Ethan Hawke

Biography of Ethan Hawke

Ethan Hawke is a prime actor and just a talented guy. During his career, our today's hero had a great reputation in various fields and succeeded as a scriptwriter, director, writer, and, of course, actor. This diversity of Ethan Hawke’s personality makes him such a remarkable character. The story about him promises to be interesting, so let's not waste time on empty words.

Ethan Green Hawke

Ethan Hawke’s Childhood and Family

The future Hollywood actor was born on November 6, 1970, in Austin, Texas. His parents divorced immediately after his birth, and so the boy spent most of his childhood with his mother and her new husband. After his mother’s second marriage, Ethan and his stepfather moved to Princeton.

Baby photo of Ethan Hawke

At the age of 6, young Ethan began attending secondary school. During this period, his favorite subject was Literature. He even seriously thought about becoming a professional writer, but the acting lessons changed the prioritization. At these lessons, little Ethan Hawke always stood out among his peers. Perhaps, for this reason, being in the third grade, he had already got the lead role in the school play for the first graders. The young actor coped with such an important mission very well. All his thoughts and life aspirations have been associated only with acting since this time.

Ethan Hawke’s First Roles

Subsequently, the young man was involved in many other semi-amateur productions. He systematically improved himself, and therefore very soon the fate rewarded him for all his efforts. It was a real success for the young actor to get an invitation to star in the forthcoming movie Explorers with River Phoenix in the lead role.

Ethan Hawke’s first role was in Explorers, 1985

Ethan Hawke did not become famous for this movie, but it gave him invaluable acting experience. He was able to feel the atmosphere of the set, as well as to learn a lot from more experienced and well-known colleagues.

All the accumulated knowledge was useful to the young actor four years later when he got one of the roles in the cult movie Dead Poets Society. It began a long way of Ethan Hawke to the heights of world cinema.

Ethan Hawke became famous for the movie Dead Poets Society

Ethan Hawke’s Filmography

The magnificent acting of Ethan Hawke in Dead Poets Society made famous Hollywood producers pay attention to the young talented guy. Suddenly became well-known, the actor began to receive new offers for the shooting. In 1991, he got the role of Jack Conroy in the movie White Fang.

The scene from the movie White Fang

This was followed by many other notable movies, for example, Waterland, Mystery Date, Rich in Love, and, of course, Reality Bites, which brought Ethan Hawke a new portion of fame.

Young Ethan Hawke

From that moment, Ethan's acting career began rapidly developing. He played in comedies, dramas, but at some period of time, he began starring in romantic movies. It is worth noting such movies as Great Expectations and Before Sunrise. They became real masterpieces and subsequently acquired a cult status in some circles.

Julie Delpy and Ethan Hawke: Turn Up the Phone!

Before Sunrise was subsequently continued in the movies Before Sunset and Before Midnight. These movies were released after 9 and 18 years after the first part of the trilogy that corresponded well to the main idea of the movie. Ethan Hawke played the lead male role in these movies.

In 2001, Ethan Hawke first appeared among the nominees for the Oscar. The actor became so famous for the shooting in Training Day, where he played one of the secondary characters.

Ethan Hawke’s Best Roles

In the same 2001, Hawke presented to the audience his first feature movie, on which he worked as a director. Chelsea Walls was shown at the Cannes Film Festival.

Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman

It is also worth noting that in the latter stages of his career, Ethan Hawke has often worked as a director and scriptwriter. In particular, the famous actor wrote the scripts for the movies Before Sunset and Before Midnight that were released in 2004 and 2013 respectively. The first of these movies brought a talented scriptwriter to another nomination for the Oscar.

Ethan Hawke’s great interview

In addition, Ethan Hawke wrote the script for the movie The Hottest State, on which he subsequently worked as well as a director. It is worth noting that this movie is based on Ethan Hawke’s novel of the same name.

Ethan Hawke and Angelina Jolie

Referring to the theme of literary work, we note that there are two novels - The Hottest State (1996) and Ash Wednesday (2002) in Ethan Hawke’s bibliography now.

In 2016, it was released the intelligent comedy Maggie’s Plan with Ethan Hawke. The main character decided to get pregnant for her and made a cunning plan with the indispensable participation of Ethan’s character - anthropologist John.

The scene from the movie Maggie’s Plan

In the same year, it was released the western The Magnificent Seven, where Ethan, Chris Pratt, Denzel Washington and other prominent actors defended the American village from the gang terror.

The Magnificent Seven: Ethan Hawke in the role of a brave cowboy

In 2018, it was a premiere of the next director's work of Ethan Blaze, based on the true story of love and creative searches of Blaze Foley, a poet, and songwriter.

Personal Life of Ethan Hawke

During the shooting of the science fiction movie Gattaca, Ethan Hawke had a relationship with actress Uma Thurman. They married in 1998. Soon Ethan and Uma had two children - daughter Maya Ray and son Levon. However, in 2005, the couple divorced.

Uma Thurman and Ethan Hawke were married in their youth

There were two reasons for that. At first, Uma Thurman, whose career was much more successful, rather than to support her husband, began to neglect his company, hesitating to appear with Ethan. Not surprisingly, the actor noticed the young blonde Ryan Shawhughes, who had worked as his kids’ nanny in 2003. Then, everything developed according to the standard plan: Uma came home earlier, saw her husband in bed with the nanny, and put him out the door.

Ethan Hawke and his children from his marriage to Uma Thurman

At first, the actor worried about their quarrel. He fell into a deep depression and even did not want to see Ryan, accusing her of all his troubles. But two years later, they met again. In 2006, Ethan helped Ryan to appear in the world of cinema, shot her in the movie adaptation of his novel The Hottest State. They married in 2008. Soon, they had a daughter, Clementine, and then their second baby, Indiana.

On the photo: Ethan Hawke and Ryan Shawhughes

It is remarkable that Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman have kept friendly relations. Ethan took an active part in the upbringing of children from his first marriage and just called himself as the proud father of four glorious children.

On the photo: Ethan Hawke, his children, and his new wife

Ethan Hawke Now

Over the past few years, a huge number of premieres with the participation of Ethan Hawke have taken place. These include the 2019 films "La verite" and "The Purge," as well as 2020 "Tesla" and "Cut Throat City". At the same time, the premiere of the American television series "The Good Lord Bird", in which Ethan Hawke will play the role of John Brown.