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Jordan Charles

Biography

Born in London, Ontario, Canada, to Italian parents, award-nominated actor Jordan Charles' passion for performance began early. In Canada, he started acting on stage in local Italian productions when he was a few years old. He was later theatrically cast as Matthew Cuthbert in Anne of Green Gables while only twelve years old, playing the elder father of the protagonist Anne. A multi-year Meisner graduate of the reputable Baron Brown Studio - School for the Dramatic Arts in Santa Monica, and the Margie Haber Studio in West Hollywood, CA, Jordan's commitment to acting and its craft sees him embody diverse, textured characters and ranging performance work in lead roles in independent and studio films. He is a prior Forty Under 40 recipient, and holds citizenship in each of the USA, Canada, and the European Union, which allows domestic and international opportunities across his acting and filmmaking goals. Concentrating on feature film acting, Jordan seeks challenges often against type. In early roles, he did so to capture the lead serial killer role in Friend (2009), an independent film directed by Curt Thackery which generated regional acclaim. His proclivity for complicated characters capable of wide range and emotion continued with his lead role in Makua Charley (2013), a film festival award-winning dramatic thriller centered on Hawaiian mythology. Jordan followed this with a bit part in Cameron Crowe's Aloha (2015), then played two different maligning lead characters in two divergent timelines in The Gunman (2016). He's proven the rare ability to play both hero or rogue, and brings unique layers and choices to every character. Roles in upcoming films continue his advance on notable projects. 2023-2024 sees him act in, write, and produce a crime saga called Brothers in Arms, an original cinematic story set in modern Los Angeles, which is contemplating feature film development. The project's initial short film earned a Best Cinematography Award and multiple film festival nominations, and saw Jordan earn a Best Actor nomination at Swedish International Film Festival. A multi-hyphenate creative, Jordan complements his acting with other production roles as screenwriter and producer. His first screenplay earned a quarterfinal placing at Creative Screenwriting's Expo Competition. He operates two film production companies where he collaborates alongside other emerging filmmakers to develop feature film content. A strong advocate of building community inside the profession and out, Jordan is active in industry advocacy for the arts, Screen Actors Guild Foundation programs, and has served on boards for environmental/sustainability causes. He is a long-standing SAG-AFTRA actor, and a member of Actors' Equity for stage acting.
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Mikko Niskanen

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Mikko Niskanen was a Finnish film director and actor. He was born in Äänekoski, Central Finland in 1929. He was the third of six children, and his father worked as a timber barge pilot. His mother too had a job outside the home, so the children often spent summers with their grandmother in Viitasaari. At the age of 13, Mikko Niskanen started working in timber felling and floating. Two years later he enrolled in a vocational school in Jyväskylä to become a car mechanic. He took a serious interest in amateur theatre and was accepted to study at the Finnish Theatre Academy in Helsinki from 1947 until 1950. He then acted in Jyväskylä and Kuopio theatres until 1954 when he landed an actor's job at the film studios of Suomen Filmiteollisuus in Helsinki. One of his first film roles was in Edvin Laine's The Unknown Soldier (1955). Between 1958 and 1961 Niskanen studied at the Moscow Film School in the Soviet Union. Niskanen's 1962 film The Boys was entered into the 3rd Moscow International Film Festival. He continued his directing career focusing on themes such as rural life and youth. His second breakthrough was Under Your Skin (Käpy selän alla, 1966), a story of two young couples spending a weekend camping in the countryside. The film received six Jussi Awards and was followed by another story about young lovers, Asfalttilampaat (1968). Niskanen's tour de force as both actor and director was the five-hour television drama Eight Deadly Shots which was also released as a 145-minute theatrical version edited by Jörn Donner. Based on a true story from late 1960s Finland, it is a naturalistic drama about a poor farmer struggling to make a living for his family. He gradually becomes a violent alcoholic who goes on killing spree when the police arrive to calm him down. Besides directing, Niskanen gave a powerful and intense performance in the leading role. The film, like many of Niskanen's works were shot on locations around his home province north of Jyväskylä. Mikko Niskanen died of cancer at the age of 61.
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Shirakashi Judai

Biography

Shirakashi Judai is a Japanese actor known for his versatile talents and notable contributions to both film and stage performances. Born on November 8, 1993, in Niigata Prefecture, Japan, Shirakashi has established himself as a skilled artist with a diverse range of abilities. He further demonstrates his prowess by excelling in various activities, including practicing Shaolin Kempo, showcasing his soccer skills, mastering bowling, and carving through snow on a snowboard. Shirakashi's academic background includes his studies at Chiba University. Beyond his academic pursuits, he has cultivated a set of hobbies that include exploring cafes solo, immersing himself in books, and indulging in the world of cinema.
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Sean Connery

Biography

Sir Thomas Sean Connery (August 25, 1930 – October 31, 2020) was a Scottish actor and producer who won an Academy Award, two BAFTA Awards (one being a BAFTA Academy Fellowship Award), and three Golden Globes, including the Cecil B. DeMille Award and a Henrietta Award. Connery was the first actor to portray the character James Bond in film, starring in seven Bond films (every film from Dr. No to You Only Live Twice, plus Diamonds Are Forever and Never Say Never Again), between 1962 and 1983. In 1988, Connery won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role in The Untouchables. His films also include Marnie (1964), Murder on the Orient Express (1974), The Man Who Would Be King (1975), A Bridge Too Far (1977), Highlander (1986), Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989), The Hunt for Red October (1990), Dragonheart (1996), The Rock (1996), and Finding Forrester (2000). Connery was polled in a 2004 The Sunday Herald as "The Greatest Living Scot" and in a 2011 EuroMillions survey as "Scotland's Greatest Living National Treasure". He was voted by People magazine as both the “Sexiest Man Alive" in 1989 and the "Sexiest Man of the Century” in 1999. He received a lifetime achievement award in the United States with a Kennedy Center Honor in 1999. Connery was knighted in the 2000 New Year Honours for services to film drama. On 31 October 2020, it was announced that Connery had died at the age of 90. Description above from the Wikipedia article Sean Connery, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia
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Berk Cankat

Biography

Berk Cankat (born 9 May 1984) is a Turkish actor and graphic designer. His first television experience was with Sana Bir Sır Vereceğim on Fox TV. In this series, he portrayed the character of "Savaş" which had fantastic powers and controlled minds with his gaze. After making a name for himself, he joined the Medcezir series as a guest actor and brought the character of "Cem" to life. After becoming well-known in Turkey, in summer 2014 he got a role on Star TV's series Güzel Köylü playing the character of "Cemal". Cankat shared the leading role with Gizem Karaca, Mehmet Ali Nuroğlu and Ahmet Mümtaz Taylan. However, the series ended on 17 June 2015. In November 2015, he was cast as "İskender (Alex)" on the historic series Muhteşem Yüzyıl: Kösem, produced by Tims Productions for Star TV. In January 2016, Cankat won an Elle Style Awards as Actor of the Year. In 2017, he was cast in a leading role on Yıldızlar Şahidim opposite Özge Gürel.
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Dolores Costello

Biography

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Dolores Costello (September 17, 1903 – March 1, 1979) was an American film actress who achieved her greatest success during the era of silent movies. She was nicknamed "The Goddess of the Silent Screen". She was stepmother of John Barrymore's daughter Diana by his second wife Blanche Oelrichs, the mother of John Drew Barrymore and Dolores (Dee Dee) Barrymore, and the grandmother of John Barrymore III, Blyth Dolores Barrymore, Brahma Blyth (Jessica) Barrymore, and Drew Barrymore. Dolores Costello was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the daughter of actors Maurice Costello and Mae Costello (née Altschuk). She was of Irish and German descent. She had a younger sister, Helene, and the two made their first film appearances in the years 1909–1915 as child actresses for the Vitagraph Film Company. They played supporting roles in several films starring their father, who was a popular matinee idol at the time. The two sisters appeared on Broadway together as chlorines and their success resulted in contracts with Warner Brothers Studios. In 1926, following small parts in feature films, she was selected by John Barrymore to star opposite him in The Sea Beast, a loose adaptation of Herman Melville's Moby-Dick. Warner Bros. soon began starring her in her own vehicles. Meanwhile, she and Barrymore became romantically involved and married in 1928. Within a few years of achieving stardom, the delicately beautiful blonde-haired actress had become a successful and highly regarded film personality in her own right. As a young adult her career developed to the degree that in 1926 she was named a WAMPAS Baby Star, and had acquired the nickname "The Goddess of the Silver Screen". Warners alternated Costello between films with contemporary settings and elaborate costume dramas. In 1927 she was re-teamed with John Barrymore in When a Man Loves, an adaptation of Manon Lescaut. In 1928 she co-starred with George O'Brien in Noah's Ark, a part-talkie epic directed by Michael Curtiz. Costello spoke with a lisp and found it difficult to make the transition to talking pictures, but after two years of voice coaching she was comfortable speaking before a microphone. One of her early sound film appearances was with her sister Helene in Warner Bros.'s all-star extravaganza The Show of Shows (1929). Her acting career became less a priority for her following the birth of her first child, Dolores Ethel Mae "DeeDee" Barrymore, on April 8, 1930, and she retired from the screen in 1931 to devote time to her family. Her second child, John Drew Barrymore, was born on June 4, 1932, but the marriage proved difficult due to her husband's increasing alcoholism, and they divorced in 1935. She resumed her career a year later and achieved some successes, most notably in Little Lord Fauntleroy (1936) and The Magnificent Ambersons (1942). She retired permanently from acting following her appearance in This is the Army (1943), again under the direction of Michael Curtiz. In 1950 Costello divorced Dr. John Vruwink, whom she had married in 1939. She spent the remaining years of her life in semi-seclusion, managing an avocado farm. She died from emphysema in Fallbrook, California in 1979.
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Freddie Bartholomew

Biography

Freddie Bartholomew was an English-American child actor. One of the most famous child actors of all time, he became very popular in 1930s Hollywood films. His most famous starring roles are in Captains Courageous and Little Lord Fauntleroy. He was born in London and for the title role of David Copperfield, he emigrated to the United States in 1934, living there the rest of his life. He became an American citizen in 1943 following World War II military service. Despite his great success and acclaim following David Copperfield, his childhood film stardom was marred by nearly constant legal battles and payouts which eventually took a huge toll on both his finances and his career. In adulthood, after World War II service, his film career dwindled rapidly, and he switched from performing to directing and producing in the medium of television.
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Holly Dignard

Biography

Holly Elissa Dignard (born 1 October 1979) is a Canadian actress. She made her TV debut on the Sci-Fi Channel's hit series Outer Limits. Her credits include The Chris Isaak Show, Stargate SG-1, Voyage of the Unicorn, Stargate Atlantis, The L Word, Battlestar Galactica, Kyle X/Y, Eureka, Supernatural, Kill Switch and Polar Shift. She is one of the stars of the Canadian series Whistler. Dignard has a production company entitled Jackal Empire Productions. Description above from the Wikipedia article Holly Dignard, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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Langston Hughes

Biography

An influential American writer from the early to mid 20th century. Beginning with the publication of "The Negro Speaks of Rivers" in 1921, Hughes first captured the public's imagination as a poet. A versatile writer, Hughes was also adept in writing short stories, novels, plays, and non-fiction. His work often focused on the lives of ordinary people and frequently employed humor, social commentary, and folk wisdom in his writing. In the late 1930s he began writing for Hollywood, but his time there was short lived due to a variety of factors, not least of which was the racism prevalent in the industry at that time. During his lifetime, he received one feature film credit for writing "Way Down South" (1939) with Clarence Muse. In the early 1960s, his play "Black Nativity" was produced for British television.
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Travis Stevens

Biography

Known for inventive visuals, contemporary themes, and subverting genre tropes, Travis Stevens' work as a filmmaker is both bold and unpredictable. In 2019, his writing and directing debut "Girl On The Third Floor" premiered at SXSW. Starring wrestling superstar CM Punk, the film won a Fangoria Chainsaw Award ("Best First Feature"), before terrifying audiences on Netflix -- becoming the #2 most watched film on the streaming service. His follow-up, the feminist vampire comedy "Jakob's Wife", premiered at SXSW 2021 and was Certified Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes. The picture won the 2022 Rondo Award for "Best Independent Film" and scored a Critic's Choice Super Award nomination for lead actress Barbara Crampton ("Best Actress in a Horror Movie"), as well as Fangoria Chainsaw Award nominations for "Best Lead Performance" for her and "Best Supporting Performance" for Larry Fessenden. His latest project, the Shudder Original "A Wounded Fawn", stars Josh Ruben, Sarah Lind and Malin Barr. This visually riveting, original horror story premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival to rave reviews and sold-out screenings. It was named one of the "Best Horror Films of 2022" by The Hollywood Reporter, the AV Club, Slash Film, Paste Magazine and is Certified Fresh at 95% on Rotten Tomatoes. Before focusing on writing and directing, Travis produced a string of well-regarded genre films that include Adam Wingard's "A Horrible Way To Die", the documentary "Jodorowsky's Dune", E.L. Katz's "Cheap Thrills", and Sarah Adina Smith's "Buster's Mal Heart" starring Rami Malek.
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