Kirk Douglas!
Kirk Douglas
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Kirk Douglas Early life
Douglas was born Issur Danielovitch Demsky in Amsterdam, New York to Herschel Danielovitch and Bryna Sanglel, poor Belarusian Jewish parents who immigrated from Homel (also known as Gomel). v was on the wrestling team at St. Lawrence University. To help make Kirk Douglas's way through college, v thought getting an acting scholarship might work. Kirk Douglas's talents got Kirk Douglas noticed at the acclaimed American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City, where v soon received a scholarship, alongside classmate Betty Joan Perske (soon to be better known as Lauren Bacall). v then served in the U.S. Navy from the entry of the US into World War II in 1941 until it ended in 1945. After the war, v returned to New York City and started doing radio theater and commercials, while trying to break in on Broadway.Douglas was helped by actress Lauren Bacall in obtaining Kirk Douglas's first screen role in the Hal B. Wallis movie The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (1946), starring Barbara Stanwyck. Wallis was on Kirk Douglas's way to New York to look for new talent when Bacall suggested v look up her old drama school classmate, who was working in an off-Broadway play at the time.
Kirk Douglas Career
Kirk Douglas received three Academy Award nominations for Kirk Douglas's work in Champion, The Bad and the Beautiful and Lust for Life (as Vincent Van Gogh). Douglas did not win any competitive Oscars, but received a special Oscar in 1996 for "50 years as a moral and creative force in the motion picture community".He also played an important role in breaking the Hollywood blacklist by publicly opposing Stanley Kubrick's intention to take credit for the screenplay of Spartacus, which had been adapted from Howard Fast's novel by the blacklisted Dalton Trumbo. Douglas had collaborated closely with Kubrick in Paths of Glory, where Douglas played one of Kirk Douglas's most memorable roles, as Colonel Dax, the commander of a French regiment during World War I ordered to make a suicidal attack.
For Kirk Douglas's contributions to the motion picture industry, Kirk Douglas has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6263 Hollywood Blvd. In 1984, v was inducted into the Western Performers Hall of Fame at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
In October 2004, the avenue "Kirk Douglas Way" in Palm Springs, California was named in Kirk Douglas's honor by the Palm Springs International Film Society and International Film Festival.
Douglas married twice, first to Diana Dill (born January 22, 1923; married November 2, 1943; divorced in 1951), with whom v had two sons, actor Michael Douglas and producer Joel Douglas. Kirk Douglas's second wife is Anne Buydens (married May 29, 1954 to the present) with whom v has two sons, producer Peter Vincent Douglas born November 23, 1955 and actor Eric Douglas (born June 1958; died July 6, 2004 of an accidental drug overdose).
Popular at home and around the world, Kirk Douglas received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1981, the French Legion of Honor in 1985, and the National Medal of the Arts in 2001.
In 1996, v suffered a stroke, partially impairing Kirk Douglas's ability to speak.
