Charlize Theron biography
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[h3]Charlize Theron grew up on a farm outside of Johannesburg. She was named after her father Charles who was of French descent, while her mother Gerda hailed from German stock – but both parents were born and raised in South Africa. [/h3]

Aged six, Theron began ballet lessons and at 12 was sent to a boarding school in Johannesburg, specialising in the arts. Here Theron stepped up her dance training, now studying classical ballet as well as flamenco, Greek and contemporary dance.

Back at home though, trouble was brewing. Charles had slipped into alcoholism and Theron had come to feel like her mother's protector after Charles started to physically abuse her.

In 1991, when Theron was back from school for the weekend and upstairs in her room, the situation came to a head. Charles attacked Gerda once more and she shot him dead (for years Theron told interviewers her father was killed in a car crash). The incident was viewed as self-defence and therefore Gerda didn’t serve any time in prison.

Keen to move on, Gerda encouraged Charlize to enter a Johannesburg modelling contest. Theron won the contest and flew to Italy to represent South Africa at the International New Model Today competition. She won again and soon modelling work came flooding in. Soon she was living on her own in Milan, travelling to jobs all over Europe.

After a year, Theron moved to New York to study at the Joffrey Ballet School, financing herself by modelling in her spare time. Sadly her prima ballerina dreams turned to dust when her knee "blew out" in class, forcing her into premature retirement.

In 1994, Theron found herself living in a cheap hotel, broke and eating bread stolen from restaurants. Fate would play its card though when, while attempting to cash a much-needed $500 donation from her mother, the cashier refused as it was an out-of-state cheque. Theron went ballistic, giving the cashier and bank's staff a taster of her South African fieriness. Unbeknown to her, Theron’s blast had been witnessed by John Crosby, a longtime talent manager then representing John Hurt and Rene Russo. He immediately offered to represent her. Crosby organised acting classes and within months, Theron had made her acting debut in Children of the Corn III.

By 1997 Theron would already have established a reputation as one of the most promising young actresses on the scene by appearing in a few TV series as well as an ad for Martini. Her silver screen debut was in Jonathan Lynn's Trial And Error. Lynn's previous hit film My Cousin Vinny had earned an unexpected Oscar for Marisa Tomei.

Now Theron was entering the major league. The Devil's Advocate (1997), also starring [urlnew=http://www.thebiographychannel.co.uk/biography_home/50:0/Al_Pacino.htm]Al Pacino[/urlnew] and [urlnew=http://www.thebiographychannel.co.uk/biography_home/795:0/Keanu_Reeves.htm]Keanu Reeves[/urlnew], saw Theron act her socks off as Reeves’s suicidal wife.
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1998 saw Theron take a brief but memorable part in [urlnew=http://www.thebiographychannel.co.uk/biography_home/41:0/Woody_Allen.htm]Woody Allen's[/urlnew] Celebrity, followed by a lead part in a Disney remake of Mighty Joe Young. The film was a success and slowly, Theron’s profile was rising among fans and critics alike.

In Hollywood, Theron was now very much in demand. 1999 began with The Astronaut's Wife, alongside [urlnew=http://www.thebiographychannel.co.uk/biography_home/519:0/Johnny_Depp.htm]Johnny Depp[/urlnew]. Next Theron featured in Lasse Hallstrom's The Cider House Rules. The film brought in well-earned box office ratings and Theron was able to demonstrate a wider dimension to her acting abilities.

The Millennium began as busy year for Theron, yet none of the four films she starred in proved a big enough success to warrant any significant coverage for her. Reindeer Games starring [urlnew=http://www.thebiographychannel.co.uk/biography_home/507:0/Ben_Affleck.htm]Ben Affleck[/urlnew] and The Yards featuring Marl Wahlberg were minor hits. Men of Honour, in which she starred as [urlnew=http://www.thebiographychannel.co.uk/biography_home/5:0/Robert_De_Niro.htm]Robert De Niro’s[/urlnew] alcoholic wife, drew a better audience reaction.

By the start of 2001, Theron’s career was at a point whereby her earning potential was far greater than it once had been, yet her status as an A-list actor wasn’t quite sealed. Sweet November was a box office flop, earning Theron a Razzie nomination, and signifying the beginning of a nose-dive in her acting credibility. A brief cameo in 15 Minutes followed, reuniting Theron with Robert De Niro and she was also reunited with Woody Allen in the period drama, The Curse of the Jade Scorpion.

Trapped in 2001 was significant to Theron for more than professional reasons as it was here that she starred alongside the actor Stuart Townsend, whom she started dating shortly afterwards.

Next came Waking Up In Reno (2002), an odd road-trip comedy about two southern couples with [urlnew=http://www.thebiographychannel.co.uk/biography_home/97:0/Billy_Bob_Thornton.htm]Billy Bob Thornton[/urlnew] playing a car dealer who cheats on wife (played by Natasha Richardson) with Theron. She had the opportunity to once again showcase her comic abilities but the film failed to propel her to the forefront of the plot.

The big budget remake of The Italian Job in 2003 saw Theron credited beside Mark Wahlberg again but the film didn’t take the audience by storm and was considered a poor reflection of the 1969 original.

Theron’s turn in The Devil’s Advocate was to prove more life-changing then she’d ever anticipated back in 1997, when writer and director Patty Jenkins approached her after seeing the film. Theron’s willingness to play a part that involved being filmed with her nose openly running was enough to convince Jenkins she was right to star in Monster, a film she was writing about [urlnew=http://www.thebiographychannel.co.uk/biography_home/752:0/Aileen_Carol_Wuornos.htm]Aileen Wuornos[/urlnew], America's first female serial killer.

Theron grabbed the opportunity to play Wuornos and in gaining nearly three stone, made herself virtually unrecognisable. She threw herself into the part buy studying Nick Broomfield's 1992 documentary Aileen Wuornos: The Selling of a Serial Killer, and nailed all of Wuornos's ticks and body movements to a tee. The hard work finally paid off when she collected an Oscar and a Golden Globe for the role.
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Taking a break from the immense time and dedication that had gone into Monster, Theron took a part as far from Aileen Wuornos as possible, playing Britt Ekland in The Life and Death of Peter Sellers (2004) alongside Geoffrey Rush.

Since the success of Monster, Theron has taken comparatively less demanding roles to date and can be said to be concentrating a little more on her personal life rather than a back-to-back film schedule.
Aeon Flux in 2005 was Theron’s most high-profile part since her Oscar win but sadly, the critics and audience alike weren’t convinced by the big screen adaptation of the 1995 MTV cartoon and subsequently, Theron failed to live-up to her Academy Award profile.

[i]Sarah Barnard[/i]
Charlize Theron biography



- Theron’s first language is Afrikaans, English is spoken as her second language.

- Theron used hypnotherapy as an aid to quit smoking.

- Theron was named after her father, whose name was Charles.

- Theron gained 30 pounds to play Aileen Wuornos in Monster (2003)
On the show, Sunday Morning Shootout (2003), it was revealed that Theron’s manager discovered her in a Hollywood bank after he witnessed her yelling at a bank teller for refusing to cash her cheque.

- As a teenager in her native South Africa, Theron learned English by watching American TV.

- She is the second African to win an Academy Award. The South African-born cinematographer Ted Moore was the first. South African-born actor Basil Raytheon was the first African born actor to be nominated, followed by Cecil Kellaway.
Charlize Theron biography



Robot Chicken (2006) (TV)

Arrested Development (2005) (TV)

Aeon Flux (2005)

North Country (2005)

Head in the Clouds (2004)

The Life and Death of Peter Sellers (2004)

Monster (2003)

The Italian Job (2003)

Waking Up in Reno (2002)

Trapped (2002)

The Curse of the Jade Scorpion (2001)

15 Minutes (2001)

Sweet November (2001)

The Legend of Bagger Vance (2000)

Men of Honor (2000)

The Yards (2000)

Reindeer Games (2000)

The Cider House Rules (1999)

The Astronaut's Wife (1999)

Mighty Joe Young (1998)

Celebrity (1998)

The Devil's Advocate (1997)

Trial and Error (1997)

Hollywood Confidential (1997) (TV)

That Thing You Do! (1996)

2 Days in the Valley (1996)

Children of the Corn III (1995) (uncredited)
Charlize Theron biography

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