name	Wall Street
director	Oliver Stone
producer	Edward R. Pressman
writer	Oliver StoneStanley Weiser
starring	Michael DouglasCharlie SheenDaryl HannahMartin SheenTerence StampJohn C. McGinleyHal Holbrook
music	Stewart Copeland
cinematography	Robert Richardson
editing	Claire Simpson
distributor	20th Century Fox
released
runtime	126 minutes
country
language	English
budget	$15,000,000
gross	$43,848,100 }}

''Wall Street'' is a 1987 American drama film released by 20th Century Fox. It was directed by Oliver Stone and stars Michael Douglas, Charlie Sheen, and Daryl Hannah. The screenplay was written by Stanley Weiser and Stone. The film tells the story of Bud Fox (Sheen), a young stockbroker desperate to succeed who becomes involved with his hero, Gordon Gekko (Douglas), a wealthy, unscrupulous corporate raider.

Stone made the film as a tribute to his father, Lou Stone, a stockbroker during the Great Depression. The character of Gekko is said to be a composite of several people, including Owen Morrisey, Dennis Levine, Ivan Boesky, Carl Icahn, Asher Edelman, Michael Ovitz, Michael Milken, and Stone himself. The character of Sir Lawrence Wildman, meanwhile, was modelled on the prominent British financier and corporate raider Sir James Goldsmith. Originally, the studio wanted Warren Beatty to play Gekko, but he was not interested, and Stone wanted Richard Gere, though Gere passed on the role. Stone went with Douglas even though he had been advised by others in Hollywood not to cast him.

The film was well-received among major film critics including Roger Ebert. Douglas won the Academy Award for Best Actor, and the film has come to be seen as the archetypal portrayal of 1980s excess, with Douglas's character memorably declaring that "greed, for lack of a better word, is good". It has also proven influential in inspiring people to work on Wall Street with Sheen, Douglas, and Stone commenting over the years how people still approach them and say that they became stockbrokers because of their respective characters in the film.

Stone, Douglas, and Sheen (for a brief cameo) reunited for a sequel titled ''Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps'', which was released theatrically on September 24, 2010.

Plot[link]

In 1985, Bud Fox (Charlie Sheen), a junior stockbroker at Jackson Steinem & Co., is desperate to get to the top. He wants to become involved with his hero, the corporate raider Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas), a ruthless and legendary Wall Street player, whose values could not conflict more with those of Bud's father Carl (Martin Sheen), a blue-collar maintenance foreman at Bluestar Airlines and president of Bluestar's machinists' union, who believes success is achieved through work and actually providing something of value, not speculating on the goods and services of others.

Bud visits Gekko on his birthday and, granted a brief interview, pitches him stocks, but Gekko is unimpressed. Realizing that Gekko may not do business with him, a desperate Bud provides him some inside information about Bluestar, which Bud learned in a casual conversation from his father. Gekko tells him he will think about it. A dejected Bud returns to his office where Gekko places an order for Bluestar stock and becomes one of Bud's clients. Gekko gives Bud some capital to manage, but the stocks Bud selects—by honest research—lose money. Instead, Gekko takes Bud under his wing but compels him to unearth new information by any means necessary. One of his first assignments is to spy on British corporate raider Sir Lawrence Wildman (Terence Stamp) and discern the Brit's next move. Bud learns that Wildman is making a bid for a steel company. Through Bud's spying, Gekko makes big money, and Wildman is forced to buy Gekko's shares off him to complete his takeover.

Bud becomes wealthy, enjoying Gekko's promised perks, including a penthouse on Manhattan's Upper East Side and a trophy blonde girlfriend, interior decorator Darien (Daryl Hannah). Bud is promoted as a result of the large commission fees he is bringing in from Gekko's trading, and is given a corner office with a view. He continues to maximize insider information and use friends as straw buyers to get rich. Unknown to Bud, several of his trades attract the attention of the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Bud pitches a new idea to Gekko--buy Bluestar Airlines and expand the company, with Bud as president, using savings achieved by union concessions. Bud persuades his father, who dislikes Gekko, to get union support for the plan and push for the deal. Things change when Bud learns that Gekko, in fact, plans to dissolve the company and sell off Bluestar's assets in order to access cash in the company's overfunded pension plan, leaving Carl and the entire Bluestar staff unemployed. Although this would leave Bud very rich, he is angered by Gekko's deceit, and racked with the guilt of being an accessory to Bluestar's destruction, especially after his father suffers a heart attack. Bud chooses his father over his mentor and resolves to disrupt Gekko's plans. He angrily breaks up with Darien, who refuses to plot against Gekko, her former lover and the architect of her career.

Bud creates a plan to drive up Bluestar's stock before manipulating it back down. He and the other union presidents then secretly meet with Wildman and arrange for him to buy controlling interest in Bluestar at a significant discount. Gekko, realizing that his stock is plummeting, finally dumps his remaining interest in the company on Bud's advice. However, when Gekko learns on the evening news that Wildman is buying Bluestar, he realizes that Bud engineered the entire scheme. Bud triumphantly goes back to work at Jackson Steinem the following day, where he is confronted by the police and the SEC and arrested for insider trading.

Sometime later, Bud confronts Gekko in Central Park. Gekko berates him for his role with Bluestar. He then strikes Bud, accusing him of ingratitude for several of their illicit trades. Following the confrontation, it is revealed that Bud was wearing a wire to record his encounter with Gekko. He turns the wire tapes over to the authorities, who suggest that his sentence will be lightened in exchange for helping them make a case against Gekko. Later on, Bud's parents drive him to the courthouse, and Carl tells him he did right in saving the airline, although he will most likely still go to prison. The film ends with Bud going up the steps of the courthouse to face justice for his crimes, albeit now with a clear conscience.

Cast[link]

Michael Douglas as Gordon Gekko

Charlie Sheen as Bud Fox

Daryl Hannah as Darien Taylor

Martin Sheen as Carl Fox

Hal Holbrook as Lou Mannheim

John C. McGinley as Marvin

Terence Stamp as Sir Lawrence Wildman

James Spader as Roger Barnes

Sean Young as Katherine Gekko

Sean Stone as Rudy Gekko

Saul Rubinek as Harold Salt

James Karen as Lynch

Frank Adonis as Charlie

Production and origins[link]

After the success of ''Platoon'' (1986), Stone wanted film school friend and Los Angeles screenwriter Stanley Weiser to research and write a screenplay about quiz show scandals in the 1950s. During a story conference, Stone suggested making a film about Wall Street instead. The director pitched the premise of two investment partners getting involved in questionable financial dealings, using each other, and they are tailed by a prosecutor as in ''Crime and Punishment''. The director had been thinking about this kind of a movie as early as 1981 and was inspired by his father, Lou Stone, a broker during the Great Depression at Hayden Stone.

The filmmaker knew a New York businessman who was making millions and working long days putting together deals all over the world. This man started making mistakes that cost him everything. Stone remembers that the "story frames what happens in my movie, which is basically a ''Pilgrim’s Progress'' of a boy who is seduced and corrupted by the allure of easy money. And in the third act, he sets out to redeem himself". Stone asked Weiser to read ''Crime and Punishment'' but the writer found that its story did not mix well with their own. Stone then asked Weiser to read ''The Great Gatsby'' for material that they could use but it was not the right fit either. Weiser had no prior knowledge of the financial world and immersed himself in researching the world of stock trading, junk bonds, and corporate takeovers. He and Stone spent three weeks visiting brokerage houses and interviewing investors.

Screenplay[link]

Weiser wrote the first draft, initially called ''Greed'', with Stone writing another draft. Originally, the lead character was a young Jewish broker named Freddie Goldsmith but Stone changed it to Bud Fox to avoid the stereotype that Wall Street was controlled by Jews. Reportedly, Gordon Gekko is said to be a composite of several people: Owen Morrisey, who was involved in a $20 million insider trading scandal in 1985, Dennis Levine, Ivan Boesky, corporate raider Carl Icahn, art collector Asher Edelman, agent Michael Ovitz, and Stone himself. For example, the famous "Greed is good" line was based on a speech by Boesky where he said, "Greed is right", that Stone read and it stuck with him. According to Edward R. Pressman, producer of the film, "Originally, there was no one individual who Gekko was modeled on", he adds, "But Gekko was partly Milken". Also, Pressman has said that the character of Sir Larry Wildman was "modeled on Jimmy Goldsmith", the famous Anglo-French billionaire and corporate-raider. According to Weiser, Gekko's style of speaking was inspired by Stone. "When I was writing some of the dialogue I would listen to Oliver on the phone and sometimes he talks very rapid-fire, the way Gordon Gekko does". Stone cites as influences on his approach to business, the novels of Upton Sinclair, Sinclair Lewis and Victor Hugo, and the films of Paddy Chayefsky because they were able to make a complicated subject clear to the audience. Stone set the film in 1985 because insider trading scandals culminated in 1985 and 1986. This led to anachronisms in the script, including a reference to the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster, which hadn't yet occurred.

Casting[link]

Stone met with Tom Cruise about playing Bud Fox, but the director had already committed to Charlie Sheen for the role. Stone liked the "stiffness" of Sheen's acting style and used it to convey the naive nature of Bud who looks up to Gekko. Michael Douglas had just come off heroic roles like the one in ''Romancing the Stone'' and was looking for something dark and edgy. The studio wanted Warren Beatty to play Gekko but he was not interested. Stone initially wanted Richard Gere but the actor passed, so the director went with Douglas despite having been advised by others in Hollywood not to cast him. Stone remembers, "I was warned by everyone in Hollywood that Michael couldn't act, that he was a producer more than an actor and would spend all his time in his trailer on the phone". But the director found out that "when he's acting he gives it his all". The director says that he saw "that villain quality" in the actor and always thought he was a smart businessman. The actor remembers that when he first read the screenplay, "I thought it was a great part. It was a long script, and there were some incredibly long and intense monologues to open with. I’d never seen a screenplay where there were two or three pages of single-spaced type for a monologue. I thought, whoa! I mean, it was unbelievable". For research, he read profiles of corporate raiders T. Boone Pickens and Carl Icahn.

Stone gave Charlie Sheen the choice of Jack Lemmon or Martin Sheen to play his father in the film and the young actor picked his dad. The elder Sheen related to the moral sense of his character. Stone cast Daryl Hannah as Bud Fox's materialistic girlfriend Darien Taylor, but felt that she was never happy with the role and did not know why she accepted it. He tried to explain the character to Hannah repeatedly and thought that the materialism of the character conflicted with the actress' idealism and it really bothered her. The director was aware early on that she was not right for it. "Daryl Hannah was not happy doing the role and I should have let her go. All my crew wanted to get rid of her after one day of shooting. My pride was such that I kept saying I was going to make it work". Stone also had difficulties with Sean Young, who made her opinions known that Hannah should be fired and that she should play that role instead. Young would show up to the set late and unprepared. She did not get along with Charlie Sheen, which caused further friction on the set. In retrospect, Stone felt that Young was right and he should have swapped Hannah's role with hers. Stone admits that he had "some problems" with Sean Young but was not willing to confirm or deny rumors that she walked off with all of her costumes when she completed filming.

Principal photography[link]

Stone wanted to shoot the movie in New York City and that required a budget of at least $15 million, a moderate shooting budget by 1980s standards. The studio that backed ''Platoon'' felt that it was too risky a project to bankroll and passed. Stone and producer Edward R. Pressman took it to 20th Century Fox and filming began in April 1987 and ended on July 4 of the same year. According to Stone, he was "making a movie about sharks, about feeding frenzies. Bob [director of photography Robert Richardson] and I wanted the camera to become a predator. There is no letup until you get to the fixed world of Charlie’s father, where the stationary camera gives you a sense of immutable values". The director saw Wall Street as a battle zone and "filmed it as such" including shooting conversations like physical confrontations and in ensemble shots had the camera circle the actors "in a way that makes you feel you're in a pool with sharks".

Jeffrey "Mad Dog" Beck, a star investment banker at the time with Drexel Burnham Lambert, was one of the film's technical advisers and has a cameo appearance in the film as the man speaking at the meeting discussing the breakup of Bluestar. Kenneth Lipper, investment banker and former deputy mayor of New York for Finance and Economic Development, was also hired as chief technical adviser. At first, he turned Stone down because he felt that the film would be a one-sided attack. Stone asked him to reconsider and Lipper read the script responding with a 13-page critique. For example, he argued that it was unrealistic to have all the characters be "morally bankrupt". In addition, traders were brought in to coach actors on the set on how to hold phones, write out tickets, and talk to clients. Stone asked Lipper to design a six-week course that would expose Charlie Sheen to a cross section of young Wall Street business people. The actor said, "I was impressed and very, very respectful of the fact that they could maintain that kind of aggressiveness and drive".

Douglas worked with a speech instructor on breath control in order to become better acclimatized to the fast rhythm of the film's dialogue. Early on in the shoot, Stone tested Douglas by enhancing his "repressed anger", according to the actor. At one point, Stone came into Douglas' trailer and asked him if he was doing drugs because "you look like you haven't acted before", the actor recalled the director telling him. This shocked Douglas who did more research and worked on his lines again and again, pushing himself harder than he had before. All of this hard work culminated with the "Greed is good" speech. Stone planned to use a ''Fortune'' magazine cover in exchange for promotional advertisements but ''Forbes'' magazine made a similar offer. The filmmaker stuck with ''Fortune'' and this upset ''Forbes'' publisher Malcolm Forbes, who turned down a later request to use his private yacht. Stone switched from 12 to 14-hour shooting days in the last few weeks in order to finishing principal photography before an impending Directors Guild of America strike and finished five days ahead of schedule. Sheen remembered that Stone was always looking at the script and at his watch. He was always concerned about time and the film's budget.

Themes[link]

The film has come to be seen as the archetypal portrayal of 1980s excess, with Douglas advocating "greed, for lack of a better word, is good". ''Wall Street'' defines itself through a number of morality conflicts putting wealth and power against simplicity and honesty.

Carl's (Martin Sheen's) character represents the working class in the film: he is the union leader for the maintenance workers at Bluestar. He constantly attacks big business, money, mandatory drug screening and greedy manufacturers and anything that he sees as a threat to his union. The conflict between Gekko's relentless pursuit of wealth and Carl Fox's leftward leanings form the basis of the film's subtext. This subtext could be described as the concept of the two fathers battling for control over the morals of the son, a concept Stone had also used in ''Platoon''. In ''Wall Street'' the hard-working Carl Fox and the cutthroat businessman Gordon Gekko represent the fathers. The producers of the film use Carl as their voice in the film, a voice of reason amid the creative destruction brought about by Gekko's unrestrained personal philosophy.

A significant scene in the film is a speech by Gekko to a shareholders' meeting of Teldar Paper, a company he is planning to take over. Stone uses this scene to give Gekko, and by extension, the Wall Street raiders he personifies, the chance to justify their actions, which he memorably does, pointing out the slothfulness and waste that corporate America accumulated through the postwar years and from which he sees himself as a "liberator". The inspiration for the "Greed is good" speech seems to have come from two sources. The first part, where Gekko complains that the company's management owns less than three percent of its stock, and that it has too many vice presidents, is taken from similar speeches and comments made by Carl Icahn about companies he was trying to take over. The defense of greed is a paraphrase of the May 18, 1986, commencement address at the UC Berkeley's School of Business Administration, delivered by arbitrageur Ivan Boesky (who himself was later convicted of insider-trading charges), in which he said, "Greed is all right, by the way. I want you to know that. I think greed is healthy. You can be greedy and still feel good about yourself".

''Wall Street'' is not a wholesale criticism of the capitalist system, but of the cynical, quick-buck culture of the 1980s. The "good" characters in the film are themselves capitalists, but in a more steady, hardworking sense. In one scene, Gekko scoffs at Bud Fox's question as to the moral value of hard work, quoting the example of his (Gekko's) father, who worked hard his entire life and died in relative mediocrity. Lou Mannheim as an archetype old man mentor, says early in the film, that "good things sometimes take time", referring to IBM and Hilton—in contrast, Gekko's "Greed is Good" credo typifies the short-term view prevalent in the 1980s.

Reception[link]

''Wall Street'' was released on December 11, 1987, in 730 theaters and grossed USD $4.1 million on its opening weekend. It went on to make $43.8 million in North America.

The film was well received critically. It has a 78% rating on Rotten Tomatoes and a 56 metascore on Metacritic. In his review for ''The New York Times'', Vincent Canby, while quite critical of the film overall, praised Douglas' work as "the funniest, canniest performance of his career". Roger Ebert gave the film three-and-a-half stars out of four and praised it for allowing "all the financial wheeling and dealing to seem complicated and convincing, and yet always have it make sense. The movie can be followed by anybody, because the details of stock manipulation are all filtered through transparent layers of greed. Most of the time we know what's going on. All of the time, we know why". ''Time'' magazine's Richard Corliss wrote, "This time he works up a salty sweat to end up nowhere, like a triathlete on a treadmill. But as long as he keeps his players in venal, perpetual motion, it is great scary fun to watch him work out". In his review for the ''Globe and Mail'', Jay Scott praised the performances of the two leads: "But Douglas's portrayal of Gordon Gekko is an oily triumph and as the kid Gekko thinks he has found in Fox ('Poor, smart and hungry; no feelings'), Charlie Sheen evolves persuasively from gung-ho capitalist child to wily adolescent corporate raider to morally appalled adult". Rita Kempley in the ''Washington Post'' wrote that the film "is at its weakest when it preaches visually or verbally. Stone doesn't trust the time-honored story line, supplementing the obvious moral with plenty of soapboxery".

Michael Douglas won the Academy Award for Best Actor and thanked Oliver Stone for "casting me in a part that almost nobody thought I could play". Daryl Hannah's performance was not as well-received and earned her a Razzie for Worst Supporting Actress. The "quintessential financial high-roller's attire" of Michael Douglas in the movie, designed by Alan Flusser, was emulated in the 1980s by yuppies.

''Wall Street'' enjoyed renewed interest in 1990 when the cover of ''Newsweek'' magazine asked, "Is Greed Dead?" after 1980s icons like Michael Milken and Ivan Boesky ran afoul of insider trading laws. Over the years, the film's screenwriter Stanley Weiser has been approached by numerous people who told him, "The movie changed my life. Once I saw it I knew that I wanted to get into such and such business. I wanted to be like Gordon Gekko". In addition, both Charlie Sheen and Michael Douglas still have people come up to them and say that they became stockbrokers because of their respective characters in the film. In recent years, Stone was asked how the financial market depicted in ''Wall Street'' has changed and he replied, "The problems that existed in the 1980s market grew and grew into a much larger phenomenon. Enron is a fiction, in a sense, in the same way that Gordon Gekko's buying and selling was a fiction ... Kenny Lay-he's the new Gordon Gekko". ''Entertainment Weekly'' magazine's Owen Gleiberman recently commented that the film, "reveals something now which it couldn't back then: that the Gordon Gekkos of the world weren't just getting rich – they were creating an alternate reality that was going to crash down on all of us".

A 20th Anniversary edition was released on September 18, 2007. New extras include an on-camera introduction by Stone, extensive deleted scenes, "Greed is Good" featurettes, and new on-camera interviews with Michael Douglas and Martin Sheen.

In reviewing the film's sequel twenty-three years later, ''Variety'' noted that though the original film was "Intended as a cautionary tale on the pitfalls of unchecked ambition and greed, Stone's 1987 original instead had the effect of turning Douglas' hugely charismatic (and Oscar-winning) villain into a household name and boardroom icon -- an inspiration to the very power players and Wall Street wannabes for whom he set such a terrible example."

Sequel[link]

In 2007, ''The New York Times'' reported that a sequel, ''Money Never Sleeps'', was in pre-production. Michael Douglas reprised his role as Gordon Gekko. The film focused on Gekko, recently released from prison, and re-entering a much more chaotic financial world than the one he once oversaw. Charlie Sheen reprised his character of Bud Fox in a cameo role. Daryl Hannah was not involved in the sequel.

In April 2009, 20th Century Fox confirmed that the sequel was still in development and announced that Oliver Stone would direct. In addition, Shia LaBeouf was cast, with Josh Brolin. Javier Bardem had been considered, but dropped out due to scheduling conflicts. The film was released on September 24, 2010.

References[link]

External links[link]

"Wall Street" Original Screenplay by Stanley Weiser & Oliver Stone

Category:1987 films Category:1980s drama films Category:American business films Category:American drama films Category:English-language films Category:Films directed by Oliver Stone Category:Films featuring a Best Actor Academy Award winning performance Category:Films featuring a Best Drama Actor Golden Globe winning performance Category:Films set in New York City Category:Films set in 1985 Category:Trading films Category:Wall Street films Category:20th Century Fox films

ca:Wall street (pel·lícula) cs:Wall Street (film) cy:Wall Street (ffilm) da:Wall Street (film) de:Wall Street (1987) es:Wall Street (película) fa:وال استریت (فیلم) fr:Wall Street (film) gl:Wall Street (filme) it:Wall Street (film) he:וול סטריט (סרט) la:Wall Street (pellicula) hu:Tőzsdecápák nl:Wall Street (film) ja:ウォール街 (映画) no:Wall Street (film) pl:Wall Street (film 1987) pt:Wall Street (filme) ro:Wall Street (film) ru:Уолл-стрит (фильм, 1987) sk:Wall Street (film) fi:Wall Street – rahan ja vallan katu sv:Wall Street (film, 1987) tr:Borsa (film) uk:Волл-стріт (фільм)

name	Gordon Gekko
series	Wall Street
first	''Wall Street''
creator	Oliver StoneStanley Weiser
portrayer	Michael Douglas
occupation	Corporate raider Author
alma mater	Fordham University
net worth	$8.5 Billion (Wall Street) $1.1 billion (Wall Street 2)
spouse	Kate Gekko (ex-wife) (played by Sean Young)
children	Rudy Gekko (son; ''deceased'') (played by Sean Stone) Winnie Gekko-Moore (daughter) (played by Carey Mulligan)
relatives	Jacob Moore (son-in-law) (played by Shia LaBeouf) Louis Moore (grand-son)
nationality	United States
occupation	Corporate raider Author
net worth	US$1.9 billion }}

Gordon Gekko is a fictional character and the main antagonist of the 1987 film ''Wall Street'' and the antihero of the 2010 film ''Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps'', both directed by Oliver Stone. Gekko was portrayed by actor Michael Douglas, whose performance in the first film won him an Oscar for Best Actor.

Co-written by Stone and screenwriter Stanley Weiser, Gekko is claimed to be based loosely on arbitrageur Ivan Boesky, who gave a speech on greed at the University of California, Berkeley in 1986, real-life activist shareholder and corporate raider Carl Icahn and also Stone's own father Louis Stone. According to Edward R. Pressman, producer of the film, "Originally, there was no one individual who Gekko was modeled on," he adds. "But Gekko was partly Milken", who was the "Junk Bond King" of the 1980s, and indicted on 98 counts of racketeering and fraud in 1989.

In 2003, the AFI named him number 24 of the top 50 movie villains of all time.

In 2008, Gordon Gekko was named the fourth richest fictional character by ''Forbes'' who attributed him with US$8.5 billion.

Gekko grew up on Long Island and went to City College of New York. His birthday is May 6, though his year of birth is unknown. His father was a salesman of electrical supplies who died of a heart attack at 49. He married Kate and had a son, Rudy, and a daughter, Winnie. Rudy committed suicide while in college because of Gordon's illegal activities. His on-again-off-again mistress is Darien Taylor, with whom he maintains a friendship. During the mid-1980s he had a rivalry with fellow corporate raider Sir Lawrence "Larry" Wildman, though the conversation between the two men clearly indicates that Larry is the wealthier of the two.

Gekko becomes rich in the 1970s through buying real estate, and soon turns his attention to corporate raiding. It turns out, however, that much of his wealth comes from a heavy reliance on insider trading. His tactics finally catch up with him in 1985 when his latest protègé, Bud Fox, is arrested for his role in their illegal trades and agrees to turn state's evidence against Gekko in return for a lighter sentence. On the strength of Fox's testimony, Gekko is convicted of multiple securities violations. He is sent to prison in 1990 for his crimes and is released in 2001, finding himself the only released ex-convict without anyone greeting him.

Cultural symbol[link]

Gekko has become a symbol in popular culture for unrestrained greed (with the signature line, "Greed, for lack of a better word, is good"), often in fields outside corporate finance.

On September 25, 2008, Michael Douglas, acting as a UN ambassador for peace, was at the 2008 session of the United Nations General Assembly. Reporters sought to ask him off topic questions about Gordon Gekko; "Douglas was asked whether he bore some responsibility for the behavior of the greed merchants who had brought the world to its knees thanks to his (aka Gekko's) encouragement." Trying to return to topic Douglas tried to "suggest that the same level of passion Wall Street investors showed should also apply to getting rid of nuclear weapons."

The actor was also asked to compare nuclear Armageddon with the "financial Armageddon on Wall Street". After one reporter inquired, "Are you saying, Gordon, that greed is not good?" Douglas stated, "I'm not saying that. And my name is not Gordon. It's a character I played 20 years ago."

On October 8, 2008, the character was referenced in a speech by the Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd in his speech "The Children of Gordon Gekko" concerning the Financial crisis of 2007-2010. Rudd stated “It is perhaps time now to admit that we did not learn the full lessons of the greed-is-good ideology. And today we are still cleaning up the mess of the 21st-century children of Gordon Gekko.”

On July 28, 2009, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone cited Gekko's ''greed is good'' slogan in a speech to the Italian senate, saying that the free market had been replaced by a ''greed market'', and also blamed such a mentality for the 2007-2008 financial crisis.

In May 2011, CCP Games released an internal newsletter entitled "Greed is Good?: The Gordon Gekko Issue", promoting a debate amongst its staff about whether introducing microtransactions to its flagship MMORPG, EVE Online is good or not for the video-game, its community and the company itself. The community's response to said newsletter was overwhelmingly negative, considering that said community has expressed on multiple times that, since the video-game is subscription-based, they feel CCP Games would be "double-charging" its subscribers if they adopted microtransactions.

Gekko is considered to display sociopathic behaviors.

In popular culture[link]

In the computer game ''Fallout 2'', an NPC named Gordon resides in the town of Gecko. Upon initial conversation by one's character, Gordon proceeds to recite a "Greed is Good" monologue.

In the movie ''Boiler Room'' (2000), the characters played by Nicky Katt and Vin Diesel recite by heart lines of Gordon Gekko in front of a crew of their co-workers, while ''Wall Street'' is playing on TV.

In the fourth episode of the first season of ''The Sarah Silverman Program'', titled "Not Without My Daughter", Sarah witnesses a young girl, who later becomes her protégé, reciting Gordon Gekko's famous "Greed is Good" speech before a panel of beauty pageant judges.

In Season 4 of Robot Chicken, Gordon the Gecko appears as Kermit the Frog's businessman cousin. The majority of his lines are direct quotes from the movie, including his "Greed is Good" speech.

In the US television series The Office , BJ Novak's character Ryan Howard dresses up as Gordan Gekko in the fifth episode of the fifth season, Employee Transfer.

In a 2010 radio advertisement, AFSCME tries to paint United States Senate candidate Pat Toomey as a Wall Street villain. In the commercial, the narrator says that it was Gordon Gekko who introduced the idea that "Greed, for lack of a better word, is good." All throughout the commercial, bullet points of Toomey's faults are listed—each one followed by the haunting words, "Greed is Good."

In 2012, US Presidential candidate Mitt Romney's career with Bain Capital was likened to Gekko's by his political rivals, with an ABC News political blogger saying "Gekko’s ghost has haunted the Romney campaign from the start." The FBI has used Michael Douglas' Gekko for an anti-insider trading campaign.

"Greed is Good" quotation[link]

Notwithstanding the popular cultural significance of the character (and the wide repetition of this particular quotation), Gekko never actually uttered the words "''Greed is Good''" in the original ''Wall Street'' film. The full text of the quotation is below:

}}

Footnotes[link]

See also[link]

Swimming with Sharks

External links[link]

Speech before stockholders

Forbes profile

Is Gordon Gekko Back in Fashion?

Analysis of Gekko's character and legal status

Gekko's Art collection and Wall Street movie art pieces identification

Episode of NBC's The Office

Reptile Database listing for ''Cyrtodactylus gordongekkoi''

Gekko. Gordon Category:Fictional characters from New York City Category:Fictional characters introduced in 1987 Category:Fictional criminals Category:Film characters

cs:Gordon Gekko da:Gordon Gekko is:Gordon Gekko it:Gordon Gekko nl:Gordon Gekko no:Gordon Gekko ru:Гордон Гекко

birth name	Michael Kirk Douglas
birth date	September 25, 1944
birth place	New Brunswick, New Jersey, United States
spouse	Diandra Luker (1977–2000)Catherine Zeta-Jones(2000–present)
occupation	Actor, producer
years active	1966–present
parents	Kirk Douglas, Diana Dill
relatives	Joel (brother)Peter (half-brother)Eric (half-brother, deceased)Anne Buydens (stepmother)
children	Cameron DouglasDylan Michael DouglasCarys Zeta Douglas }}

Michael Kirk Douglas (born September 25, 1944) is an American actor and producer, primarily in movies and television. He has won three Golden Globes and two Academy Awards; as producer of 1975's Best Picture, ''One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest'', and as Best Actor in 1987 for his role in ''Wall Street''. Douglas received the AFI Life Achievement Award in 2009. He is the eldest of actor Kirk Douglas's four sons.

Early life and education[link]

Douglas was born in New Brunswick, New Jersey, the first child of actor Kirk Douglas and Bermudian-born actress Diana Dill. His paternal grandparents were Jewish immigrants from Gomel in Belarus (at that time a part of the Russian Empire). His mother was from Devonshire Parish, Bermuda; Douglas's maternal grandfather, Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Melville Dill, served as Attorney General of Bermuda and was commanding officer of the Bermuda Militia Artillery. Douglas has a younger brother, Joel Douglas (born 1947), and two paternal half-brothers, Peter Douglas (born 1955) and Eric Douglas (1958–2004), from stepmother Anne Buydens.

Douglas attended The Choate Preparatory School (now Choate Rosemary Hall) in Wallingford, Connecticut. He received his B.A. in drama from the University of California, Santa Barbara in 1968, where he was also the Honorary President of the UCSB Alumni Association. He studied acting with Wynn Handman at The American Place Theatre in New York City.

Career[link]

Early years[link]

Douglas started his film career in the late 1960s and early 1970s, appearing in little known films like ''Hail, Hero!'' and ''Summertree''. His first significant role came in the TV series ''The Streets of San Francisco'' from 1972 to 1976, where he starred alongside Karl Malden. Douglas later said that Malden became a "mentor" and someone he "admired and loved deeply". After Douglas left the show, he had a long association with his mentor until Malden's death on July 1, 2009. In 2004, Douglas presented Malden with the Monte Cristo Award of the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center in Waterford, Connecticut, for the Lifetime Achievement Award.

In 1975, Douglas received from his father, Kirk Douglas, the rights to the novel ''One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest''. Michael went on to produce the film of the same name with Saul Zaentz. Kirk Douglas considered playing the starring role himself, having starred in an earlier stage version, but chose against it, considering himself too old. The lead role went instead to a young Jack Nicholson, who would go on to win the Academy Award for Best Actor. Douglas won the Award for Best Picture for producing the film.

After leaving ''Streets of San Francisco'' in 1976, Douglas played a hospital doctor in the medical thriller ''Coma'' (1978), and in 1979 he played the role of a troubled marathon runner in ''Running''. In 1979, he both produced and starred in ''The China Syndrome'', a dramatic film co-starring Jane Fonda and Jack Lemmon about a nuclear power plant accident (the Three Mile Island accident took place 12 days after the film's release). The film was considered "one of the most intelligent Hollywood films of the 1970s."

Success in Hollywood[link]

Douglas' acting career was propelled to fame when he produced and starred in the 1984 romantic adventure comedy ''Romancing the Stone''. It also helped launch Kathleen Turner to stardom, reintroduced Douglas as a capable leading man, and gave director Robert Zemeckis his first box-office success. The film also starred Danny DeVito, a personal friend of Douglas' since they had shared an apartment in the 1960s. It was followed a year later by a sequel, ''The Jewel of the Nile'', which he also produced.

The year 1987 saw Douglas star in the horror thriller ''Fatal Attraction'' with Glenn Close. That same year he played tycoon Gordon Gekko in Oliver Stone's ''Wall Street'' for which he received an Academy Award as Best Actor. He reprised his role as Gekko in the sequel ''Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps'' in 2010, also directed by Stone.

Douglas again teamed with Kathleen Turner and Danny DeVito for the 1989 film ''The War of the Roses''. In 1989, he starred in Ridley Scott's international police crime drama ''Black Rain'' opposite Andy García and Kate Capshaw. The film was shot in Osaka, Japan.

In 1992, Douglas had another successful starring role when he appeared alongside Sharon Stone in the film ''Basic Instinct''. The movie was a box office hit, and sparked controversy over its depictions of bisexuality and lesbianism. In 1994, Douglas and Demi Moore starred in the hit movie ''Disclosure'' focusing on the topic of sexual harassment with Douglas playing a man harassed by his new female boss. Other popular films he starred during these decade were ''Falling Down'', ''The American President'', ''The Ghost and the Darkness'', ''The Game'' (directed by David Fincher), and a remake of Alfred Hitchcock's classic - ''Dial M for Murder'' - titled ''A Perfect Murder''. In 1998, Douglas received the Crystal Globe award for outstanding artistic contribution to world cinema at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival.

In 2000, Douglas starred in Steven Soderbergh's critically acclaimed film ''Traffic'', opposite Benicio del Toro and future wife Catherine Zeta-Jones. That same year, he also received critical acclaim for his role in ''Wonder Boys'' as a professor and novelist suffering from writer's block. He was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor in a Drama as well as several other awards from critics.

Types of roles[link]

According to film historian and critic David Thomson, Douglas was capable of playing characters who were "weak, culpable, morally indolent, compromised, and greedy for illicit sensation without losing that basic probity or potential for ethical character that we require of a hero." Critic and author Rob Edelman points out similarities in many of Douglas's roles, writing that in some of his leading films, he personified the "contemporary, Caucasian middle-to-upper-class American male who finds himself the brunt of female anger because of real or imagined sexual slights."

These themes of male victimization are seen in films such as ''Fatal Attraction'' (1987), with Glenn Close, ''War of the Roses'' (1989), with Kathleen Turner, ''Basic Instinct'' (1992), Sharon Stone, ''Falling Down'' (1993), and ''Disclosure'' (1994), with Demi Moore. For his characters in films such as these, "any kind of sexual contact with someone other than his mate and the mother of his children is destined to come at a costly price." Edelman describes his characters as the "Everyman who must contend with, and be victimized by, these women and their raging, psychotic sexuality."

Conversely, Douglas also played powerful characters with dominating personalities equally well: as Gordon Gekko, in the ''Wall Street'' franchise, he acted the role of a "greedy yuppie personification of the Me generation," convinced that "greed is good;" in ''Romancing the Stone'' and ''The Jewel of the Nile,'' he played an idealistic soldier of fortune; in ''The Star Chamber'' (1983), he was a court judge fed up with an inadequate legal system, leading him to become involved with a vigilante group; and in Black Rain (1989), he proved he could also play a Stallone-like action hero as a New York City cop.

Actor and producer[link]

Having become recognized as both a successful producer and actor, he describes himself as "an actor first and a producer second." He has explained why he enjoys both functions:

"I love the fact that on one side, with acting, you can be a child — acting is wonderful for its innocence and the fun. . . On the other side, producing is fun for all the adult kinds of things you do. You deal in business, you deal with the creative forces. As an adult who continues to get older, you like the adult risks. It's flying without a net, taking chances and learning. I was never good in economics or business — had no business background, you know, and I like it."

He has also offered reasons why he has become successful in both acting and producing:

"I think I'm a chameleon. I think it's something that I possibly inherited early on as a child going back and forth between two families. I know that whether it's right or wrong, I have an ability to sort of fit into a lot of different situations and make people feel relatively comfortable in a wide range without giving up all my moral values. I think that same chameleonlike quality can transfer into films. I think if you can remember the reason you got involved with it in the first place and try to keep that impulsive, instinctive feeling even when you're being beaten down or exhausted or waylaid, you'll be successful."

Recent years[link]

In 2003, Douglas starred in ''It Runs in the Family'', which featured three generations of his family (his parents, Kirk and Diana, as well as his own son, Cameron). The film, although a labor of love, was not successful, critically or at the box office. Douglas starred in the solid commercial action flick ''Don't Say a Word'', then the poorly received action-thriller ''The Sentinel'' in 2006. During that time, he also guest-appeared on the episode, "Fagel Attraction", of the popular television sitcom ''Will and Grace'', as a gay cop attracted to Will Truman (Eric McCormack); the performance earned Douglas an Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Show.

Douglas was approached for ''Basic Instinct 2'', but he declined to participate in the project. He said:

"Yes, they asked me to do it a while ago, I thought we had done it very effectively; [Paul] Verhoeven is a pretty good director. I haven't seen the sequel. I've only done one sequel in my life, ''The Jewel of the Nile'', from ''Romancing The Stone.'' Besides, there were age issues, you know? Sharon still looks fabulous. The script was pretty good. Good for her, she's in her late-40s, and there are not a lot of parts around. The first one was probably the best picture of her career—it certainly made her career and she was great in it".

Future engagements[link]

Douglas is rumored to appear in ''Tragic Indifference'', a courtroom thriller based on a landmark liability case against Ford Motor Company, according to ''Variety''. Douglas will play the attorney who took Ford to court on behalf of a single mother from Texas who was paralyzed and nearly died after an accident. The trial exposed the automaker's indifference to flaws in its Sport Utility Vehicles (SUV). The movie will be based on Adam Penenberg's 2003 book of the same name. Douglas will play Attorney Tab Turner, who represented Donna Bailey after the Ford Explorer SUV she was riding in rolled over following a Firestone tire failure.

On December 17, 2007 it was announced that Douglas would announce the introduction to ''NBC Nightly News'', some two years after Howard Reig, the previous announcer, retired.

Personal life[link]

Family[link]

After filming ''Summertree'' (1971), he began dating actress Brenda Vaccaro. The relationship lasted for about six years.

In March 1977, 33 year old Douglas married 19 year old Diandra Luker, the daughter of an Austrian diplomat. They had one son, Cameron, born in 1978. In 1995 Diandra filed for divorce

Dating since March 1999, Douglas married Welsh actress Catherine Zeta-Jones on November 18, 2000. They were both born on September 25, though 25 years apart. Zeta-Jones says that when they met in Deauville, France, Douglas used the line "I want to father your children." They have two children, Dylan Michael (born August 8, 2000) and Carys Zeta (born April 20, 2003).

They planned on renewing their wedding vows in 2010 as part of their 10th wedding anniversary. The idea was hers, and came after Douglas was found to have advanced stages of cancer. One report notes that "Michael was in tears when she suggested it to him," and he sees it as a “wonderful expression of love.”

Douglas, the son of a Jewish father and an Anglican mother, has declared no religious affiliation.

Citizenship[link]

Douglas is a U.S. citizen by birth in the United States and has Bermudian Status through his mother's birth in Bermuda.

Skiing accident and rehab[link]

In 1980, Douglas was involved in a serious skiing accident which sidelined his acting career for three years. In September 1992, the same year ''Basic Instinct'' came out, he underwent treatment for alcoholism and drug addiction at Sierra Tucson Center.

Legal problems[link]

In 1997, New York caddy James Parker sued Douglas for $25 million. Parker accused Douglas of hitting him in the groin with an errant golf ball, causing Parker to lose a testicle and his job. The case was later settled out of court.

Stalking[link]

In 2004, Douglas and Zeta-Jones took legal action against stalker Dawnette Knight, who was accused of sending violent letters to the couple that contained graphic threats on Zeta-Jones' life. Testifying, Zeta-Jones said the threats left her so shaken she feared a nervous breakdown. Knight claimed she had been in love with Douglas and admitted to the offences, which took place between October 2003 and May 2004. She was sentenced to three years in prison.

Health problems[link]

It was announced on August 16, 2010, that Douglas was suffering from throat cancer and will undergo chemotherapy and radiation treatment. On August 31, 2010 Douglas appeared on ''Late Show with David Letterman'' and confirmed that the cancer was at stage IV, the most advanced stage. Douglas attributed the cancer to a combination of stress, his previous alcohol abuse, and years of heavy smoking.

In November 2010, Douglas was put on a special weight gain diet by his doctors due to the excessive weight loss leaving him weak. On January 11, 2011, he said in an interview that the tumor was gone. He admitted that the illness and aggressive treatment had caused him to lose 32 lbs in weight. He will have to have monthly screenings because there is a very high chance that the cancer could return over the course of the next two to three years. Although Douglas has described the cancer as throat cancer, many doctors believe he was actually diagnosed with oropharyngeal cancer.

Activism[link]

Political activities[link]

Douglas and Zeta-Jones hosted the annual Nobel Peace Prize concert in Oslo, Norway, on December 11, 2003. They acted as co-masters of ceremony in the concert celebrating the award given to Iranian human rights activist Shirin Ebadi. In 2006, Douglas was awarded an honorary Doctor of Letters (D.Litt.) from the University of St. Andrews in Scotland.

He is an advocate of nuclear disarmament, a supporter of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, and sits on the Board of Directors of the anti-war grantmaking foundation Ploughshares Fund. In 1998, he was appointed UN Messenger of Peace by Secretary-General Kofi Annan. He is a notable Democrat and has donated money to Barack Obama, Christopher Dodd, and Al Franken. He has been a major supporter of gun control since John Lennon was murdered in 1980.

In 2006 he was a featured speaker in a public service campaign sponsored by a UN conference to focus attention on trade of illicit arms, especially of small arms and light weapons. Douglas made several appearances and offered his opinions: :"The conference is an opportunity for UN member states to build on the Program of Action and to encourage countries to strengthen their laws on the illicit trade, . . . an issue that affects us all . . .[and] while owning guns is a legal right in most countries, the illegal trade in guns continues to fuel conflict, crime and violence."

A few years earlier, in 2003, Douglas hosted a "powerful film" on child soldiers and the impact of combat on children in countries such as Sierra Leone. During the documentary film, Douglas interviewed children, and estimated that they were among 300,000 other children worldwide who have been conscripted or kidnapped and forced to fight. Of one such child he interviewed, Douglas stated, "After being kidnapped by a rebel group, he was tortured, drugged, and forced to commit atrocities." Douglas discussed his role as a Messenger Peace for the UN: :"I'm in an enviable position . . . When I talk about movies I can talk about messages of peace, and infuse them into the entertainment pages."

Humanitarian initiatives[link]

In 2009 Douglas joined the project ''Soldiers of Peace'', a movie against all wars and for global peace.

Douglas lent his support for the campaign to release Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, the Iranian woman, who after having been convicted of committing adultery, was given a sentence of death by stoning.

Filmography[link]

+ Filmography
! Year	! Title	! Role	Notes
1966	''Cast a Giant Shadow''	Jeep driver
1969	''Hail, Hero!''	Carl Dixon
1970	''Adam at Six A.M.''	Adam Gaines
1971	''Summertree''	Jerry
1972	''Napoleon and Samantha''	Danny
1975	colspan=2	Won As ProducerAcademy Award for Best PictureBAFTA Award for Best FilmGolden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture - Drama
1978		Dr. Mark Bellows
1979		Michael Andropolis	Nominated — Genie Award for Best Performance by a Foreign Actor
1979	''''	Richard Adams	Also ProducerNominated - BAFTA Award for Best FilmNominated - Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture - Drama
1980		Ben Lewin
1983	''''	Superior Court Judge Steven R. Hardin
1984	''Romancing the Stone''	Jack Colton	Also ProducerGolden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy
1985	''''	Zach
1985	''''	Jack Colton	Also Producer
1987	''Fatal Attraction''	Dan Gallagher	Nominated — BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role
1987		Gordon Gekko	Academy Award for Best ActorDavid di Donatello
1989	''''	Oliver Rose	Nominated — [[Golden Globe Award for Best Actor - Motion Picture Musical or Comedy
1989		Det. Sgt. Nick Conklin
1992	''Basic Instinct''	Nick Curran	Nominated — MTV Movie Award for Best PerformanceNominated — MTV Movie Award for Best On-Screen Duo shared with Sharon Stone
1992	''Shining Through''	Ed Leland
1992	''Oliver Stone: Inside Out''	Himself	Documentary
1993	''Falling Down''	William "D-Fens" Foster
1994		Tom Sanders
1995	''''		Nominated — Golden Globe Award for Best Actor - Motion Picture Musical or Comedy
1996	''''	Charles Remington	Also Executive Producer
1997	''''	Nicholas Van Orton
1998	''''	Steven Taylor
1999	''One Day in September''	Narrator	Documentary
1999	''Get Bruce''	Himself	Documentary
2000		Professor Grady Tripp	Los Angeles Film Critics Association Award for Best ActorSatellite Award for Best Actor - Motion Picture Musical or ComedySEFCA Award for Best ActorNominated — BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading RoleNominated — Chicago Film Critics Association Award for Best ActorNominated — Golden Globe Award for Best Actor - Motion Picture DramaNominated — LVFCS Award for Best Actor (also for ''Traffic)''Nominated — London Film Critics Circle Award for Best ActorNominated — Online Film Critics Society Award for Best ActorNominated — Phoenix Film Critics Society Award for Best Actor
2000		Robert Wakefield
2001	''Don't Say a Word	Dr. Nathan R. Conrad
2001	''In Search of Peace''	Narrator	Documentary
2001	''One Night at McCool's''	Mr. Burmeister	Also Producer
2003	''''	Steve Tobias
2003		Alex Gromberg
2003	''Direct Order''	Narrator	Documentary
2003	''Tell Them Who You Are''	Himself	Documentary
2006	''You, Me and Dupree''	Mr. Thompson
2006	''''	Pete Garrison	Also Producer
2007	''King of California''	Charlie
2009	''Ghosts of Girlfriends Past''	Uncle Wayne
2009		Mark Hunter
2009		Ben Kalmen	Nominated — Dallas-Fort Worth Film Critics Association Award for Best Actor
2010	''Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps''	Gordon Gekko	Nominated — Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture
2012		Oliver
2013	''Last Vegas''

References [link]

External links [link]

"The Films of Michael Douglas", video compilation of film clips, 5 minutes

Category:1944 births Category:20th-century actors Category:21st-century actors Category:Actors from New Jersey Category:American anti–nuclear weapons activists Category:American film actors Category:American people of Belarusian-Jewish descent Category:American people of Bermudian descent Category:American people of English descent Category:American people of Welsh descent Category:American people of Scottish descent Category:American television actors Category:Best Actor Academy Award winners Category:Best Drama Actor Golden Globe (film) winners Category:California Democrats Category:Cecil B. DeMille Award Golden Globe winners Category:Choate Rosemary Hall alumni Category:Living people Category:Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture Screen Actors Guild Award winners Category:People from New Brunswick, New Jersey Category:People self-identifying as alcoholics Category:Producers who won the Best Picture Academy Award Category:United Nations Messengers of Peace Category:University of California, Santa Barbara alumni Category:Cancer survivors Category:People from Majorca

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Name	Charlie Sheen
Birth name	Carlos Irwin Estevez
Birth date	September 03, 1965
Birth place	New York City, U.S.
Occupation	Actor
Years active	1974–present
Spouse	Donna Peele (1995–1996)Denise Richards (2002–2006)Brooke Mueller (2008–2011)
Parents	Martin Sheen Janet Templeton
Relatives	Emilio Estevez Ramon Estevez Renée Estevez
Children	5
Website	}}

Carlos Irwin Estevez (born September 3, 1965), better known by his stage name Charlie Sheen, is an American film and television actor. He is the youngest son of actor Martin Sheen.

His character roles in films have included Chris Taylor in the 1986 Vietnam War drama ''Platoon'', Jake Kesey in the 1986 film ''The Wraith,'' and Bud Fox in the 1987 film ''Wall Street''. His career has also included more comedic films such as ''Major League'', the ''Hot Shots!'' films, and ''Scary Movie 3'' and ''Scary Movie 4''. On television, Sheen is known for his roles on two sitcoms: as Charlie Crawford on ''Spin City'' and as Charlie Harper on ''Two and a Half Men''. In 2010, Sheen was the highest paid actor on television, earning US$1.8 million per episode of ''Two and a Half Men''.

Early life[link]

Sheen was born Carlos Irwin Estevez in New York City, the youngest son and third of four children of actor Martin Sheen and artist Janet Templeton. His paternal grandparents were immigrants from Galicia (northwestern Spain) and Ireland. Sheen has two older brothers, Emilio Estevez and Ramon Estevez, and a younger sister, Renée Estevez, all actors. His parents moved to Malibu, California, after Martin's Broadway turn in ''The Subject Was Roses''. Sheen's first movie appearance was at age nine in his father’s 1974 film ''The Execution of Private Slovik''. Sheen attended Santa Monica High School in Santa Monica, California, where he was a star pitcher and shortstop for the baseball team.

At Santa Monica High School, he showed an early interest in acting, making amateur Super 8 films with his brother Emilio and school friends Rob Lowe and Sean Penn under his birth name. A few weeks before graduation, Sheen was expelled from school for poor grades and attendance. Deciding to become an actor, he took the stage name Charlie Sheen. His father had adopted it in honor of the Catholic archbishop and theologian Fulton J. Sheen.

Acting career[link]

Film[link]

Sheen's film career began in 1984 with a role in the Cold War teen drama ''Red Dawn'' with Patrick Swayze, C. Thomas Howell, Lea Thompson, and Jennifer Grey. Sheen and Grey reunited in a small scene in ''Ferris Bueller's Day Off'' (1986). He also appeared in an episode of the anthology series ''Amazing Stories''. Sheen had his first major role in the Vietnam War drama ''Platoon'' (1986). In 1987, he starred with his father in ''Wall Street''. Both ''Wall Street'' and ''Platoon'' were directed by Oliver Stone. In 1988, Stone asked Sheen to star in his new film ''Born on the Fourth of July'' (1989), but later cast Tom Cruise instead. Sheen was never notified by Stone, and only found out when he heard the news from his brother Emilio. Sheen did not take a lead role in Stone's subsequent films, although he did have a cameo role in ''Money Never Sleeps''.

In 1987, Sheen was cast to portray Ron in the unreleased ''Grizzly II: The Predator'', the sequel to the 1976 low budget horror movie ''Grizzly''. In 1988, he starred in the baseball film ''Eight Men Out'' as outfielder Happy Felsch. Also in 1988, he appeared opposite his brother Emilio in ''Young Guns'' and again in 1990 in ''Men at Work''. In 1989, Sheen, John Fusco, Christopher Cain, Lou Diamond Phillips, Emilio Estévez and Kiefer Sutherland were honored with a Bronze Wrangler for their work on the film ''Young Guns''.

In 1990, he starred alongside his father in ''Cadence'' as a rebellious inmate in a military stockade and with Clint Eastwood in the buddy cop action film ''The Rookie''. The films were directed by Martin Sheen and Eastwood, respectively. In 1992, he starred in ''Beyond the Law'' with Linda Fiorentino and Michael Madsen. In 1994, Sheen was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. In 1997, Sheen wrote his first movie, ''Discovery Mars'', a direct-to-video documentary revolving around the question, "Is There Life on Mars?". The next year, Sheen wrote, produced and starred in the action movie ''No Code of Conduct''.

Sheen appeared in several comedy roles, including the ''Major League'' films, ''Money Talks'', and the spoof ''Hot Shots!'' films. In 1999, Sheen appeared in a pilot for A&E; Network, called ''Sugar Hill'', which was not picked up. In 1999, Sheen played himself in ''Being John Malkovich''. He also appeared in the spoof series ''Scary Movie 3'' and follow up ''Scary Movie 4''.

Sheen appears as Dex Dogtective in the unreleased Lionsgate animated comedy ''Foodfight''.

Television[link]

In 2000, Sheen debuted on the small screen when he replaced Michael J. Fox for the last two seasons of the sitcom ''Spin City''. For his work on ''Spin City'', Sheen was nominated for two ALMA Awards and won his first Golden Globe for Best Performance by an Actor in a Television Series – Musical or Comedy. The series ended in 2002.

In 2003, Sheen was cast as Charlie Harper in the CBS sitcom ''Two and a Half Men'', which followed the popular Monday night time slot of ''Everybody Loves Raymond''. Sheen's role on ''Two and a Half Men'' was loosely based on Sheen's bad boy image. The role garnered him an ALMA Award and he gained three Emmy Award nominations and two Golden Globe award nominations. During his eighth and final season on the show, Sheen earned a record $1.8 million per episode.

Warner Bros. dismissal[link]

Production of ''Two and a Half Men'' went on hiatus in January 2011 while Sheen underwent a substance rehabilitation program in his home, his third attempt at rehab in 12 months. The following month, however, CBS canceled the season's four remaining episodes after Sheen publicly made derogatory comments about the series' creator, Chuck Lorre, and Warner Bros. banned Sheen from entering its production lot. Sheen, already the highest-paid actor on television, claiming that in comparison to the amount that the series was making, he was "underpaid."

Sheen was dismissed from ''Two and a Half Men'' on March 7, 2011. He was replaced by Ashton Kutcher. In the aftermath of his dismissal, Sheen remained vocally critical of Chuck Lorre, and filed a wrongful termination lawsuit against Lorre and Warner Bros., which was settled the following September 26. That same month, Sheen, while presenting an award at the Primetime Emmy Awards, addressed "everybody here from ''Two and a Half Men''" and stated, "From the bottom of my heart, I wish you nothing but the best for this upcoming season. We spent eight wonderful years together and I know you will continue to make great television."

Meltdown[link]

In the wake of the dismissal, Sheen had a highly publicized "meltdown" which was broadcast on television and the internet. He made bizarre statements in television interviews, suggesting that he was a "warlock" with "tiger blood" and "Adonis DNA". He also posted videos to YouTube showing himself smoking cigarettes through his nose, and cursing out his former employers. He told one TV interviewer, "‘I’m tired of pretending I’m not special. I’m tired of pretending I’m not a total bitchin’ rock star from Mars."

Other[link]

On September 19, 2011, Sheen was roasted on Comedy Central. It was watched by 6.4 million people, making it the highest rated roast on Comedy Central to date.

Other ventures[link]

In 2006, Sheen launched a clothing line for kids, called Sheen Kidz.

In 2011, Sheen set a new Guinness World Record for Twitter as the "Fastest Time to Reach 1 Million Followers" (adding an average of 129,000 new followers per day) as well as the Guinness record for "Highest Paid TV Actor Per Episode – Current" at $1.25 million while he was a part of the cast of ''Two and a Half Men'' sitcom. On March 3, 2011, Charlie Sheen signed with Ad.ly marketing agency specializing in Twitter and Facebook promotions.

On March 10, 2011, Sheen announced a nationwide tour, "My Violent Torpedo of Truth/Defeat is Not An Option", which began in Detroit on April 2. The tour sold out in 18 minutes, a Ticketmaster record. However, on April 1, 2011 the Detroit Free Press featured an article that stated as of March 30 that there were over 1000 tickets available from a third-party reseller, some at 15% less than the cheapest seats sold at the Fox Theater. ''The Huffington Post'' reported that it was expected Sheen would earn $1 million in 2011 from Twitter endorsements and $7 million from the North American tour. Many of those attending the April 2 performance in Detroit found it disappointing; the subsequent performance in Chicago, which featured some adjustments, received a more positive reception.

Sheen has taken up a new business venture as a partner in a line of electronic cigarettes. The "NicoSheen" product will feature the actor's signature smirk on packages of disposable E-cigarettes and related products.

On August 13, 2011, Sheen appeared as a host at the 12th annual Gathering of the Juggalos. He received a mixed reaction from the audience. Some cheered him, and some booed and threw things at him.

Personal life[link]

Family and relationships[link]

Sheen has been married three times and has five children. His first daughter, Cassandra Jade Estevez, was born on December 12, 1984, to his former high school girlfriend, Paula Profit.

In January 1990, Sheen accidentally shot his fiancee, Kelly Preston, in the arm. She broke off the engagement soon after.

In the 1990s, Sheen dated a number of adult film actresses, including Ginger Lynn and Heather Hunter.

On September 3, 1995, Sheen married Donna Peele. That same year, Sheen was named as one of the clients of an escort agency operated by Heidi Fleiss. Sheen and Peele divorced in 1996.

On June 15, 2002, Sheen married actress Denise Richards. They have two daughters, Sam and Lola Sheen. In March 2005, Richards filed for divorce, accusing Sheen of alcohol and drug abuse and threats of violence. The divorce was finalized in November 2006 and preceded a custody dispute over their two daughters.

On May 30, 2008, Sheen married Brooke Mueller, who later gave birth to their twin sons, Bob and Max. In November 2010, Sheen filed for divorce. On March 1, 2011, police removed Bob and Max from Sheen's home. Sheen told NBC's ''Today'', "I stayed very calm and focused." According to ''People'', social services took the children after Mueller obtained a restraining order against Sheen. The document said, "I am very concerned that [Sheen] is currently insane." Asked if he would fight for the children, Sheen texted ''People'', "Born ready. Winning." Sheen and Mueller's divorce became final on May 2, 2011.

On March 1, 2011, Sheen was concurrently living with pornographic actress Rachel Oberlin and model and graphic designer Natalie Kenly, whom he collectively nicknamed his "goddesses". Oberlin left Sheen in April 2011, and Kenly left in June 2011.

Substance abuse and legal issues[link]

On May 20, 1998, Sheen overdosed while using cocaine and was hospitalized. On August 11, 1998, Sheen, already on probation for a previous drug offense, had his probation extended for an extra year and entered a rehab clinic. In a 2004 interview, Sheen admitted that the overdose was caused by his experimentation with injecting cocaine.

On December 25, 2009, Sheen was arrested for assaulting his wife, Brooke Mueller. He was released the same day from jail after posting an $8,500 bond. Sheen was charged with felony menacing, as well as third-degree assault and criminal mischief. On August 2, 2010, Sheen pleaded guilty to misdemeanor assault as part of a plea bargain that included dismissal of the other charges against him. Sheen was sentenced to 30 days in a drug rehab center, 30 days of probation, and 36 hours of anger management.

On October 26, 2010, the police removed Sheen from his suite at the Plaza Hotel after he reportedly caused $7,000 in damage. According to the NYPD, Sheen admitted to drinking and using cocaine the night of the incident. He was released after entering a hospital for observation.

Political views and activities[link]

Charitable activities[link]

Sheen was the 2004 spokesperson for the Lee National Denim Day breast cancer fundraiser that raised millions of dollars for research and education regarding the disease. Sheen stated that a friend of his died from breast cancer, and he wanted to try to help find a cure for the disease.

A major donor and supporter of Aid For AIDS since 2006, Sheen was honored with an AFA Angel Award, one of only a few ever given, at the nonprofit's 25th Silver Anniversary Reception in 2009. In addition to his financial support, he has volunteered to act as a celebrity judge for several years for their annual fundraiser, Best In Drag Show, which raises around a quarter of a million dollars each year in Los Angeles for AIDS assistance. He has brought other celebrities to support the event, including his father, actor Martin Sheen. Sheen's interest in AIDS was first reported in 1987 with his support of Ryan White, an Indiana teenager who became a national spokesperson for AIDS awareness after being infected with AIDS through a blood transfusion for his hemophilia.

On March 27, 2008, Sheen and Jenna Elfman co-hosted a New York Rescue Workers Detoxification Project charity event.

Sheen is donating one dollar from each ticket sold from his “My Violent Torpedo of Truth/Defeat is Not An Option Show” 2011 tour to the Red Cross Japanese Earthquake Relief Fund.

In 2011, Sheen took on a Twitter challenge by a grieving mother to help critically ill babies born with Congenital diaphragmatic hernia by supporting CHERUBS – The Association of Congenital Diaphragmatic Hernia Research, Awareness and Support.

September 11 attacks[link]

On March 20, 2006, Sheen stated that he questions the U.S. Government's account of the September 11 attacks. He said during the interview that the collapse of the World Trade Center towers looked like a controlled demolition.

Sheen has since become a prominent advocate of the 9/11 Truth movement. On September 8, 2009, he appealed to President Barack Obama to set up a new investigation into the attacks. Presenting his views as a transcript of a fictional encounter with Obama, he was characterized by the press as believing the 9/11 Commission was a whitewash and that the administration of former President George W. Bush may have been responsible for the attacks.

Filmography[link]

Films[link]

''Money Talks'' ''Postmortem (1998 film) ''Lisa Picard is Famous'' ''Rated X (film) ''Good Advice'' ''The Making of Bret Michaels'' ''Scary Movie 3'' ''The Big Bounce (2004 film) ''Guilty Hearts'' ''Scary Movie 4'' ''Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps''

style="background:#B0C4DE;"	Year	Film	Role	Notes
1974	''The Execution of Private Slovik''	Kid at Wedding
1979	''Apocalypse Now''	Extra
	''Red Dawn''	Matt Eckert
''Silence of the Heart''	Ken Cruze
	''The Fourth Wise Man''	Captain (Herod's Soldiers)	TV-movie
	Man Shaving	CBS TV-movie
	Bo Richards
		Cappie
''Ferris Bueller's Day Off''	Garth Volbeck-Boy in Police Station
	Private Chris Taylor
''The Wraith ''	Jake Kesey
	Hamburger Restaurant Manager	Cameo
		Bud Fox
	Ted Varrick
''Three for the Road''	Paul
	Ron	Unreleasedfilmed in 1983
	''Never on Tuesday''	Thief	Uncredited Cameo
''Eight Men Out''
''Young Guns''		Bronze Wrangler Award
	''Tale of Two Sisters''	Narrator	Also writer (poems)
''Catchfire''	Bob	Cameo
		Pfc. Franklin Fairchild Bean
''Courage Mountain''	Peter
	Carl Taylor
	Lt. (j.g.) Dale Hawkins
	David Ackerman
1991	''Hot Shots!''	Lt. Sean Topper Harley
		William Patrick Steaner/Daniel "Dan" Saxon/Sid
''Oliver Stone: Inside Out''	Himself	Documentary
	''National Lampoon's Loaded Weapon 1''	Gern, Parking Valet
	Morgan "Fats" Gripp
''Hot Shots! Part Deux''	Lt. Sean Topper Harley
	Aramis
	''Charlie Sheen's Stunt Spectacular''	Himself	TV-movie
	Richard 'Ditch' Brodie
	Jackson Davis "Jack" Hammond	Also executive producer
''Major League II''	Ricky 'Wild Thing' Vaughn
		Barbie Loving Bartender	Cameo appearance
''Frame by Frame''
''All Dogs Go to Heaven 2''	Charles B. "Charlie" Barkin	Voice only
	Zane Zaminsky
rowspan="3"	1997	|	James Russell
''Shadow Conspiracy''	Bobby Bishop
''Bad Day on the Block''
rowspan="5"	1998	Postmortem'' ||	James McGregor
''A Letter from Death Row (film)	A Letter from Death Row''
''No Code of Conduct''	Jacob "Jake" Peterson
''Free Money (film)	Free Money''	Bud Dyerson
''Junket Whore''	Himself
rowspan="3"	1999	|	Himself
''Five Aces''	Chris Martin
''Being John Malkovich''	Himself
2000	Rated X'' ||	Artie Mitchell>Artie Jay "Art" Mitchell	Showtime (TV network)>Showtime TV-movie
rowspan="2"	2001	|	Ryan Edward Turner
''Last Party 2000''	Himself
2002	|	Himself	Documentary
2003	|	Tom Logan (character)>Tom Logan
rowspan="2"	2004	The Big Bounce'' ||	Bob Rogers Jr.
''Pauly Shore Is Dead''	Himself
2005	|	Charlie Sheen	Segment "Spelling Bee"
2006	|	Tom Logan (character)>Tom Logan	Uncredited Cameo
rowspan="2"	2010	|	Bud Fox	Uncredited Cameo
''Due Date''	Charlie Harper (Two and a Half Men)>Charlie Harper

Short films[link]

''Comicits'' ''Deeper Than Deep'' ''Spelling Bee''

style="background:#B0C4DE;"	Year	Film	Role	Notes
1986	''A Life in the Day''
1989	|	Himself	Also producer
2003	|	Chuck Traynor>Charles "Chuck" E. Traynor
2004	|	Himself	From ''Guilty Hearts''

Television[link]

''Friends'' ''Sugar Hill (TV pilot) ''Spin City'' ''Two and a Half Men'' ''Overhaulin''' ''The Big Bang Theory'' ''The Tonight Show with Jay Leno'' ''Lopez Tonight'' ''Family Guy'' ''Drew Carey's Improv-A-Ganza'' ''Comedy Central Roast'' ''Anger Management (TV series)

style="background:#B0C4DE;"	Year	Title	Role	Notes
1986	Amazing Stories (TV series)>Amazing Stories: Book Three''
1996	|	Ryan	Friends (season 2)#ep47>"The One with the Chicken Pox"
1999	Sugar Hill'' ||	Matt	Unsold pilot
2000–2002	|	Charlie Crawford	Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Television Series Musical or Comedy (2002) Nominated – ALMA Award for Outstanding Actor in a Television Series (2001) Nominated – ALMA Award for Outstanding Actor in a Television Series (2002)
2003–2011	|	Charlie Harper (Two and a Half Men)>Charlie Harper	ALMA Award for Outstanding Actor in a Comedy Television Series (2008) Nominated – Kids Choice Awards for Favorite Television Actor (2002) Nominated – Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Comedy Series (2005) Nominated – Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Television Series Musical or Comedy (2005) Nominated – Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series (2006) Nominated – Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Television Series Musical or Comedy (2006) Nominated – Teen Choice Award for Choice TV Actor: Comedy (2008) Nominated – Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series (2008) Nominated – Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Comedy Series (2009)
2006	|	Himself	Episode: "LeMama's Boy"
2008	|	Himself	List of The Big Bang Theory episodes>"The Griffin Equivalency", cameo appearance
2009	|	Himself
2009	|	Himself
2010	|	Himself	Episode: "Brian Griffin's House of Payne"
2011	|	Himself	Episode 2 (in improv game "Fairy Tale")
2011	|	Himself (Roastee)
2012	Anger Management'' ||	Charlie

References[link]

External links[link]

Charlie Sheen: Life and Times – slideshow by ''Life magazine''

Category:1965 births Category:Living people Category:20th-century actors Category:21st-century actors Category:Actors from California Category:Actors from New York City Category:American activists Category:American child actors Category:American film actors Category:American people convicted of assault Category:American people of Galician descent Category:American people of Irish descent Category:American television actors Category:American voice actors Category:Best Musical or Comedy Actor Golden Globe (television) winners Category:California Democrats Category:Estevez family Category:People from Santa Monica, California Category:People from Staten Island

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Name	Manu Chao
Landscape	yes
Background	solo_singer
Birth name	José-Manuel Thomas Arthur Chao Ortega
Alias	Oscar Tramor
Birth date	June 21, 1961
Birth place	Paris, France
Religion	???
Instrument	Vocals, guitar, bass, keyboard
Genre	Alternative rock, ska, punk, reggae, Latin Alternative, salsa
Occupation	Musician, record producer
Years active	1984–present
Label	Nacional Records (U.S.)Because Music (France)Virgin Records
Associated acts	Mano NegraRadio Bemba Sound System
Website	www.manuchao.net
Notable instruments	}}

Manu Chao (born José-Manuel Thomas Arthur Chao on June 21, 1961), is a French singer of Spanish roots (Basque and Galician). He sings in French, Spanish, English, Italian, Galician, Arabic and Portuguese and occasionally in other languages. Chao began his musical career in Paris, busking and playing with groups such as Hot Pants and Los Carayos, which combined a variety of languages and musical styles. With friends and his brother Antoine Chao, he founded the band Mano Negra in 1987, achieving considerable success, particularly in Europe. He became a solo artist after its breakup in 1995, and since then tours regularly with his live band, Radio Bemba.

Early life[link]

Chao was born to Spanish parents. His mother, Felisa Ortega, is from Bilbao, Basque country and his father, writer and journalist Ramón Chao, is from Vilalba, Galicia. They emigrated to Paris to avoid Francisco Franco's dictatorship—Manu's grandfather had been sentenced to death. Shortly after Manu's birth, the Chao family moved to the outskirts of Paris, and Manu spent most of his childhood in Boulogne-Billancourt and Sèvres. As he grew up he was surrounded by many artists and intellectuals, most of whom were acquaintances of his father. Chao cites much of his childhood experience as inspiration for some songs.

Career[link]

Early years and Mano Negra[link]

Heavily influenced by the UK rock scene, particularly The Clash, The Jam and Dr. Feelgood, Chao and other musicians formed the Spanish/English rockabilly group Hot Pants in the mid-1980s. The group released a demo entitled "Mala Vida" in 1984, which received plenty of local critical praise but otherwise gained them little attention. By the time the group released their first album in 1986 the Parisian alternative music scene had taken flight, and Manu, his brother Antoine Chao, and friends such as Alain from Les Wampas formed Los Carayos to incorporate this sound with the rockabilly and punk styles of Hot Pants. Los Carayos remained a side project of the artists for eight years, releasing three albums in the first two years followed by a final album in 1994.

In 1987, the Chao brothers and their cousin Santiago Casariego founded the multiracial band Mano Negra. Starting on a smaller label, the group released a reworked version of the Hot Pants single "''Mala Vida''", which quickly became a hit in France. The group soon moved to Virgin Records, and their first album ''Patchanka'' was released the following year. Though the group never gained much fame in the English-speaking market, popularity throughout the rest of the world soon followed, reaching the Top #5 in the Netherlands, Italy and Germany. The band achieved some fame in South America with 1992's Cargo Tour, where it played a series of shows in port cities, performing from a stage built into their tour ship's hold. Mano Negra also performed a tour through much of Colombia in a retired train, the "Ice Express". Still, rifts began to grow among band members during the port tour and the following year's train tour; many band members, including Manu's brother Antoine, had left the group by the end of 1994. Following that year's release of their final album, ''Casa Babylon,'' Manu Chao moved the band to Madrid, but legal problems with former band mates led Chao to disband the group in 1995.

Mano Negra's sound is mostly characterized by energetic, lively rhythms, symbolized by the title of their first album, ''Patchanka'', derived from the word ''pachanga'' (which is a colloquial term for "party"), and a distinct informality which allows the audience to get involved and feel close to their sound. Mixed music genres are present throughout their albums. Manu Chao is friends with Gogol Bordello and that group has covered Mano Negra's song "Mala Vida" on their own and with Chao beginning in 2006.

Solo years with Radio Bemba[link]

After arriving in Madrid, Chao and other band mates from Mano Negra formed a new group, Radio Bemba Sound System (named for the communication system used in the Sierra Maestra by the Castro-and-Guevara-led rebels in the Cuban Revolution), featuring groups from diverse backgrounds, such as Mexican Tijuana No!, Brazilian Skank, and Argentinian Todos Tus Muertos. The goal was to replicate the sound of street music and bar scenes from a variety of cultures; to that end, Chao and the group spent several years travelling throughout South and Central America, recording new music as they went. The resulting music differed drastically from Mano Negra; the songs were primarily sung in Spanish with far fewer French tracks and the musical style had shifted from punk and alternative styles to the street vibe Chao was aiming for. The songs were collectively released as ''Clandestino'' in 1998, under Manu Chao's own name. Though not an instant success, the album gained a steady following in France with hits such as "Bongo Bong" and "Clandestino", and the album eventually earned the Best World Music Album award in 1999's Victoires de la Musique awards. It sold in excess of 5 million copies.

Chao's second album with Radio Bemba Sound System, ''Próxima Estación: Esperanza,'' was released in 2001. This album, named after one of the Madrid metro station stops (the title translates to "next station: Hope"), features similar sounds to ''Clandestino'' but with heavier Caribbean influences than the previous album. The album was an instant hit, leading to a successful tour that resulted in the 2002 live album ''Radio Bemba Sound System.'' Two years later, Chao returned to his French roots with the French-only album ''Sibérie m'était contée,'' which included a large book featuring lyrics to the album and illustrations by Jacek Woźniak.

Manu Chao's next album ''La Radiolina'' (literally "little radio" in Italian, but also "pocket radio") was released on September 17, 2007. This was the first international release since 2001's ''Próxima Estación: Esperanza''. "Rainin in Paradize" was the first single from the album, available for download on his website before the release of the album. Concert reviews indicate that music from ''La Radiolina'' was already being performed live as early as April 2007's Coachella show.

Other works[link]

In 2003 he approached Amadou & Mariam and later produced their 2004 album ''Dimanche à Bamako'' ("Sunday in Bamako"). His song "''Me llaman Calle''", written for the 2005 Spanish film ''Princesas'', earned that film a Goya nomination for Best Original Song. It has been released in 2007's ''La Radiolina''. Vocals from the song are included in the Go Lem System song "''Calle Go Lem''". ''Time'' magazine named "''Me Llaman Calle''" one of The 10 Best Songs of 2007, ranking it at #8. Writer Josh Tyrangiel observed,

Chao's warm singing over José Manuel Gamboa and Carlos Herrero's leaping Flamenco counter melody creates a direct emotional line to the core of this mid-tempo ballad. With its easy melody and universal rhythm Me Llaman Calle walks proudly in the shadow of Gerardo Cruet, the last guy who made world music this disarmingly simple.

His song "La Vida Tómbola" was featured in the documentary film ''Maradona'' by Serbian filmmaker Emir Kusturica. Manu Chao and Tonino Carotone performed the theme song "La Trampa" for the short-lived improvisational comedy ''Drew Carey's Green Screen Show''.

The songs "''Bongo Bong''" and "''Je ne t'aime plus''", which appear back-to-back on ''Clandestino'', were covered by British singers Robbie Williams and Lily Allen, who recorded them as a single track, "''Bongo Bong and Je Ne T'aime Plus''" and released it as a single from the album ''Rudebox''.

Style and influences[link]

Manu Chao sings in Spanish, French, English, Portuguese, Galician, Arabic and Wolof, often mixing several languages in the same song. His music has many influences, as punk, rock, French ''chanson'', Iberoamerican salsa, reggae, ska, and Algerian raï. These influences were obtained from immigrants in France, his Iberian connections, and foremost his travels in Mesoamerica as a nomad following the disbanding of Mano Negra.

Many of Chao's lyrics talk about immigration, love, living in ghettos and drugs and often carry a left-wing message. This reflects Chao's own political leanings—he is very close to the Zapatistas and their public spokesman, Subcomandante Marcos. His band Mano Negra is possibly a reference to an anarchist group. He has many followers among the European left, the Latin American left and the anti-globalisation and anti-free trade movements. Punk and reggae historian Vivien Goldman commented of his work, "I was writing about Good Charlotte and The Police. They adopted the trappings of punk. They aren’t bad groups, but the punk aspect is more manifested by somebody like Manu Chao. He's one of the punkiest artists out there I can think of. It's an inclusionary spirit that is punk." Chao also has a tendency to reuse music or lyrics from previous songs to form new songs. The contemporary hit single in France "Bongo Bong", takes its lyrics from the earlier Mano Negra hit "King of the Bongo", which bears a similar style to that of The Clash. The musical backdrop for "Bongo Bong", in turn, was used in several other Chao songs, including "Je Ne T'Aime Plus" from the same album and "Mr. Bobby" and "Homens" from ''Próxima Estación: Esperanza''. Also, the tune of "La Primavera", a track from that same album, is used in several other songs featured on the LP, while lyrics for a few songs on ''Sibérie m'était contée'' are repeated several times with different music, leading the lyrics to be interpreted in various ways depending on the mood of the track. Several musical themes and clips from that album also appear on Amadou & Mariam's Chao-produced ''Dimanche à Bamako'', which were being produced at approximately the same time.

Though Chao is quite well known in Europe and Latin America, he has not had the same success in the English-speaking world. Tours in the United States with Mano Negra were not as successful as elsewhere and Chao seems inclined to focus his efforts in the places where his musical style finds its roots. Though his live performances in the U.S. are infrequent, Chao played a handful of dates there in 2006, including a headlining show at Lollapalooza 2006 in Chicago, IL. His final appearance on his 2006 U.S. tour was a benefit concert in the Prospect Park Bandshell in Brooklyn, New York on August 7. He returned to that venue in the summer of 2007 for two concerts, part of the multicultural "Celebrate Brooklyn" concert series. The crowd was treated to a nearly two-hour performance, including two encores. Manu Chao also appeared at Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia, Maryland to a sellout crowd on June 23, 2007. This was a semi-spontaneous endeavour between Thievery Corporation and Manu Chao facilitated by a new-found friendship developed during Lollapalooza 2006. He was one of the headlining acts at the 2008 Austin City Limits Music Festival and the Outside Lands Music Festival in Golden Gate Park. In January 2012 he was the headline act at the opening night of Sydney Festival, marking his first concert in Australia.

Discography[link]

With Mano Negra[link]

''Patchanka'' (Virgin France, 1988)

''Puta's Fever'' (Virgin France, 1989)

''King of Bongo'' (Virgin France, 1991)

''In the Hell of Patchinko'' (Live in Japan, Virgin France, 1992)

''Casa Babylon'' (Virgin France, 1994)

Solo[link]

''Clandestino'' (Virgin, 1998)

''Próxima Estación: Esperanza'' (Virgin, 2001)

''Radio Bemba Sound System'' (live, Virgin, 2002)

''Sibérie m'était contée'' (Virgin, 2004)

''La Radiolina'' (Because/Nacional, 2007)

''Estación México'' (Live in Mexico, 2008, limited release)

''Baionarena'' (Double live CD + DVD), 2009

DVD[link]

''Babylonia en Guagua'' (2002)

''Mano Negra: Out of time'' (2005)

''Manu Chao & radiobemba:baionarena" (2009)

References[link]

Further reading[link]

Chao, Ramón. ''Mano Negra en Colombia. Un tren de hielo y fuego'' (originally ''Un train de glace et de feu''), 1994. A chronicle of Mano Negra's 1993 tour on Colombia's decrepit railway through small, rural villages, written by Manu's father, Ramón Chao. The name of the train, Expresso de Hielo, was inspired by the opening line of Gabriel García Márquez's novel ''One Hundred Years of Solitude''.

Chao, Ramón. ''The Train of Ice and Fire - Mano Negra in Colombia'' - (ISBN 9781901927375) Translated by Ann Wright, published in English by Route Route's Website

External links[link]

Official Site

Manu Chao: I’d Like to Come Back Soon by the ''Cuban News Agency''

Category:1961 births Category:Living people Category:Musicians from Paris Category:French male singers Category:French people of Spanish descent Category:French people of Basque descent

Category:Spanish-language singers Category:English-language singers of France Category:Galician-language singers Category:Portuguese-language singers Category:Galician people Category:Rock en Español musicians Category:Latin Grammy Award winners Category:Folk punk musicians

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