Charles Bronson
Birthday:
3 November 1921, Ehrenfeld, Pennsylvania, USA
Birth Name:
Charles Dennis Buchinsky
Height:
174 cm
The archetypal screen tough guy with weatherbeaten features--one film critic described his rugged looks as "a Clark Gable who had been left out in the sun too long"--Charles Bronson was born Charles Buchinsky, one of 15 children of struggling parents in Pennsylvania. His mother, Mary (Valinsky), was born in Pennsylvania, to Lithuanian par...
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The archetypal screen tough guy with weatherbeaten features--one film critic described his rugged looks as "a Clark Gable who had been left out in the sun too long"--Charles Bronson was born Charles Buchinsky, one of 15 children of struggling parents in Pennsylvania. His mother, Mary (Valinsky), was born in Pennsylvania, to Lithuanian parents, and his father, Walter Buchinsky, was a Lithuanian immigrant coal miner.He completed high school and joined his father in the mines (an experience that resulted in a lifetime fear of being in enclosed spaces) and then served in WW II. After his return from the war, Bronson used the GI Bill to study art (a passion he had for the rest of his life), then enrolled at the Pasadena Playhouse in California. One of his teachers was impressed with the young man and recommended him to director Henry Hathaway, resulting in Bronson making his film debut in You're in the Navy Now (1951).He appeared on screen often early in his career, though usually uncredited. However, he made an impact on audiences as the evil assistant to Vincent Price in the 3-D thriller House of Wax (1953). His sinewy yet muscular physique got him cast in action-type roles, often without a shirt to highlight his manly frame. He received positive notices from critics for his performances in Vera Cruz (1954), Target Zero (1955) and Run of the Arrow (1957). Indie director Roger Corman cast him as the lead in his well-received low-budget gangster flick Machine-Gun Kelly (1958), then Bronson scored the lead in his own TV series, Man with a Camera (1958). The 1960s proved to be the era in which Bronson made his reputation as a man of few words but much action.Director John Sturges cast him as half Irish/half Mexican gunslinger Bernardo O'Reilly in the smash hit western The Magnificent Seven (1960), and hired him again as tunnel rat Danny Velinski for the WWII POW big-budget epic The Great Escape (1963). Several more strong roles followed, then once again he was back in military uniform, alongside Lee Marvin and Ernest Borgnine in the testosterone-filled The Dirty Dozen (1967).European audiences had taken a shine to his minimalist acting style, and he headed to the Continent to star in several action-oriented films, including La bataille de San Sebastian (1968) (aka "Guns for San Sebastian"), the cult western Once Upon a Time in the West (1968) (aka "Once Upon a Time in The West"), Le passager de la pluie (1970) (aka "Rider On The Rain") and, in one of the quirkier examples of international casting, alongside Japansese screen legend ToshirĂ´ Mifune in the western Soleil rouge (1971) (aka "Red Sun").American audiences were by now keen to see Bronson back on US soil, and he returned triumphantly in the early 1970s to take the lead in more hard-edged crime and western dramas, including The Valachi Papers (1972) and the revenge western Chato's Land (1972). After nearly 25 years as a working actor, he became an 'overnight" sensation. Bronson then hooked up with British director Michael Winner to star in several highly successful urban crime thrillers, including The Mechanic (1972) and The Stone Killer (1973). He then scored a solid hit as a Colorado melon farmer-done-wrong in Richard Fleischer's Mr. Majestyk (1974). However, the film that proved to be a breakthrough for both Bronson and Winner came in 1974 with the release of the controversial Death Wish (1974) (written with Henry Fonda in mind, who turned it down because he was disgusted by the script).The US was at the time in the midst of rising street crime, and audiences flocked to see a story about a mild-mannered architect who seeks revenge for the murder of his wife and rape of his daughter by gunning down hoods, rapists and killers on the streets of New York City. So popular was the film that it spawned four sequels over the next 20 years.Action fans could not get enough of tough guy Bronson, and he appeared in what many fans--and critics--consider his best role: Depression-era street fighter Chaney alongside James Coburn in Hard Times (1975). That was followed by the somewhat slow-paced western Breakheart Pass (1975) (with wife Jill Ireland), the light-hearted romp (a flop) From Noon Till Three (1976) and as Soviet agent Grigori Borsov in director Don Siegel's Cold War thriller Telefon (1977).Bronson remained busy throughout the 1980s, with most of his films taking a more violent tone, and he was pitched as an avenging angel eradicating evildoers in films like the 10 to Midnight (1983), The Evil That Men Do (1984), Assassination (1987) and Kinjite: Forbidden Subjects (1989). Bronson jolted many critics with his forceful work as murdered United Mine Workers leader Jock Yablonski in the TV movie Act of Vengeance (1986), gave a very interesting performance in the Sean Penn-directed The Indian Runner (1991) and surprised everyone with his appearance as compassionate newspaper editor Francis Church in the family film Yes Virginia, There Is a Santa Claus (1991).Bronson's final film roles were as police commissioner Paul Fein in a well-received trio of crime/drama TV movies Family of Cops (1995), Breach of Faith: A Family of Cops II (1997) and Family of Cops III: Under Suspicion (1999). Unfortunately, ill health began to take its toll; he suffered from Alzheimers disease for the last few years of his life, and finally passed away from pneumonia at Los Angeles' Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in August 2003.Bronson was a true icon of international cinema; critics had few good things to say about his films, but he remained a fan favorite in both the US and abroad for 50 years, a claim few other film legends can make. Show less «
I guess I look like a rock quarry that someone has dynamited.
I guess I look like a rock quarry that someone has dynamited.
Acting is the easiest thing I've done, I guess that's why I'm stuck with it.
Acting is the easiest thing I've done, I guess that's why I'm stuck with it.
Someday I'd like a part where I can lean my elbow against a mantlepiece and have a cocktail.
Someday I'd like a part where I can lean my elbow against a mantlepiece and have a cocktail.
I don't look like someone who leans on a mantelpiece with a cocktail in my hand, you know. I look like the kind of guy who has a bottle of b...Show more »
I don't look like someone who leans on a mantelpiece with a cocktail in my hand, you know. I look like the kind of guy who has a bottle of beer in my hand. Show less «
[in 1971] Maybe I'm too masculine. Casting directors cast in their own, or an idealized image. Maybe I don't look like anybody's ideal.
[in 1971] Maybe I'm too masculine. Casting directors cast in their own, or an idealized image. Maybe I don't look like anybody's ideal.
I am not a fan of myself.
I am not a fan of myself.
Nobody stays on top forever. Nobody!
Nobody stays on top forever. Nobody!
[1977 comment on Robert Aldrich] A very good director. Beyond that, he has one fault: he is inflexible. He's horrified if you give him ideas...Show more »
[1977 comment on Robert Aldrich] A very good director. Beyond that, he has one fault: he is inflexible. He's horrified if you give him ideas; he only appreciates his own. He wants to use his own brain for everything. That's his greatest fault. If he wasn't so inflexible he would be very great. He refuses to give in. Well, it's impossible for one man to know everything. Show less «
I don't have friends, I have thousands of acquaintances. No friends. I figured I had a wife and children. They took up all the personal time...Show more »
I don't have friends, I have thousands of acquaintances. No friends. I figured I had a wife and children. They took up all the personal time I had. My children are my friends. My wife was my friend. We were opposite but I figured it made for a better relationship that way. One of the difficult parts of being a public person married to someone who was seriously ill is that people asked, "So, how's your wife?", I found it difficult. They were strangers. Show less «
[on wife Jill Ireland's terminal illness] When you love someone you feel their pain. It's why some husbands go through morning sickness when...Show more »
[on wife Jill Ireland's terminal illness] When you love someone you feel their pain. It's why some husbands go through morning sickness when their wives are pregnant. But to ever talk about it is difficult. I wouldn't tell Jill how I felt. I behaved in such a way that was opposite to how I felt. I must have seemed strong to her. I didn't want to bring her down. It was like keeping the stiff upper lip, of being British about it. Of course, she understood that. The fear really hits you. That's what you feel first. And then it's the anger and frustration. Part of the problem is how little we understand about the ultimate betrayal of the body when it rebels against itself. You always worry about charlatans. We found that specialists did not know as much as we thought. So, you think maybe there are other answers. There are not but if you believe something will help you it probably will: it will help, not cure. What kind of man would I have been if I had not been there to help her? I felt along with her--not the physical pain, of course, but all her mental anguish. You can't be detached. She needed to have someone who understood what was happening in her mind. That was what I was for. Show less «
[explaining his enduring popularity] Audiences like to see the bad guys get their comeuppance.
[explaining his enduring popularity] Audiences like to see the bad guys get their comeuppance.
Stripping naked is not entertainment. It's for voyeurs and I'm damned sure I'm not going to feed their imaginations and let them get their l...Show more »
Stripping naked is not entertainment. It's for voyeurs and I'm damned sure I'm not going to feed their imaginations and let them get their licks by seeing me totally nude. Show less «
[on why he was cast in You're in the Navy Now (1951)] I got the job because I could belch on cue.
[on why he was cast in You're in the Navy Now (1951)] I got the job because I could belch on cue.
When I was a kid I was always drawing things. I'd get butcher paper or grocery bags and draw on them. And at school I was the one who got to...Show more »
When I was a kid I was always drawing things. I'd get butcher paper or grocery bags and draw on them. And at school I was the one who got to draw on the windows with soap. Turkeys for Thanksgiving, that kind of thing. It seemed I just knew how to draw I could draw anything in one continuous line without lifting the crayon from the paper. I had a show of my stuff in Beverly Hills and it sold out in two weeks - and it wasn't because my name was Charles Bronson, because I signed them Buchinsky. Show less «
I never talk about the philosophy of a picture. Winner is an intelligent man, and I like him. But I don't ever talk to him about the philoso...Show more »
I never talk about the philosophy of a picture. Winner is an intelligent man, and I like him. But I don't ever talk to him about the philosophy of a picture. It has never come up. And I wouldn't talk about it to you. I don't expound. I don't like to over talk a thing. Because I'm entertained more by my own thoughts than by the thoughts of others. I don't mind answering questions. But in an exchange of conversation, I wind up being a pair of ears. Show less «
It seemed like an easy way to make money. A friend took me to a play, and I thought I might as well try it myself. I had nothing to lose. I ...Show more »
It seemed like an easy way to make money. A friend took me to a play, and I thought I might as well try it myself. I had nothing to lose. I hung around New York and did a little stock-company stuff. I wasn't really sure at that time if l even wanted to be an actor. I got no encouragement. I was living in my own mind, generating my own adrenaline. Nobody took any notice of me. I was in plays I don't even remember. Nobody remembers. I was in something by Moliere - I don't even know what it was called. I have no interest in the stage anymore. From an audience point of view, it's old-fashioned. The position I've been in for the last eight years, I have to think that way. I can't think of theater acting for one segment of the population in just one city. That's an inefficient way of reaching people. Show less «
I had a very bad experience on the plane in from California yesterday. There was a man on the plane, sitting across from me, and they were s...Show more »
I had a very bad experience on the plane in from California yesterday. There was a man on the plane, sitting across from me, and they were showing an old Greer Garson movie. He said, 'Hey, why aren't you in that?' The picture was made before I even became an actor. I said, 'Why aren't you?' I think I made him understand how stupid his question was. When I'm in public, I even try to hide. I keep as quiet as possible so that I'm not noticed. Not that I hide behind doorways or anything ridiculous like that, but I hide by not making waves. I also try to make myself seem as unapproachable as possible. Show less «
I supply a presence. There are never any long dialogue scenes to establish a character. He has to be completely established at the beginning...Show more »
I supply a presence. There are never any long dialogue scenes to establish a character. He has to be completely established at the beginning of the movie, and ready to work. Now on this picture, Mr. Majestyk, there's something I haven't done for a while - acting. It has that, too, besides the action. Show less «
One of the ironies is that I made my breakthrough in movies shot in Europe that the Japanese thought were American movies and that the Ameri...Show more »
One of the ironies is that I made my breakthrough in movies shot in Europe that the Japanese thought were American movies and that the Americans thought were foreign. Show less «
[on his character in Death Wish (1974)] He's an average guy, an average New Yorker. In wartime, he would be a conscientious objector. His wh...Show more »
[on his character in Death Wish (1974)] He's an average guy, an average New Yorker. In wartime, he would be a conscientious objector. His whole approach to life is gentle, and he has raised his daughter that way. Now he has second thoughts, and he becomes a killer. Show less «
I don't have any friends, and I don't want any friends. My children are my friends.
I don't have any friends, and I don't want any friends. My children are my friends.
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Paul Kersey
Deakin
Harmonica
Chaney
Mr. Roberts
Arthur Bishop
Joseph Wladislaw
Vince Majestyk
Wolenski
Leo Kessler
Danny 'Tunnel King'
Red Harvest
Nick Colton
Tate
Butch Cassidy
Trooper Hanna