Born June 4, 1936 in Chicago, Illinois into a prominent American family, Bruce Dern’s mother was the niece of poet Archibald MacLeish and his father was the son of former Utah Governor and sitting Secretary of War under Franklin Delano Roosevelt, George Dern. His godfather was future Presidential candidate Adlai Stevenson.

A lifelong avid runner and track star in high school, Dern tried out for the Olympic Trials in 1956. Studying at the Actors Studio under Elia Kazan and Lee Strasberg, he made his Broadway debut in 1958 in Sweet Bird of Youth in support of Paul Newman and Geraldine Page. He made his film debut in 1960 in Wild River in support of Montgomery Clift and Lee Remick, gaining prominence as Bette Davis’ murdered lover in 1964’s Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte.

Married to Marie Dawn Pierce in 1957, they divorced in 1959. Dern married actress Diane Ladd in 1960, the mother of his daughter, actress Laura Dern. He and Dern were divorced in 1969, the year he married third wife Andrea Beckett with whom he has been married ever since.

Dern’s career took off in a big way with his strong supporting roles as a marathon runner in 1969’s They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? and as the cattle thief who kills John Wayne in 1970’s The Cowboys. In 1972, he costarred with Jack Nicholson in The King of Marvin Gardens and in 1974 he co-starred with Robert Redford and Mia Farrow in The Great Gatsby for which he was nominated for a Golden Globe. In 1975 he starred in the hit comedy, Smile, and in 1976 he was one of four stars of Alfred Hitchcock’s last film, Family Plot.

Dern received his first Oscar nomination for his performance in 1978’s Coming Home in support of Jane Fonda and Jon Voight. He won the Silver Bear for Best Actor for 1982’s That Championship Season at that year’s Berlin Film Festival. Subsequent films include 1990’s After Dark, My Sweet, 1995’s Wild Bill, 1996’s Mulholland Falls, 2000’s All the Pretty Horses, 2003’s Monster, 2011’s Inside Out, 2012’s Django Unchained, and 2013’s Nebraska for which he received his second Oscar nomination, his first in the lead actor category at the age of 77.

His most memorable recent performances have been in his Django Unchained director Quentin Tarantino’s 2015 film, The Hateful Eight, and his 2019 film, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.

Dern has vowed to live to be 100 so that he can go on acting, playing the parts that other actors never lived long enough to play. He may just do that. He was in eight films in 2021 and four so far in 2022. He has four films in post-production, one in pre-production and is currently filming two others. His most recently released film was a remake of the classic The Most Dangerous Game first filmed ninety years ago, four years before he was born.

Bruce Dern is a hale and hearty 86.

BRUCE DERN AND OSCAR

• Coming Home (1978) – nominated – Best Supporting Actor
• Nebraska (2013) – nominated – Best Actor

ESSENTIAL FILMS

THEY SHOOT HORSES, DON’T THEY? (1969), directed by Sydney Pollack

Nominated for 9 Oscars, and winner of Best Supporting Actor for Gig Young as the ruthless promoter and emcee of a 1930s marathon dance contest, this was one of the year’s best films. Jane Fonda in her breakout role and Susannah York as jaded contestants were nominated for their performances but equally fine were Michael Sarrazin and Red Buttons as their dance partners and Dern and Bonnie Bedelia as a sweet young couple hoping to win to provide a better life for their unknown child. Combined with his 180 degree turn as John Wayne’s killer in The Cowboys, Dern provided the versatility that would extend throughout his entire career.

THE KING OF MARVIN GARDENS (1972), directed by Bob Rafelson

Rafelson’s follow-up film to Five Easy Pieces provided Jack Nicolson with another fine role as an introverted DJ and gave Ellen Burstyn, fresh from her Oscar-nominated role in The Last Picture Show another strong acting opportunity as Nicholson’s brother Dern’s loopy girlfriend. Dern himself really shines here in a role that should have made him a star of Nicholson’s caliber but somehow didn’t. He is at his best a dreamer with more ideas than brains and plays wonderfully opposite Nicholson, Burstyn, and newcomer Julia Ann Robinson who died tragically in a fire in her home two years later at the age of 24.

COMING HOME (1978), directed by Hal Ashby

Nominated for a Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actor in 1974’s The Great Gatsby, Oscar finally took notice of him as Jane Fonda’s cuckhold husband in Ashby’s anti-war film, for which he received his second Golden Globe nomination for Best Supporting Actor. Although the film is dominated by the Oscar winning performances of Jon Voight as a paraplegic Vietnam War veteran and Fonda as Army officer Dern’s wife whose charity work leads to an affair with Voight, Dern, Penelope Milford who was nominated for a Best Supporting Actress Oscar, as Fonda’s Friend, and Robert Carradine as Milford’s brother stand out in support.

NEBRASKA (2013), directed by Alexander Payne

Nominated for 6 Oscars including Best Picture, Director, Actor (Dern), Supporting Actress (June Squibb) and Screenplay by Bob Nelson, this much-admired comedy provided Dern with the role of his life as an elderly, booze-addled man who convinces his estranged son (Will Forte) to drive him from Montana to Nebraska to claim a million-dollar Mega Sweepstakes Marketing prize. Its greatest strengths are Nelson’s screenplay and the performances of Dern, Forte, and Squibb as Dern’s perpetually complaining wife. Squibb, then 83, had previously been best known as one of the strippers in the original Broadway run of Gypsy in 1959.

THE HATEFUL EIGHT (2015), directed by Quentin Tarantino

Dern first worked for Tarantino in a minor role in 2011’s Django Unchained, the year he was nominated for his only Emmy for his guest-starring role in TV’s Big Love. Tarantino gave him a bigger role as one of the evil title characters in this, which was nominated for 3 Oscars including Best Supporting Actress (Jennifer Jason Leigh), Cinematography, and Score (which it won for Ennio Morricone). Samuel L. Jackson played the bounty hunter protagonist, a former while Kurt Russell, Leigh, Walter Goggins, Damian Bichir, Tim Roth, and Michael Madsen played the other seven.