Robert Downey Jr.

Biography:

Downey was born in New York City on April 4, 1965, the youngest of two children. His father, Robert Downey, Sr., is an actor, writer, producer, cinematographer, and director of underground films, and his mother, Elsie (née Ford), is also an actress and appeared in Downey Sr.'s films. Downey's father is of Irish and Ashkenazi Jewish ancestry and his mother is of German and Scottish descent. His father was born "Robert Elias," but changed his last name to "Downey" (after his stepfather James Downey) when he was a minor and wanted to enlist in the Army.
Downey had minor roles in his father's projects in his childhood. At the age of 10, he was living in England and studied classical ballet. He grew up in Greenwich Village and attended the Stagedoor Manor Performing Arts Training Center in upstate New York, as a teenager. When his parents divorced in 1978, Downey moved to California with his father, but in 1982 he dropped out of Santa Monica High School and moved back to New York to pursue an acting career full time. His performance, described by Janet Maslin in The New York Times as "desperately moving", was widely praised, though Downey has said that for him "the role was like the ghost of Christmas Future" since his drug habit resulted in him becoming an "exaggeration of the character" in real life.

During the 1980s, he had roles in a series of coming of age films associated with the Brat Pack. Less Than Zero (1987) is particularly notable. His performance, described by Janet Maslin in The New York Times as "desperately moving", was widely praised, though Downey has said that for him "the role was like the ghost of Christmas Future" since his drug habit resulted in him becoming an "exaggeration of the character" in real life.
After Zero, Downey started landing roles in bigger films such as Air America (1990) and Soapdish (1991). These higher-profile roles eventually led to his being cast as Charlie Chaplin in the 1992 film Chaplin, a role for which he prepared extensively, learning how to play the violin and tennis. He even had a personal coach in order to imitate Chaplin's posture and way of carrying himself. The role garnered Downey an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor at the Academy Awards 65th ceremony, losing to Al Pacino in Scent of a Woman.

Between 1996 and 2001, Downey was frequently arrested on drug-related charges and went through several drug treatment programs, but had difficulty staying sober.

"It's like I have a loaded gun in my mouth and my finger's on the trigger, and I like the taste of the gunmetal."

After being released from the California Substance Abuse Treatment Facility and State Prison in 2000, Downey joined the cast of the hit television series Ally McBeal, playing the new love interest of Calista Flockhart's title character. His performance was praised and he was nominated for an Emmy Award in the Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series category and won a Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actor in a mini-series or TV Film, but his character was written out when Downey was fired after two drug arrests in late 2000 and early 2001.
After five years of substance abuse, arrest, rehab, and relapse, Robert Downey, Jr. was finally ready to work toward a full recovery from drugs and a return to his career. In discussing his failed attempts to control his own addictive behavior in the past, Downey told Oprah Winfrey in November 2004 that "when someone says, 'I really wonder if maybe I should go to rehab?' Well, uh, you're a wreck, you just lost your job, and your wife left you. Uh, you might want to give it a shot."
He added that after his last arrest in April 2001, when he knew he would likely be facing another stint in prison or another form of incarceration, such as court-ordered rehab, "I finally said, 'You know what? I don't think I can continue doing this.' And I reached out for help, and I ran with it.You can reach out for help in kind of a half-assed way, and you'll get it, and you won't take advantage of it. It's not that difficult to overcome these seemingly ghastly problems...what's hard is to decide to actually do it."

Downey got his first post-rehab acting job in August 2001, lip-syncing in the video for the Elton John's single "I Want Love". Video director Sam Taylor-Wood shot 16 takes of the video and used the last one because, according to John, Downey looked completely relaxed, and "the way he underplays it is fantastic."

Downey was able to return to the big screen only after Mel Gibson, who had been a close friend to Downey since both had co-starred in Air America, paid Downey's insurance bond for the 2003 film The Singing Detective and after that he appeared in semi-independent films such as Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (2005), and A Scanner Darkly (2006). He also had supporting roles in the mainstream films Gothika (2003) and Zodiac (2007). In 2004, Downey released his debut studio album The Futurist.

Downey signed on with publishers HarperCollins to write a memoir, which in 2006 was already being billed as a "candid look at the highs and lows of his life and career". In 2008, however, Downey returned his advance to the publishers and cancelled the book without further comment.

In 2007, Downey was cast as the title character in the comic book adaptation Iron Man which premiered in the spring of 2008, making almost $100 million in the United States and Canada during its opening weekend. In addition to receiving commercial success, Downey's performance in the film received rave reviews. His other 2008 films include Charlie Bartlett and the Ben Stiller-directed Tropic Thunder, in which he portrayed an Australian method actor overly engrossed in his role as an African-American soldier. He received his second Oscar nomination for said film, in the category of Best Supporting Actor, which he lost to Heath Ledger.

"Yes, Downey is Iron Man, but he really is Actor Man. In the realm where box office is irrelevant and talent is king, the realm that actually means something, he has always ruled, and finally this summer he gets to have his cake and let us eat him up all the way to the multiplex, where his mastery is in full effect." - Ben Stiller, The 2008 Time.

Stiller says that he and Downey always stayed focused on the fact that they were skewering insufferable actors, not African-Americans. 'I was trying to push it as far as you can within reality,' Stiller explains. 'I had no idea how people would respond to it.' Stiller screened a rough cut of the film [in March 2008] and it scored high with African-Americans. He was relieved at the reaction. 'It seems people really embrace it,' he says.

Next he played the titular lead character in Guy Ritchie's adaptation of Sherlock Holmes, released Christmas 2009, for which Downey won a Golden Globe for Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Musical Or Comedy for his portrayal of the famous detective.He is also returning to the role of Iron Man in the 2010 sequel, Iron Man 2.

Music Carrer:

Robert Downey, Jr.'s passion for singing has become known, as he has sung on several soundtracks in his films such as Too Much Sun, Two Girls and a Guy, Friends and Lovers, The Singing Dectective and Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. He released a CD in 2005 called The Futurist, and while promoting his film Tropic Thunder, he and his co-stars Ben Stiller and Jack Black were back up singers "The Pips" to Gladys Knight singing "Midnight Train to Georgia".


Personal Life:

Downey started dating actress Sarah Jessica Parker after meeting on the set of Firstborn. They separated in 1991, according to Downey, because of his drug and alcohol abuse.
Downey also dated Marisa Tomei in the late 1980s, with whom he appeared in Only You and Chaplin. He married actress/singer Deborah Falconer on May 29, 1992 after a 42-day courtship, and had a son with her named Indio Falconer Downey, born on September 7, 1993 in Los Angeles County, California. The strain on their marriage from Downey's repeated trips to rehab and jail finally reached a breaking point; in the midst of Downey's last arrest where he was sentenced to an extended stay in rehab, Falconer left Downey in 2001 and took Indio with her. Downey and Falconer finalized their divorce on April 26, 2004.
Under the guidance of both of his parents, Indio Falconer Downey began developing his own show business career before he had even reached his teens. His first professional work was an appearance in one of his father's movies, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, playing a younger version of his father's character Harry Lockhart.
Following his mother's musical lead, Indio has branched out into a musical career as lead guitarist for a rock band, The Jack Bambis.
In 2003, while on the set of Gothika, Downey met producer Susan Levin, an Executive Vice President of Production at Joel Silver's movie company, Silver Pictures. Downey and Susan quietly struck up a romance during production, though Susan turned down his romantic advances twice, the couple's relationship continued after production wrapped on Gothika, and Downey proposed to Susan on the night before her thirtieth birthday.The couple were married on August 27, 2005 in a Jewish ceremony at Amagansett, New York.

Rachel McAdams, who co-starred with Downey in Sherlock Holmes, referred to him as a "superhero" for his "committed" work ethic during a 2009 panel discussion. On the same panel, Downey described how he worked long hours and many weekends to ensure his accuracy in portraying Holmes so as to help make the film a success.