Jon Voight Biography

The son of a Czechoslovakian-American golf pro, John Voight discovered his love for acting as a teenager. Following a stint on Broadway, he appeared in his first film, ‘Fearless Frank’, in 1965.

However, it was his role as hustler Joe Buck in the ground-breaking film, ’Midnight Cowboy’, that earned him an Oscar nomination and launched his career into the big time.

Follow up films included ‘Hour of the Gun’, ‘Out of It’, ’The Revolutionary’ and ’Deliverance’. In 1978, he picked up a Best Actor Academy Award, for his portrayal of a quadriplegic Vietnam War veteran, alongside Jane Fonda, in ’Coming Home’.

Following a string of hit and miss films in the late 1970s and early 1980s, Voight picked up another Academy nod for his performance in ’Runaway Train’. A ‘spiritual reawakening’ then led Voight to work on a number of intellectually related and doomed film projects.

After playing Robert De Niro's underworld contact, in ’Heat’, Voight once again began to star in big budget offerings. ’Mission: Impossible’, ‘The Rainmaker’ and ’Enemy Of The State’ were all commercial successes. Having appeared opposite his real life daughter, Angelina Jolie, in 'Tomb Raider', he next appeared in ’Ali’ and was promptly nominated for both a Golden Globe and an Oscar.