Edward Harrison Norton was born on August 18,1969 and is an American actor and filmmaker.
99 Facts About Edward Norton
2.
Edward Norton gained immediate recognition and critical acclaim for his debut in Primal Fear, which earned him a Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actor and an Academy Award nomination in the same category.
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Edward Norton starred in the film Fight Club, which garnered a cult following.
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Edward Norton established the production company Class 5 Films in 2003, and was director or producer of the films Keeping the Faith, Down in the Valley, and The Painted Veil.
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Edward Norton continued to receive critical acclaim for his acting roles in films such as The Score, 25th Hour, The Illusionist, Moonrise Kingdom, and The Grand Budapest Hotel.
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Edward Norton has since directed and acted in the crime film Motherless Brooklyn, and starred in Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery.
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Edward Norton is discreet about his personal life and has expressed no interest in being a celebrity.
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Edward Norton is a trustee of Enterprise Community Partners, a non-profit organization that advocates for affordable housing, and serves as president of the American branch of the Maasai Wilderness Conservation Trust.
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Edward Norton is married to Canadian film producer Shauna Robertson, with whom he has two children.
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In March 2022, on the day of another sentencing of Russian opposition leader and political prisoner Alexei Navalny, Edward Norton became the first celebrity sponsor of the international Anti-Corruption Foundation.
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Edward Harrison Norton was born into a progressive Episcopalian family in Boston, Massachusetts, on August 18,1969.
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Edward Norton is descended from John Norton a Bristol Victorian architect designing mainly Churches and Tyntesfield Estate.
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Edward Norton's mother, Lydia Robinson "Robin" Rouse, was an English teacher who died of a brain tumor in 1997.
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Edward Norton enjoyed watching films with his father as a pre-teen, but later reflected that he was fascinated with the cinematography rather than the acting.
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Edward Norton recalled that it was theater and not films that inspired him to act.
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Edward Norton made his professional debut at the age of eight in the musical Annie Get Your Gun at his hometown's Toby's Dinner Theatre.
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In 1984, Edward Norton won the acting cup at Pasquaney, an annual summer camp for boys in Hebron, New Hampshire, where he later returned as a theater director.
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Edward Norton subsequently immersed himself in films, naming Dustin Hoffman and Robert De Niro as two of his early inspirations because "the ones [he] liked were the ones who made [him] think [he] could do it because they weren't the most handsome guys".
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Edward Norton graduated from Wilde Lake High School in 1987.
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Edward Norton attended Yale College, where he earned a BA in History.
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Edward Norton took six months researching different acting techniques, focusing on method acting.
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Edward Norton later took lessons from acting coach Terry Schreiber after discovering he was looking for a Japanese translator to help direct a play in Tokyo.
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Edward Norton described him as a great teacher who encouraged students to become "multilingual actors" with different techniques for versatile roles.
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Edward Norton wrote scripts for plays at the Signature Theatre Company and starred in off-Broadway theater.
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In 1994, Edward Norton auditioned for Albee's Finding the Sun but did not get the part.
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Albee found a new role for him instead and had Edward Norton read for Fragments.
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Albee remarked that Edward Norton was a rare actor "who really knocked me out".
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Edward Norton recalled that he was inspired by Al Pacino, who began his career in theater while struggling to establish himself in New York.
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Edward Norton then rented a studio space near The Public Theater and presented his auditions of Shakespearean works to her.
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Edward Norton was selected for the part over two thousand other prospects.
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Edward Norton's performance was lauded by critics; the Chicago Sun-Times praised Norton's character as "completely convincing", while the San Francisco Chronicle dubbed the actor "the one to watch" after his compelling debut.
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Edward Norton won a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor and was nominated for an Academy Award in the same category for his role in the film.
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Edward Norton starred in two other films released in 1996; he played Holden Spence in the musical Everyone Says I Love You and lawyer Alan Isaacman in the biographical drama The People vs Larry Flynt.
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In 1998, Edward Norton starred alongside Matt Damon in Rounders, which follows two friends who urgently need cash and play poker to pay off a huge debt.
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The film and Edward Norton's performance received a lukewarm response; Entertainment Weekly wrote that his acting "never really goes anywhere", while the Chicago Reader observed that his character was not good enough to make the film interesting.
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Edward Norton received an Oscar nomination for Best Actor, and won a Golden Satellite Award in the same category.
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In 2000, Edward Norton made his directorial debut with the romantic comedy Keeping the Faith, starring as a priest named Brian Finn.
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In 2001's heist film The Score, Edward Norton plays Jack Teller, an ambitious young thief caught in an unlikely alliance with experienced thief Nick Wells arranged by his long-time friend Max.
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The San Francisco Chronicle stated that despite starring with screen legends De Niro and Brando, Edward Norton's acting "outdoes even that of Brando".
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Edward Norton played kids show host Sheldon Mopes, who quickly rises to fame for his character "Smoochy the Rhino", in the black comedy Death to Smoochy.
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Edward Norton portrayed Nelson Rockefeller in the biopic film Frida, which depicts the life of Mexican artist Frida Kahlo.
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Edward Norton rewrote the script several times without credit, focusing on the historical context and adding some humor while retaining Kahlo's real-life crude personality.
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The final screenplay, with Edward Norton's contribution, received positive reviews from critics as well as admiration from the film's co-stars including Hayek and Alfred Molina.
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Edward Norton's instinct is going to be, 'I have to take over this film.
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Edward Norton was cast as Baldwin IV, the leper king of Jerusalem, in 2005's epic historical film Kingdom of Heaven.
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Edward Norton had two major film roles in 2006, starring as Eisenheim the magician in The Illusionist and bacteriologist Walter Fane in The Painted Veil.
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Edward Norton co-produced The Painted Veil, in which he starred with Naomi Watts, who portrayed his character's unfaithful wife.
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Edward Norton appeared in two documentaries in 2007: Brando, which chronicles the life and career of screen legend Marlon Brando, with whom Edward Norton co-starred in 2001's The Score, and Man from Plains, which depicts the post-presidency endeavors of former US president Jimmy Carter.
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Edward Norton provided rewrites of the script every day of filming.
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Director Louis Leterrier welcomed his contributions, saying that, "Edward Norton's script has given Bruce's story real gravitas".
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The Writers Guild of America credited Penn as the sole writer, arguing that Edward Norton had not contributed significantly to the screenplay.
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Edward Norton did not participate in promoting the film and went to Africa for humanitarian activities instead, it led to rumors that Edward Norton was sparking conflicts with the film's producers.
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Edward Norton dismissed the accusations and said that the media had misrepresented the "healthy" collaborations for headlines.
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The Wall Street Journal felt that Edward Norton's presence improved the film to "a thunderously efficient enterprise" from the 2003 version.
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Edward Norton was expected to reprise his role in future Marvel Cinematic Universe ventures, including the 2012 blockbuster The Avengers.
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Edward Norton later claimed that he chose not to play Hulk again because he "wanted more diversity" and opted against associating himself with one character throughout his career.
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Edward Norton starred in the crime drama Pride and Glory as Ray Tierney, an honest detective assigned to investigate the precinct run by his older brother.
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In 2009, Edward Norton produced the documentary By the People: The Election of Barack Obama, which follows former US president Barack Obama's campaigns leading to his 2008 election victory.
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Edward Norton planned for this project in 2006, when Obama was a senator from Illinois, elaborating that Obama was "an interesting prism through which to examine politics".
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Edward Norton portrayed Brown University Professor Bill and his identical twin Brady Kincaid in the comedy Leaves of Grass, and convicted arsonist Gerald "Stone" Creeson in the crime film Stone.
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Edward Norton starred as scoutmaster Randy Ward in charge of finding his missing camper in the coming-of-age film Moonrise Kingdom, directed by Wes Anderson.
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Edward Norton produced the comedy-drama Thanks for Sharing under his company Class 5 Films.
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In 2014, Edward Norton played in two Academy Award-winning films, The Grand Budapest Hotel and Birdman or.
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Edward Norton collaborated again with director Anderson for The Grand Budapest Hotel, which featured an ensemble cast and won four Academy Awards.
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The film, as well as Edward Norton's performance, was well received by critics.
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Besides acting, Edward Norton announced in February 2014 that he would direct Motherless Brooklyn, a crime drama based on the acclaimed 1999 novel by Jonathan Lethem.
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Edward Norton had wanted to work on the project since 1999 but did not begin until Brett Ratner, director of 2002's Red Dragon, joined in to help production.
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Edward Norton played Whit Yardsham, an estranged friend and business partner of Howard Inlet in the 2016 drama Collateral Beauty.
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Edward Norton worked again with director Anderson for the 2018 stop motion film Isle of Dogs, in which he voiced Rex, a member of a pack of five dogs.
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In 2022, Edward Norton portrayed New York tech billionaire Miles Bron in Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery.
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Since coming to fame in the mid-1990s, Edward Norton has opted not to discuss his personal life in public, saying that he "believes that excessive media coverage can distract him from fulfilling his role as an actor".
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Edward Norton insisted that he was not romantically involved with Love, and the two were only friends and colleagues.
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Edward Norton absented himself from the premiere of The Italian Job, in which he starred, to attend the premiere of The Maldonado Miracle, Hayek's directorial debut.
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In 2011, Edward Norton proposed to Canadian film producer Shauna Robertson after dating for six years.
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Edward Norton appeared on the PBS genealogy series Finding Your Roots in January 2023, where it was confirmed that Pocahontas was his 12th great-grandmother.
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Edward Norton learned he is a distant cousin of fellow actress Julia Roberts.
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Edward Norton's father is an environmental lawyer and conservationist; Edward Norton is an environmentalist.
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Edward Norton narrated the four-part National Geographic documentary Strange Days on Planet Earth, which examines earth system science.
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Edward Norton is an advocate for renewable energy, specifically solar energy.
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Edward Norton is a supporter of the African Wildlife Foundation and its "Say No" campaign which raises awareness and fights against illegal poaching of elephants and rhinoceroses for ivory and horn.
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Edward Norton is the president of the American branch of the Maasai Wilderness Conservation Trust.
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Edward Norton raised over $1.2 million for the Trust after completing his run.
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At his designation ceremony, Edward Norton said that biodiversity is an issue that "transcends national boundaries", with people "having lost sight" of the need for environmental protection.
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Edward Norton has served as a member of the board of trustees of Enterprise Community Partners, a non-profit developer of affordable housing founded by his grandparents, in 1998.
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Edward Norton has invested $9 billion in equity capital, pre-development lending, mortgage financing, and house building for low-income Americans.
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In 2008, Edward Norton initiated the company's plan to embark on green affordable housing.
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Edward Norton attributed his involvement in community building to his upbringing in Columbia, Maryland, which is a planned city built in the 1960s and home to a diverse population.
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Edward Norton believes celebrities should "participate quietly" in discussions on politics and social issues as, "Having a public forum tends to make people offer too casual a commentary".
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Edward Norton made speeches to encourage voters to support Democratic nominee John Kerry.
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Edward Norton was a supporter of Democrat Eliot Spitzer, former New York governor.
91.
Edward Norton produced the 2009 documentary By the People: The Election of Barack Obama, which chronicles Obama's political activities from 2006 to his 2008 election victory.
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Edward Norton spoke highly of Obama, crediting him as "a perfect framework" to explore contemporary US politics.
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Edward Norton produced a campaign video for Obama's 2012 presidential race with Bennett Miller; the video featured voters from diverse economic and racial backgrounds.
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Edward Norton expressed "grave concerns" over the Trump administration's position regarding climate change.
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In 2020 Edward Norton donated $8,400 to the Joe Biden 2020 presidential campaign.
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Edward Norton has been regarded as one of the most talented actors of his generation.
97.
Interview magazine commented that Edward Norton has successfully portrayed a wide range of roles and found it impossible to simply characterize him as a leading man, a villain, or a character actor.
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Edward Norton has a strict work ethic and a high desire for professionalism.
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Incidents include Edward Norton's editing the final cut of American History X, which is 40 minutes longer than director Tony Kaye's version; conflicts with director Brett Ratner on the set of Red Dragon ; refusing to promote The Italian Job ; and uncredited rewriting of the screenplay for The Incredible Hulk, which angered screenwriter Zak Penn.