Look up Jon in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Jon is a shortened form of the common given name Jonathan, meaning "God has given",^[1] and a alternate spelling of John, meaning "God is gracious".^[2] In the year of 2008, Jon was the 527th most popular name in the United States; its popularity has declined steadily (sometimes increasing, but not substantially) since its peak in 1968 as #65.^[3] Pet form of Jon include: Jonny and Jonnie.

See also[link]

• John (disambiguation)
• Jón

References[link]

Sam Rockwell
Rockwell at the 2009 premiere of Moon at the Tribeca Film Institute
Born	(1968-11-05) November 5, 1968 (age 43) Daly City, California
Occupation	Actor
Years active	1989–present

Sam Rockwell (born November 5, 1968) is an American actor known for his leading roles in Lawn Dogs, Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, Choke and Moon, as well as for his supporting roles in The Green Mile, Iron Man 2, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Frost/Nixon, Galaxy Quest, Matchstick Men, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, Conviction and Cowboys & Aliens.

Early life[link]

He was born in Daly City, California, the son of actors who divorced when he was five years old.^[1] He was raised by his father, Pete Rockwell, in San Francisco, while his mother, Penny Hess, stayed behind in New York (he spent his summer vacations with her). Rockwell had what The New York Times described in 1998 as a "footloose upbringing" and, at age 10, made his brief stage debut playing Humphrey Bogart in an East Village improv comedy sketch starring his mother.^[2] His mother had an unconventional lifestyle – she was involved with hippies, sex, and drugs.^[3]

He attended San Francisco School of the Arts with Margaret Cho and dropped out before graduation. He later received his high school diploma after his parents enrolled him in an Outward Bound-style alternative high school called Urban Pioneers because, as Rockwell explained, "I just wanted to get stoned, flirt with girls, go to parties."^[4] The school, the actor said, "had a reputation as a place stoners went because it was easy to graduate," but the program ended up helping him regain an interest in performing. After appearing in an independent film during his senior year, he graduated and moved to New York to pursue an acting career.^[5]

Acting career[link]

Early films[link]

After his first film role in the 1989 horror film Clownhouse (produced by Francis Ford Coppola's production company) which he filmed when based in San Francisco, he moved to New York and trained at the William Esper Studios. His career slowly gathered momentum in the early 1990s, when he alternated between small-screen guest spots in TV shows like The Equalizer, NYPD Blue and Law & Order and small roles in films such as Last Exit to Brooklyn and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. He also appeared as the title character in The Search for One-eye Jimmy. During this time Rockwell worked in restaurants as a busboy and delivered burritos by bicycle.^[6] At one point, Rockwell even worked as a private detective's assistant. "I tailed a chick who was having an affair and took pictures of her at this motel", he told Rolling Stone in 2002. "It was pretty sleazy." A well-paying Miller commercial in 1994 finally allowed him to pursue acting full-time.

The turning point in Rockwell's career was Tom DiCillo's 1996 film Box of Moon Light, in which he played an eccentric man-child who dresses like Davy Crockett and lives in an isolated mobile home. The ensuing acclaim put him front and center with casting agents and new-found fans alike, with Rockwell himself acknowledging that "That film was definitely a turning point....I was sort of put on some independent film map after 10 years in New York."^[5]

He also won strong reviews for the 1997 film Lawn Dogs, where he played a working-class lawn mower who befriends a wealthy 10-year-old girl (Mischa Barton) in an upper-class gated community in Kentucky; Rockwell's performance won him Best Actor honors at both the Montreal World Film Festival and the Catalonian International Film Festival. In 1999, Rockwell played prisoner William "Wild Bill" Wharton in the Stephen King prison drama The Green Mile. At the time of the film's shooting, Rockwell explained why he was attracted to playing such unlikeable characters. He said, "I like that dark stuff. I think heroes should be flawed. There's a bit of self-loathing in there, and a bit of anger... But after this, I've really got to play some lawyers, or a British aristocrat, or they'll put a label on me."^[1]

Hollywood recognition[link]

After appearances as a bumbling actor in 1999's science fiction satire Galaxy Quest, in the 1999 Shakespeare adaptation A Midsummer Night's Dream as Flute, and as gregarious villain Eric Knox in Charlie's Angels (2000), Rockwell won the biggest leading role of his career as The Gong Show host Chuck Barris in George Clooney's 2002 directorial debut, Confessions of a Dangerous Mind. Rockwell's performance was well received, and the film received generally positive reviews.

Rockwell has also received positive notices for his role opposite Nicolas Cage in Ridley Scott's Matchstick Men (2003), with Entertainment Weekly calling him "destined by a kind of excessive interestingness to forever be a colorful sidekick."^[7] He received somewhat more mixed reviews as Zaphod Beeblebrox in the 2005 film version of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. He then had a notable supporting role as Charley Ford, brother of Casey Affleck's character Robert Ford, in the well-received 2007 drama The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, in which Brad Pitt played the lead role of Jesse James. According to an interview on The Howard Stern Show, director Jon Favreau considered casting him as the titular character in Iron Man as the studio was initially hesitant to work with Robert Downey, Jr., who had been considered for his role in The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy. Rockwell appeared in the Iron Man sequel, released in 2010, as Tony Stark's rival weapons' developer, Justin Hammer. He is said to have accepted the role without reading the script. He had never heard of the character before he was contacted about the part, and was unaware that Hammer is an old man in the comic books.

In addition to big-budget feature films, Rockwell also keeps his feet firmly planted in the indie film world with projects such as The F Word and he recently played a very randy, Halloween-costume-clad Batman in a short, Robin's Big Date, opposite Justin Long as Robin. He also starred in the 2008 film Snow Angels opposite Kate Beckinsale and directed by David Gordon Green. He had worked on several occasions with the comedy troupe Stella (Michael Ian Black, Michael Showalter and David Wain), making cameo appearances in their short films and eponymous TV series.

Rockwell played Victor Mancini in the film Choke, based on the novel by Chuck Palahniuk. Critic Roger Ebert said of his performance that he "seems to have become the latter-day version of Christopher Walken – not all the time, but when you need him, he's your go-to guy for weirdness."^[8]

In 2007, Rockwell guest-starred in a comedy mini-series via the web called "Casted: The Continuing Chronicles of Derek Riffchyn, Greatest Casting Director in the World. Ever." He appears opposite Jonathan Togo (of CSI: Miami fame) as Derek and Justin Long (Dodgeball, Accepted) as Scott. Rockwell plays an aspiring young actor named Pete Sampras, no relation to the tennis player. The video can be viewed on YouTube, episode number two of a four-part series.^[9]

In 2009, he starred in the critically acclaimed science fiction film Moon, directed by Duncan Jones, for which his performance was widely praised, with some critics calling for an Academy Award for Best Actor nomination.^[10]

On May 3, 2010, it was announced that Rockwell would team up again with Iron Man 2 director Jon Favreau, for Favreau's adaptation of the graphic novel Cowboys & Aliens. He played a bar owner named Doc who joins in the pursuit of the aliens.^[11]

Rockwell will appear in Martin McDonagh's Seven Psychopaths alongside Woody Harrelson, Christopher Walken, Tom Waits, and Colin Farrell.^[12]

Theatre[link]

Since 1992, Rockwell has been a member of the LAByrinth Theater Company, where Philip Seymour Hoffman and John Ortiz are Co-Artistic Directors. In 2005, Hoffman directed him in Stephen Adly Guirgis' hit play, The Last Days of Judas Iscariot. This past August, Rockwell work-shopped an upcoming LAByrinth production, North of Mason-Dixon, scheduled to debut in London in 2007 and then premiere in New York City later the same year. Other plays in which Rockwell performed are: Dumb Waiter (2001), Zoo Story (2001), Hot L Baltimore (2000), Goosepimples (1998), Love and Human Remains, Face Divided, Orphans, Den of Thieves, Dessert at Waffle House, The Largest Elizabeth, and A Behanding in Spokane.

Personal life[link]

Rockwell has never been married, and stated in a 2007 interview, "I definitely don't want to become a parent. It's not my bag."^[13]

Filmography[link]

Awards and nominations[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Sam Rockwell

• Sam Rockwell at the Internet Movie Database
• Sam Rockwell at the Internet Broadway Database
• Sam Rockwell at the Internet Off-Broadway Database
• Sam Rockwell Interview

Hilary Swank
Swank at the 83rd Academy Awards in 2011.
Born	Hilary Ann Swank (1974-07-30) July 30, 1974 (age 37) Lincoln, Nebraska, U.S.
Occupation	Actress, producer
Years active	1990–present
Spouse	Chad Lowe (1997–2007)

Hilary Ann Swank (born July 30, 1974) is an American film actress. She has won the Academy Award for Best Actress twice, as Brandon Teena in Boys Don't Cry (1999) and as struggling waitress-turned-boxer Maggie Fitzgerald in Million Dollar Baby (2004). She also put in a notable performance in Insomnia, working alongside Al Pacino. Since 2003, Swank has also worked as an executive producer.

Early life[link]

Swank was born in Lincoln, Nebraska.^[1] Her mother, Judy Kay (née Clough),^[2] was a secretary and dancer, and her father, Stephen Michael Swank, was an officer in the Air National Guard and later a traveling salesman.^[3] She has a brother, Daniel, who is eight years her senior.^[4] Her surname, originally Schwenk, is of German origin.^[5] Many of Swank's family members hail from Ringgold County, Iowa,^[1] and her maternal grandmother was of Spanish and Shoshone (Native American) ancestry.^[6] After having lived in Spokane, Washington, Swank's family moved to a trailer park near Lake Samish in Bellingham, Washington, when Swank was six.^[7]

She attended Happy Valley Elementary, Fairhaven Middle, then Sehome High School in Bellingham until she was sixteen.^[6][8] She also competed in the Junior Olympics and the Washington state championships in swimming; she ranked fifth in the state in all-around gymnastics.

Swank made her first appearance on stage when she was nine years old, starring in The Jungle Book.^[8] She became involved in school and community theater programs, including those of the Bellingham Theatre Guild and The Seattle Children's Theater.

When she was fifteen, her parents separated, and she and her mother, supportive of her daughter's desire to act, moved to Los Angeles, where they lived out of their car until Swank's mother saved enough money to rent an apartment.^[7] Swank has called her mother the inspiration for her acting career and her life.^[9] In California, Swank enrolled in South Pasadena High School, dropping out later. She described her time at South Pasadena High School: “I felt like such an outsider. I didn’t feel like I fit in. I didn’t belong in any way. I didn’t even feel like the teachers wanted me there. I just felt like I wasn’t seen or understood.”^[7] She explained her becoming an actor out of feeling as an outsider: “As a kid I felt that I belonged only when I read a book or saw a movie, and could get involved with a character. It was natural that I became an actor because I longed so much to be those other people, or at least to play them”.^[10]

Career[link]

1992–1999[link]

Swank made her movie debut in 1992 in Buffy the Vampire Slayer in a small role, after which she acted in the direct-to-video drama Quiet Days in Hollywood, where she co-starred with her future husband Chad Lowe.^[4] Her first leading film role was in The Next Karate Kid (1994), which utilized her gymnastics background and paired her with Pat Morita. It was the fourth movie in the Karate Kid series. In 1995 she appeared with British actor Bruce Payne in Kounterfeit. In September 1997 Swank was cast as single mother Carly Reynolds on Beverly Hills, 90210. She was initially promised it would be a two-year role, but saw her character written out after 16 episodes in January 1998.^[6] Swank later stated that she was devastated at being cut from the show, thinking, "If I'm not good enough for 90210, I'm not good enough for anything."^[11]

The firing freed her to audition for the role of Brandon Teena in Boys Don't Cry. Swank reduced her body fat to seven percent in preparation for the role. Many critics hailed her as the best female performance of 1999, and Swank's work ultimately won her the Golden Globe and Oscar for Best Actress.^[6] Swank had earned only $75 per day for her work on Boys Don't Cry, culminating in a total of $3,000.^[12] Her earnings were so low that she had not even earned enough to qualify for health insurance.^[13]

1999–present[link]

Swank again won the Best Actress Oscar, and another Golden Globe, for playing a female boxer in Clint Eastwood's 2004 film Million Dollar Baby, a role for which she underwent training in the ring and gained 19 pounds of muscle.^[13] With her second Oscar, she had joined the ranks of Vivien Leigh, Helen Hayes, Sally Field, and Luise Rainer as the only actresses to have been nominated for Academy Awards twice and win both times.^[14] After winning her second Oscar, she said, "I don't know what I did in this life to deserve this. I'm just a girl from a trailer park who had a dream."^[13]

Swank at the 2010 Toronto International Film Festival

In 2006 Swank signed a three-year contract with Guerlain for the women's fragrance Insolence.^[15] She received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on January 8, 2007. Hers was the 2,325th star presented.^[16][17]

In 2007 Swank starred in Freedom Writers, a drama about a real-life teacher, Erin Gruwell, who inspired a California high school class. Many reviews of Swank's performance were positive, with one critic noting that she "brings credibility" to the role,^[18] and another stating that her performance reaches a "singular lack of artifice, stripping herself back to the bare essentials".^[19] Swank next starred in The Reaping, a horror film released on April 5, 2007, in which she played a debunker of religious phenomena. Swank convinced the producers to move the film's setting from New England to the Deep South, and the movie was being filmed in Baton Rouge, Louisiana when Hurricane Katrina struck.^[20] The same year, she also appeared in the romantic comedy P.S. I Love You alongside Gerard Butler.^[20][21]

Swank portrayed the pioneering aviator Amelia Earhart in the biopic Amelia, a film she also co-executive produced.^[22] Filming occurred in the summer of 2008 in a number of international locations. Swank met Robert Bresnik, a San Diego artist who supported her role as Earhart by producing several photographic reproductions of the flyer, at Legoland in 2008. Bresnik's grandfather Albert Bresnik was Earhart's official photographer, and he owned the original negatives of his grandfather's shoots.^{[citation needed]}

Swank is also attached to star in the Hollywood remake of Intimate Strangers.^[23] In addition, it was incorrectly reported that Swank would play a lead role in, and produce, a film adaptation of the John Marks novel Fangland.^[24][25]

Swank developed potential health problems through certain preparations for her roles, including weight gain and loss for Boys Don't Cry. She has stated that she would "do what [she] need[s] to make [the role] believable and to make it work" and that her "battle scars are a reminder that you're alive and human and that you bleed."^[26]

Personal life[link]

Swank married actor Chad Lowe on September 28, 1997. The two met in 1992 on the set of Quiet Days in Hollywood.^[4] They separated in January 2006,^[27] and in May 2006, they announced that they were divorcing. In December 2006, Swank stated that she was dating her agent, John Campisi.^[28]

Swank has stated that she believes in a Higher Power, but is not a member of any organized religion.^[29]

Human rights controversy[link]

In October 2011, Swank attracted controversy for attending an event in Chechnya's capital Grozny on the 35th birthday of Chechen president Ramzan Kadyrov on October 5.^[30] After wishing him "happy birthday Mr President", she reportedly claimed knowledge about Kadyrov saying: "I read. I do my research".^[31] Following criticism from human rights groups, who report having informed her about the human rights abuses in Chechnya prior to the event, asking her to reconsider her participation,^[32][33] Swank said she was unaware that Kadyrov had been accused of human rights violations and that she "deeply regrets" taking part in the lavish concert, and will donate her personal appearance fees "to various charitable organizations."^[34]

Filmography[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Hilary Swank

Wikinews has related news: Many SAG Awards presenters announced

• Hilary Swank at the Internet Movie Database
• Hilary Swank at the TCM Movie Database
• Hilary Swank at AllRovi
• "Hilary Swank Interview". American Academy of Achievement, Washington, D.C.. June 22, 2007. http://www.achievement.org/autodoc/page/swa0int-1.