Date of Birth
25 September 1944, New Brunswick, New Jersey, USA
Birth Name
Michael Kirk Douglas
Height
5′ 10″ (1.78 m)
Mini Biography
Michael Douglas is one of the few actors who actually appears to be a walking paradox. A household name, an estimated worth of over $200 million, a father (Kirk Douglas) who was one of the world’s biggest film stars in the 1950s and 1960s, and a wife whose father is younger than he is, Douglas has indeed gained fame and acclaim. His parents (Kirk and wife Diana Douglas) parents divorced when he was six, and he went to live with his mother and her new husband.
Only seeing Kirk on holidays, Michael attended Eaglebrook school in Deerfield, Massachusetts, where he was about a year younger than all of his classmates. Deciding he wanted to be an actor in his teenage years, Michael often asked his father about getting a “foot in the door”. Kirk was strongly opposed to Michael pursuing an acting career, saying that it was an industry with many downs and few ups, and that he wanted all four of his sons to stay out of it. Michael, however, was persistent. When he started his career in the early 1970s people were all too ready to tag him as “the next Kirk Douglas”. He defied all those critics by accepting sensitive, quiet, hippie-type roles, a far cry from the macho, leading-man, all-American hero parts that his father was most famous for. It didn’t earn Michael much credibility, but it earned him his own identity.
Douglas is an advocate of nuclear disarmament, is a supporter of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation and sits on the Board of Directors of the Ploughshares Fund. In 1998 he was appointed UN Messenger of Peace by Secretary-General Kofi Annan.[9] He is a notable Democrat, has donated money mainly to Democratic candidates[10] and backed Barack Obama for the 2008 U.S. Presidential election.
