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.^[1] 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.^[1] The director had been thinking about this kind of a movie as early as 1981^[2] and was inspired by his father, Lou Stone, a broker during the Great Depression at Hayden Stone.^[3]

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".^[2] 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.^[1] 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.^[1]

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.^[2] 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,^[4] corporate raider Carl Icahn, art collector Asher Edelman, agent Michael Ovitz, and Stone himself.^[1] 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.^[5] 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.^[6] 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".^[2] 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.^[7] Stone set the film in 1985 because insider trading scandals culminated in 1985 and 1986.^[7] 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.^[2] Stone liked the "stiffness" of Sheen's acting style and used it to convey the naive nature of Bud who looks up to Gekko.^[8] Michael Douglas had just come off heroic roles like the one in Romancing the Stone and was looking for something dark and edgy.^[2] 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.^[2] 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".^[9] The director says that he saw "that villain quality" in the actor and always thought he was a smart businessman.^[10] 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".^[2] For research, he read profiles of corporate raiders T. Boone Pickens and Carl Icahn.^[2]

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.^[8] 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.^[8] 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".^[2] 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.^[2] 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.^[10]

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.^[11] 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".^[2] 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".^[12]

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.^[13] 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.^[14] For example, he argued that it was unrealistic to have all the characters be "morally bankrupt".^[13] Lipper advised Stone on the kind of computers used on the trading floor, the accurate proportion of women at a business meeting, and the kinds of extras that should be seated at the annual shareholders meeting where Gekko delivers his "Greed is good" speech.^[13] Stone agreed with Lipper's criticism and asked him to rewrite the script. Lipper brought a balance to the film and this helped Stone get permission to shoot on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange during trading hours.^[14] Lipper and Stone disagreed over the character of Lou Mannheim. Stone shot a scene showing the honest Mannheim giving in to insider trading and Lipper argued that audiences might conclude that everyone on Wall Street is corrupt and insisted that the film needed an unimpeachable character. Stone cut the scene.^[14]

Stone also consulted with Carl Icahn, Asher Edelman, convicted inside trader David Brown, and several government prosecutors, and Wall Street investment bankers.^[10] In addition, traders were brought in to coach actors on the set on how to hold phones, write out tickets, and talk to clients.^[14] 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".^[15]

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.^[8] 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.^[8] 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.^[8] 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.^[16] 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.^[16] 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.^[8]

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".^[17] Wall Street defines itself through a number of morality conflicts putting wealth and power against simplicity and honesty.^[18]

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.^[18] 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.^[18]

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".^[18] 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.^[18] 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".^[18]

Wall Street is not a wholesale criticism of the capitalist system, but of the cynical, quick-buck culture of the 1980s.^[18] 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.^[18]

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.^[19]

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".^[20] 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".^[21] 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".^[22] 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".^[23] 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".^[24]

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".^[25] 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"^[26] of Michael Douglas in the movie, designed by Alan Flusser, was emulated in the 1980s by yuppies.^[27]

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.^[3] 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".^[1] 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.^[8] 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".^[5] 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".^[28]

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.^[29]

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."^[30]

Sequel[link]

In 2007, The New York Times reported that a sequel, Money Never Sleeps, was in pre-production.^[31] 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.^[31] Charlie Sheen reprised his character of Bud Fox in a cameo role.^[32] Daryl Hannah was not involved in the sequel.^[33][34]

In April 2009, 20th Century Fox confirmed that the sequel was still in development and announced that Oliver Stone would direct.^[35] In addition, Shia LaBeouf was cast, with Josh Brolin.^[36] Javier Bardem had been considered,^[37] but dropped out due to scheduling conflicts.^[38] The film was released on September 24, 2010.^[39]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Wall Street

• Wall Street at the Internet Movie Database
• Wall Street at AllRovi
• Wall Street at Box Office Mojo
• Wall Street at Rotten Tomatoes
• Wall Street at Metacritic
• "Wall Street" Original Screenplay by Stanley Weiser & Oliver Stone

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,^[2] 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.^[3]

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.^[4] 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.^[5]

In 2003, the AFI named him number 24 of the top 50 movie villains of all time.^[6]

In 2008, Gordon Gekko was named the fourth richest fictional character by Forbes who attributed him with US$8.5 billion.^[7]

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 protégé, 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."^[8]

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."^[8][9]

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.”^[10]

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.^[11]

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.^[12]

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.^[13]
• 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."^[14]
• The FBI has used Michael Douglas' Gekko for an anti-insider trading campaign.^{[15][16][17][18][19]}

"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, although the trailers for the film featured a montage of edited scenes that resulted in the phrase being heard as such. The full text of the quotation is below:

Footnotes[link]

See also[link]

• Swimming with Sharks

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Gordon Gekko

• 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

Michael Douglas
Douglas at the 2012 Tribeca Film Festival
Born	Michael Kirk Douglas (1944-09-25) September 25, 1944 (age 67) New Brunswick, New Jersey, United States
Occupation	Actor, producer
Years active	1966–present
Spouse	Diandra Luker (1977–2000) Catherine Zeta-Jones (2000–present)
Children	Cameron Douglas (with Diandra Luker) Dylan Michael Douglas (with Catherine Zeta-Jones) Carys Zeta Douglas (with Catherine Zeta-Jones)
Parents	Kirk Douglas, Diana Dill
Relatives	Joel Douglas (brother) Peter Douglas (half-brother) Eric Douglas (half-brother, deceased) Anne Buydens (stepmother)

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.^[1] 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).^[2] 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.^[3] 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 Allen-Stevenson School in New York City, 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.^[4]

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".^[5] 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.^[6] 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."^[4]

Success in Hollywood[link]

Douglas at the 1987 Cannes Film Festival.

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. ^[7] 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.^[8]

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.^[9]

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.^[10]

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."^[11] 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."^[4]

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."^[4] Edelman describes his characters as the "Everyman who must contend with, and be victimized by, these women and their raging, psychotic sexuality."^[4]

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.^[4]

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."^[12]

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."^[12]

Recent years[link]

Douglas in June 2004

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".^[13]

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.^[14]

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.^[15]

Personal life[link]

Family[link]

Douglas in 2012 at a Vanity Fair party with his wife, Catherine Zeta-Jones

After filming Summertree (1971), he began dating actress Brenda Vaccaro. The relationship lasted for about six years.^[16]

In March 1977,^[17] 33 year old Douglas married 19 year old Diandra Luker, the daughter of an Austrian diplomat.^[18] They had one son, Cameron, born in 1978. In 1995 Diandra filed for divorce^[18] and was awarded $45 million as her settlement.^[19]

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."^[20] They have two children, Dylan Michael (born August 8, 2000) and Carys Zeta (born April 20, 2003).^[21]

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.”^[22]

Douglas, the son of a Jewish father and an Anglican mother, has declared no religious affiliation.^[23]

Citizenship[link]

Douglas is a U.S. citizen by birth in the United States and has Bermudian Status^[24] 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.^[25] 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.^[26]

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.^[27] 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.^[28] 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.^[29] Douglas attributed the cancer to a combination of stress, his previous alcohol abuse, and years of heavy smoking.^[30]

In November 2010, Douglas was put on a special weight gain diet by his doctors due to the excessive weight loss leaving him weak.^[31] 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.^[32] 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.^[33] Although Douglas has described the cancer as throat cancer, many doctors believe he was actually diagnosed with oropharyngeal cancer.^[34][35]

Activism[link]

Opening of an exhibition by the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization entitled "Putting an End to Nuclear Explosions". From left to right: Michael Douglas, Marty Natalegawa, Ban Ki-moon, Taib Fassi Fihri and Sergio de Queiroz Duarte.

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.^[36] He is a notable Democrat and has donated money to Barack Obama, Christopher Dodd, and Al Franken.^[37] He has been a major supporter of gun control since John Lennon was murdered in 1980.^[38]

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."^[39]

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."^[39] 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."^[39]

Humanitarian initiatives[link]

In 2009 Douglas joined the project Soldiers of Peace, a movie against all wars and for global peace.^[40][41]

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.^[42]

Filmography[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Michael Douglas

• Michael Douglas at the Internet Off-Broadway Database
• Michael Douglas at the Internet Movie Database
• Michael Douglas at the TCM Movie Database
• "The Films of Michael Douglas", video compilation of film clips, 5 minutes
• Michael Douglas at Yahoo! Movies

Charlie Sheen
Sheen on March 11, 2009
Born	Carlos Irwin Estevez (1965-09-03) September 3, 1965 (age 46)[1] New York City, U.S.
Occupation	Actor
Years active	1974–present
Spouse	Donna Peele (1995–1996) Denise Richards (2002–2006) Brooke Mueller (2008–2011)[2]
Children	5
Parents	Martin Sheen (father) Janet Templeton (mother)
Relatives	Emilio Estevez (brother) Ramon Estevez (brother) Renée Estevez (sister)
Website
www.charliesheen.com

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.^[3]

Sheen's personal life has also made headlines, including reports about alcohol and drug abuse and marital problems as well as allegations of domestic violence. He was fired from his role on Two and a Half Men by CBS and Warner Bros. on March 7, 2011. Sheen subsequently announced a nationwide tour.^[4]

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.^[5] His paternal grandparents were immigrants from Galicia (northwestern Spain) and Ireland.^[6] 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.^[5][7]

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.^[8][9]

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,^[10] 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.^[11]

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.^[5] 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.^[11] 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.^[12]

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.^[12]

Sheen has been cast to star alongside Jason Schwartzman in Roman Coppola's upcoming film A Glimpse Inside the Mind of Charlie Swan III.^[13]

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.^[14][15] 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.^[16] The role garnered him an ALMA Award and he gained three Emmy Award nominations and two Golden Globe award nominations.^[14] During his eighth and final season on the show, Sheen earned a record $1.8 million per episode.^[3]

Warner Bros. dismissal[link]

In January 2011, production of Two and a Half Men went on hiatus while Sheen underwent a substance rehabilitation program in his home, his third attempt at rehab in twelve months.^[17][18][19] The following month, however, CBS canceled the season's four remaining episodes after Sheen publicly made derogatory comments about the series' creator, Chuck Lorre,^[20] and Warner Bros. officially banned Sheen from entering its production lot.^[21] Sheen, already the highest-paid actor on television,^[3] responded by publicly demanding a 50 percent raise,^[22] claiming that in comparison to the amount that the series was making, he was "underpaid."^[22]

CBS and Warner Bros. fired Sheen from Two and a Half Men on March 7, 2011.^[23] He was replaced by Ashton Kutcher.^[24][25] In the aftermath of his dismissal, Sheen remained vocally critical of Chuck Lorre,^[26] and filed a wrongful termination lawsuit against Lorre and Warner Bros., which was settled the following September 26.^[27] 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."^[28]

Meltdown[link]

This section requires expansion.

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".^[29] He also posted videos to YouTube showing himself smoking cigarettes through his nose, and cursing out his former employers. ^[30] 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."^[31]

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.^[32]

Other ventures[link]

In 2006, Sheen launched a clothing line for kids, called Sheen Kidz.^[33]

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^[34]) 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.^[35] On March 3, 2011, Charlie Sheen signed with Ad.ly marketing agency specializing in Twitter and Facebook promotions.^[36][37]

Sheen's "My Violent Torpedo of Truth/Defeat is Not An Option" tour on the marquee of Radio City Music Hall in New York City.

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.^[38] The tour sold out in 18 minutes, a Ticketmaster record.^[39] 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.^[40] 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.^[41] Many of those attending the April 2 performance in Detroit found it disappointing;^[42] the subsequent performance in Chicago, which featured some adjustments, received a more positive reception.^[43]

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.^[44]

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.^[45]

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.^[46][47]

In January 1990, Sheen accidentally shot his fiancee, Kelly Preston, in the arm.^[48] She broke off the engagement soon after.^[49][50][51]

In the 1990s, Sheen dated a number of adult film actresses, including Ginger Lynn^[48][52][53] and Heather Hunter.^[48]

On September 3, 1995,^[54] Sheen married Donna Peele.^[55] That same year, Sheen was named as one of the clients of an escort agency operated by Heidi Fleiss.^[56] Sheen and Peele divorced in 1996.^[5]

On June 15, 2002, Sheen married actress Denise Richards. They have two daughters, Sam^[57] and Lola Sheen.^[58] In March 2005, Richards filed for divorce, accusing Sheen of alcohol and drug abuse and threats of violence.^[59] The divorce was finalized in November 2006 and preceded a custody dispute over their two daughters.^[60][61][62]

On May 30, 2008, Sheen married Brooke Mueller, who later gave birth to their twin sons, Bob and Max.^[63][64][65] 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."^[66] 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."^[67] Asked if he would fight for the children, Sheen texted People, "Born ready. Winning."^[67] Sheen and Mueller's divorce became final on May 2, 2011.^[2][68][69]

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".^{[70][71][72][73][74]} Oberlin left Sheen in April 2011, and Kenly left in June 2011.^[75][76]

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.^[77][78] In a 2004 interview, Sheen admitted that the overdose was caused by his experimentation with injecting cocaine.^[79]

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.^[80][81] Sheen was charged with felony menacing, as well as third-degree assault and criminal mischief.^[82] 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.^[83]

On October 26, 2010, the police removed Sheen from his suite at the Plaza Hotel after he reportedly caused $7,000 in damage.^[84] According to the NYPD, Sheen admitted to drinking and using cocaine the night of the incident.^[84] He was released after entering a hospital for observation.^[85]

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.