Jason Robards

Great crusty, father-figure-type actor with a long and distinguished pedigree. Starting in the early '60s, his acting career has reaped two Best Supporting Actor Academy Awards (one for All the President's Men and one for Julia). Other films include Once Upon a Time in the West, Magnolia, Philadelphia, Parenthood, Bright Lights, Big City, Something Wicked This Way Comes, Tora! Tora! Tora!, and The Iceman Cometh.

He is a Pearl Harbor survivor, a Navy Cross recipient, and was once married to Lauren Bacall.

His role in Johnny Got His Gun was also featured in the Metallica video "One."

Some information taken from The Internet Movie Database.

Last I knew, Jason Robards was a resident of Fairfield, Connecticut. I base this on the following anecdote:

In the summer of 1987, as I recall, a friend of mine was making a film, later to be entitled "Orange." Fellow noders who know me personally should be struck by this fact. Anyway, I had a prominent role in this film. It was not, shall we say, a high-budget production; but in fact due to the excellent directorial and editing efforts of my friend and his associate (then an NYU film student), it turned out to be a great movie.

One evening, my friend was filming some scenes in what passes for downtown Fairfield and happened into a local ice-cream parlor whose name escapes me at the moment. Jason Robards was inside, eating an ice cream cone or some other such frozen treat. My friend begged, pleaded even, for the estimable Mr. Robards to be in the film. Mr. Robards politely declined, citing contractual obligations.

Jason Robards also starred in the made-for-TV, horrors-of-nuclear-war-oriented production "The Day After," which I caught recently on the SciFi Network. While a good amount of the political subplot now seems silly, Mr. Robards' portrayal of a midwestern doctor caught up in the destruction was excellent.

American actor (1922-2000). Born Jason Robards, Jr., he was the son of silent movie star Jason Robards, Sr. When he was younger, he wasn't much of a fan of Hollywood, as he watched what happened when his father fell out of favor with the film industry as he got older. He served in the Navy during World War II. He started thinking about going into acting while serving in the Navy -- he emceed for a Navy band and enjoyed performing. After the war, he enjoyed tremendous success in Broadway productions of Eugene O'Neill's plays "The Iceman Cometh" and "Long Day's Journey Into Night" in the 1950s. He won a Tony Award in 1959 for Best Performance by a Leading Actor for the play "The Disenchanted" -- the only time he'd acted with his father. 

He had his film debut in "The Journey" in 1959 and spent most of his career playing supporting roles -- often playing real people, including Al Capone in "The St. Valentine's Day Massacre," Doc Holliday in "Hour of the Gun," playwright George S. Kaufman in "Act One," New Mexico governor and "Ben Hur" author Lew Wallace in "Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid," Washington Post editor Ben Bradlee in "All the President's Men" (for which he won an Oscar in 1977), Dashiell Hammett in "Julia" (for which he won another Oscar in 1978), and Howard Hughes in "Melvin and Howard."

Some of his other films include: "Tender is the Night," "A Big Hand for the Little Lady," "Divorce American Style," "Once Upon a Time in the West," "Tora! Tora! Tora!," "Johnny Got His Gun," "A Boy and His Dog," "Comes a Horseman," "Raise the Titanic," "The Legend of the Lone Ranger," "Something Wicked This Way Comes," "Max Dugan Returns," "Bright Lights, Big City," "Parenthood," "Dream a Little Dream," "Quick Change," "Philadelphia," "The Adventures of Huck Finn," "The Paper," "Little Big League," "Crimson Tide," "Beloved," "Enemy of the State," and "Magnolia," as well as prominent TV movies like "The Day After," "Sakharov," and "Inherit the Wind."