 m) | | Nickname(s): | Trademarks: In many of his movies, he twirls small objects (coins, pencils, etc.)
with his fingers.
He rubs the first two fingers of his right hand together, particularly in tense scenes,
but also where he is not speaking.
Known for his meticulous detail and precision when preparing characters, often to
the chagrin of the actors and filmmakers he's working with. | Education: Chatsworth High School, Hollywood's Professional's School and
entered into Juilliard's drama program. | Family: Eugene (father), Gladys Ekstadt (mother), Mark (brother), Wesley
(brother), Joanne Whalley (wife, married 1988-1996), Mercedes (daughter), Jack
(son). | | Resides in: New Mexico (since 1983) | | Religious affiliations:Christian Science | | Political affiliation: | Personal interests/hobbies: Scuba diving, traveling, loves candles and buffalos
and owns several on his ranch in New Mexico.. | | Charities/Causes: AmeriCares | Other:
- His work with the New Mexico Film Investment Program fueled a nearly
40-fold growth in the state's annual production revenue, from $3 million in 2002 to
$117 million in 2006.
- Favorite band is Rage Against the Machine, and is a fan of Led Zeppelin.
- Is the only blonde actor to have ever played Bruce Wayne/Batman (so far).
- Val Kilmer and Marlon Brando infuriated director John Frankenheimer on the set
of Island of Dr. Moreau, The (1996). Frankenheimer later vowed to never work with
Kilmer again.
- Did his own singing while playing Jim Morrison in The Doors (1991). The real
members of the band said they had difficulty distinguishing Kilmer's voice from that
of Morrison's.
- Oliver Stone once considered him for the role of Alexander the Great in his
long-delayed Alexander (2004) project. Kilmer plays the father of Alexander,
King Philip, opposite Colin Farrell in the Alexander role instead.
- Did not want to appear in Top Gun (1986) but was forced to do so because of
contractual obligations.
- Good friends with actor Frank Whaley and musician David Crosby.
- Warwick Davis, Kilmer's co-star in Willow (1988), says in his audio commentary
that the question he is most frequently asked is: "What was is it like to work with
Val Kilmer?" Davis says he has very fond memories of working with Kilmer, stating
that Kilmer had a great sense of humor and was very dedicated to the job.
- His family has Scottish, Irish, Sephardic Jewish, Cherokee Native American
(from a paternal great-grandmother), Swedish, German and distant Mongolian
ancestry.
Personal Quotes:
* Upon playing Batman: "I've done an absurdly commercial cartoon and now I'm
more likely to get hired for a job I couldn't get hired for before, because I hadn't
done enough movies. It's so rare when an actor gets hired because he's right for
the role - it just doesn't figure into it."
* "Being successful doesn't change things. There's a painful, lonely part of acting
because you're always waiting. The thing about being a performer is doing, and
when you have to wait, it's the same pain as when you're starting out and have no
job. You think that thing will go away, but it doesn't. It just shifts. I remember
Robert Duvall saying that being a successful actor is all about finding interesting
hobbies, because if you don't have the right hobby, you die. It's very hard to
maintain interest. Most actors don't. They become a little clichéd. You learn how
to do tricks and stuff."
* "I'm very lucky in that I haven't cultivated fame. Which, from what I've seen of my
contemporaries, takes an enormous amount of time. I have a lot of respect for
people that do it and they're successful at it ... Especially people that aren't such
talented actors." - Quote from 2001.
* "There are only three reasons to do a movie: the cast, the director, the role. Like
I say, you live in a minute of screen time, but to prepare for the minute takes much
more than a day. You'd better be excited about what those moments are, even if
they're the hardest moments. Or the smallest."
* "It's the most fulfilling thing I can do and get paid for." - On theatre.
* "I'd be in a bad western on a good horse any day of the week. It's such a
fantastic genre of film."
* "Poetry is a very subjective and intimate expression. It's literally your heartbeat.
Your rhythm. The song of your soul. It's superconcentrated. It's a dense piece of
yourself."
* "Parts. Little people are very funny. They already know that life is weird. So that
part was fun. My co-star, I ended up marrying - that was fun. We went to New
Zealand and we went to Wales. All the traveling was fun but wearing the pink
dress wasn't fun." - On if filming Willow (1988) was fun.
* "I think spiritual perception comes from natural and healthy relationship to the
land and I've had that. I get an easy, automatic sense of myself in nature, a
wholeness and I feel nowhere else. I think people should live where praying is
most immediate. That's why I live in New Mexico. The physical terrain, the feeling,
the environment and culture improve my life just by waking up there."
* "For my audition, I did a monologue from one of my plays. I couldn't find anything
contemporary that they wouldn't have seen hundreds of times before. I didn't know
what I was doing, but it worked." - On his Juilliard audition.
* [Prior to his divorce from Joanne Whalley]: "It's great. Instead of going out to
parties, I go home to my family."
| | |
madmac17posted 198 days ago
