Bio
Nick Nolte is an American actor and producer best known for his roles in the feature films Cape Fear, The Prince of Tides and Hotel Rwanda, among many others.
A two-time Academy Award nominee, Nolte has sustained a discernible level of integrity throughout his career, leading him to the biggest role of his life - international super-stardom, and to his role as producer of many of the projects in which he appears under the banner of his production company Kingsgate Films.
With the ability to masterfully portray a wide range of roles, Nolte was seen in Lionsgate Films' coming-of-age mixed-martial arts drama Warrior, for which he is earning critical praise, and heard in Warner Bros.' animated feature Cats & Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore, and as the voice of Butch and as the voice of the Gorilla in MGM's The Zookeeper.
He was also seen in the Ben Stiller directed Hollywood spoof Tropic Thunder; Paramount Pictures' Spiderwick Chronicles, Sony Pictures Classics' The Beautiful Country, directed by Hans Peter Moland and executive produced by Terrence Mallick; the Olivier Assayas directed Clean, co-starring Maggie Cheung; The Peaceful Warrior, adapted from the Dan Millman novel Way of the Peaceful Warrior and directed by Victor Salva and Neverwas, directed by Joshua Michael Stern and co-starring Ian McKellan, Jessica Lange and William Hurt.
He also voiced the character of Vincent the Bear, in DreamWorks' animated feature Over the Hedge.
Nolte's additional film credits include playing the United Nations commander in the critically acclaimed feature Hotel Rwanda, starring Don Cheadle, as well as director Neil Jordan's crime caper The Good Thief, Ang Lee's The Hulk for Universal Pictures and the Polish Brothers' Northfork for Paramount Classics.
Nolte also re-teamed with director Alan Rudolph to film Investigating Sex, in which he starred opposite Neve Campbell and Robin Tunney. Nolte returned to his acting roots when he starred along with Sean Penn, in the stage production of Sam Shepherd's play The Late Henry Moss.
In recent years, Nolte has successfully added to his credit top contending films such as director Paul Schrader's Affliction, in which he received Academy Award, Golden Globe and Independent Film nominations for Best Actor, Oliver Stone's U-Turn, co-starring Sean Penn and Jennifer Lopez; Afterglow, produced by Robert Altman; Jefferson In Paris, where he portrayed Thomas Jefferson, Martin Scorsese's thriller remake, Cape Fear and The Prince of Tides, in which he starred opposite Barbra Streisand, and received an Oscar nomination for Best Actor and won the Golden Globe as Best Actor from the Hollywood Foreign Press Association.
He starred opposite Julia Roberts in I Love Trouble and as a basketball coach in Blue Chips, for director William Friedkin. Additionally, Nolte starred in I'll Do Anything for writer/director James L. Brooks, and in the critically acclaimed Lorenzo's Oil, co-starring Susan Sarandon.
His production company Kingsgate, developed White Jazz, based on the James Ellroy script based on his best selling film noir novel, and The Last Magic Summer, an adaptation of the Peter Gent novel of the same name.
Nolte, an Omaha, Nebraska native, played college football before he discovered theatre, and began his acting career at the Pasadena Playhouse. He then studied briefly with Bryan O'Byrne at Stella Adler's Academy in Los Angeles. Soon following, he traveled for several years performing in regional theatres.
Landing a breakthrough role in the legendary television series, Rich Man, Poor Man, marked only the beginning for Nolte, launching him into international fame.
Following its success, he made his feature film starring debut in The Deep, opposite Jacqueline Bisset. Nolte has since never looked back.
Diversity of character became Nolte's signature in his early film career, with roles as a drug-smuggling Vietnam veteran in Who'll Stop The Rain..., a disillusioned football star in North Dallas Forty, which he developed with author Peter Gent, as free-spirited beat-era writer Neal Casady in Heart Beat and as a reclusive marine biologist in Cannery Row.
Nolte continued to challenge himself with such character roles as the philosophical vagrant in Down and Out in Beverly Hills, a tough cop in 48 Hours, an American photojournalist in Under Fire and a determined lawman in Extreme Prejudice.
He created another unique character in Weeds, as an ex-con turned playwright.
Other Nolte film credits have included Three Fugitives, Farewell to the King, Scorsese's segment of New York Stories, Karel Reisz' Everybody Wins and Sidney Lumet's Q&A.
He also had a starring role in the HBO horse racing series Luck, in 2012.