Born Charles Robert Redford Jr. on August 18, 1936 in Santa Monica, CA, calling the red-haired star’s career illustrious is a serious understatement. The multi-talented actor, director, philanthropist, producer, and Sundance founder has emerged as one of the most important figures in modern cinema.
Redford was an average kid, spending much of his time playing baseball at Van Nuys High School in Los Angeles. He received a baseball scholarship to the University of Colorado in 1955 but lost it due to a brief drinking problem. The actor was depressed at the time due to his mother’s tragic death the same year. He then spent time studying painting at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn and theatrical set design at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City after living in Europe. His acting career began in 1960 with numerous television roles on shows like “Maverick” and “Perry Mason”. The striking actor worked steadily in television until earning lead roles in Arthur Penn’s “The Chase” and Sydney Pollack’s “This Property is Condemned” in 1966, followed by the lead in “Barefoot in the Park” in 1967. During this time he starred twice alongside Natalie Wood and Jane Fonda.
These impressive performances were merely a precursor to the superstardom he would find starring alongside the legendary Paul Newman in 1969’s “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid”. Both the actors’ performances became instantly iconic, and the melancholy comedy is still one of the most popular westerns of all time. Redford’s Sundance Institute was named after his character in the film.
As Redford began to think seriously about starting an independent film school and festival, he became arguably the biggest star of the 70s, destroying the box office with popular films like “The Candidate”, “Three Days of the Condor”, “Jeremiah Johnson”, “The Great Gatsby”, and the mega-hit romance with Barbara Streisand, “The Way We Were”. In 1980, Redford made one of the most acclaimed directing debuts in history with “Ordinary People”. The film took home Oscars for Best Picture and Best Director, and remains an American cinema classic. A plethora of later films, most famously the award-winning “American Beauty”, have copied extensively from the film’s style and its themes of suburban angst.
Redford slowed down in the 80s, acting in about half as many films as in the previous decade. During this time he focused on establishing the Sundance Institute, which started as a haven for independent film projects and morphed into a major festival and prestigious film school. The intense bidding war over Steven Soderbergh’s “Sex, Lies, and Videotape” at the 1989 festival was a major catalyst for the festival’s importance in the industry, and it quickly became the most important time of the year for talent-hungry Hollywood power-brokers like Redford rival Harvey Weinstein to take in the sights of Park City, UT and take out their massive checkbooks.
Redford’s major struggle in recent years has been his battle with Hollywood over the festival’s focus. Concerned that Sundance is becoming a hangout for celebrities with no interest in independent film, Redford continues to battle with the economic disadvantages of the industry in order to keep the festival safe for young and talented filmmakers. Meanwhile, Redford has hardly slowed down with his own projects, directing “A River Runs Through It”, “Quiz Show”, “The Horse Whisperer”, and “The Legend of Bagger Vance”, while acting in acclaimed films like “Out of Africa”, “Sneakers”, “Spy Game” (a turbulent collaboration with Brad Pitt), and “An Unfinished Life”. The question of who will carry on Redford’s extraordinary legacy has not been answered, but for now it doesn’t appear he’s interested in passing the buck any time soon. With several directing and acting projects slated for the star, he’ll remain a major player for years to come.