Biography: Josh Brolin

Academy Award®-nominated actor Josh Brolin has emerged as one of Hollywood’s top leading men. A powerful, sought-after film actor, Brolin continues to balance challenging roles in both mainstream studio productions as well as thought-provoking independents.

Academy Award®-nominated actor Josh Brolin has emerged as one of Hollywood’s top leading men.  A powerful, sought-after film actor, Brolin continues to balance challenging roles in both mainstream studio productions as well as thought-provoking independents.

This year, in addition to Men in Black 3, will also star in the crime drama The Gangster Squad alongside a noteworthy cast including Ryan Gosling, Emma Stone, and Sean Penn.  The film recalls the LAPD’s efforts to reclaim their city from one of the most powerful mob bosses of the 1940s; it will be released nationwide by Warner Bros. on October 12th.  This summer, Brolin will begin shooting Labor Day opposite Kate Winslet.  The film, directed by Jason Reitman, will be released in 2013 by Paramount Pictures.  In addition, the actor will begin shooting Spike Lee’s remake of the cult 2003 Korean action thriller, Oldboy, produced by Mandate Pictures.

Brolin has perhaps become most known for his riveting performances over the last several years.  In 2008, Brolin was nominated for an Academy Award®, a Screen Actors Guild Award and received awards from the New York Film Critics Circle and the National Board of Review for his portrayal of Dan White in Gus Van Sant‘s acclaimed film Milk. Recently, he starred in the Coen Brothers’ True Grit, which was nominated for 10 Academy Awards® including Best Picture; Oliver Stone‘s Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps opposite Shia LaBeouf and Michael Douglas; and Woody Allen’s You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger, opposite Anthony Hopkins and Naomi Watts.  He received rave reviews for his portrayal of George W. Bush in Oliver Stone‘s biopic, W.   Prior to that, Brolin earned a Screen Actors Guild Award as part of an ensemble for his work in Joel and Ethan Coen‘s No Country for Old Men, which also won four Academy Awards®, including Best Picture and Best Director.  Additionally, Brolin starred in Ridley Scott‘s blockbuster American Gangster and was nominated for a Screen Actors Guild Award as part of this ensemble. 

Other film credits include: Planet Terror, part of the critically acclaimed Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez double feature, Grindhouse, alongside co-stars Rose McGowan and Freddy Rodriguez; In the Valley of Elah for director Paul Haggis, where he starred opposite Tommy Lee Jones and Susan Sarandan; John Stockwell‘s Into the Blue, opposite Jessica Alba; Victor Nunez‘s Coastlines, opposite Timothy Olyphant; Paul Verhoeven‘s blockbuster hit, Hollow Man, with Kevin Bacon; Scott Silver‘s Mod Squad, opposite Claire Danes; Ole Bornedal‘s psychological thriller Nightwatch, with Nick Nolte, Patricia Arquette, and Ewan McGregor; Best Laid Plans opposite Reese Witherspoon, produced by Mike Newell; All the Rage, which featured an all-star cast including Gary Sinise, Joan Allen and Anna Paquin; and Guillermo Del Toro‘s science-fiction thriller, Mimic, opposite Mira Sorvino, Jeremy Northam, and Charles Dutton.  Brolin also received recognition from critics and audiences in David O. Russell‘s Flirting with Disaster, portraying a bisexual federal agent, alongside an outstanding ensemble cast led by Ben Stiller.  Brolin made his feature film debut starring in the action-comedy classic Goonies, directed by Richard Donner for producer Steven Spielberg.

In television, Brolin made his mark as a series regular in the popular ABC series The Young Riders as well as Private Eye for NBC and Winnetka Road for CBS. Brolin also received critical praise in the TNT’s epic miniseries Into the West, opposite Beau Bridges, Gary Busey and Jessica Capshaw. In addition, Brolin starred in the title role of NBC’s acclaimed political drama, Mr. Sterling. The show followed the efforts of an idealistic young politician as he attempted to both learn and work within an often corrupt system. He also appeared in the CBS movie-of-the-week Prison of Children, and in the Showtime original film Gang in Blue with Mario Van Peebles, J.T. Walsh and Stephen Lang. Brolin co-starred opposite Mary Steenburgen, Gretchen Mol and Bonnie Bedelia in CBS’s television adaptation of William Inge‘s Pulitzer Prize-winning play, Picnic.

As a producer, Brolin joined Matt Damon, Chris Moore, Anthony Arnove, and Howard Zinn, in a documentary entitled The People Speak, based on Zinn’s influential 1980 book A People’s History of the United States. The feature, which aired on the History Channel in 2009, looked at America’s struggles with war, class, race, and women’s rights and featured readings by Viggo Mortensen, Sean Penn, and David Strathairn, among others.  Brolin made his film directing debut in 2008 with a short entitled X, which he also wrote and produced. It premiered at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival before screening at such festivals as South by Southwest and the AFI Dallas Film Festival.

Brolin spent five years with Anthony Zerbe at the Reflections Festival at the GeVa Theatre in Rochester, New York. While there, he performed in and directed several of the festival’s plays, including Pitz and Joe, Life in the Trees, Forgiving Typhoid Mary, Oh, The Innocents, Peep Hole, Ellen Universe Joins the Band, Lincoln Park Zoo, and Hard Hearts. Brolin also starred opposite Elias Koteas in the acclaimed roadway production of Sam Shepard‘s True West. In 2004, Brolin starred in the award-winning Off-Broadway play The Exonerated, based on the true stories of a half-dozen former death row inmates. Additional stage credits include Skin of the Teeth, The Crucible, and A Streetcar Named Desire at the Kennedy Memorial Theatre; A Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Lebrero Theatre; and Dark of the Moon at the Ann Capa Ensemble Theatre.

This biography of Josh Brolin is courtesy of Amblin Entertainment and Men in Black 3

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