*ACTOR BIOGRAPHY
In this country, you gotta make the money first. Then when you get the money, you get the power. Then when you get the power, then you get the woman," notes Al Pacino, as Tony Montana in Brian DePalma's Scarface. Some might say that for Pacino, the first rung on the ladder of success was talent, which brought the roles, which brought the awards, which brought the money, which brought the power. There have been a few women along the way as well; while Pacino has never been married, he's been linked romantically with many of Hollywood's leading lights, and has a seven-year-old daughter -- Julie Marie -- by acting teacher Jan Tarrant.
Al Pacino is one of America's greatest modern film actors, up there with Robert DeNiro, Marlon Brando, and Dustin Hoffman. He has received Oscar nominations for The Godfather, Serpico, The Godfather: Part II, Dog Day Afternoon, . . .And Justice For All, Dick Tracy, and Glengarry Glen Ross, before finally winning for his performance as a hard-living blind ex-colonel in 1992's Scent of a Woman. Pacino is one of the few actors to be nominated four years in a row, from 1972-1975. Others who have achieved this milestone are Brando, Elizabeth Taylor, Jennifer Jones, and Thelma Ritter. Only Bette Davis and Greer Garson have gone one better.
The actor was born Alfredo James Pacino in New York City on April 24, 1940. Raised in the South Bronx by his Italian-American mother and grandparents (his father left home when the boy was two), he was a born performer. He began by entertaining his grandparents and telling tales in the school yard. "I was acting on my roof at age three in the South Bronx," recalls Pacino. After dropping out of New York's famous High School of the Performing Arts, " I lived in [Greenwich] Village at 16, 17, working at the Living Theater, at café theaters, where we'd pass the hat around. I think that scene no longer exists the same way; television and movies have altered it." Eventually Pacino continued his studies at the Herbert Berghof Studio and the Actors Studio, where he honed his method acting style. Perhaps it was some method investigation into character which led to his mysterious arrest in January 1961 on concealed weapon charges.
While his occasional theater gigs have been well chosen and critically acclaimed (Pacino has won two Tonys and an Obie for his work), the quality of Pacino's films has been inconsistent, especially for an actor of such standing. After 1975's Dog Day Afternoon, he chose a series of iffy projects, leading critics such as Time's Richard Corliss to pose the question, "Is he a failed great actor or a great bad one?" But when the man succeeds, as he does as the hapless criminal Lefty in the current Donnie Brasco, or as a hungry businessman in Glengarry Glen Ross, he's phenomenal. In 1996, Pacino merged his love for theater and film with the critically-acclaimed Looking for Richard, a documentary which marked his debut as a producer, writer, and director.
From the doomed hero of the under-rated Carlito's Way, through Dog Day Afternoon's misbegotten Sonny, and, perhaps his most famous role, that of the conflicted Michael Corleone in the Godfather trilogy, Pacino's best work is a roster of portraits of small, tragic men. As critic Pauline Kael notes, "Pacino has an unusual gift for conveying the divided spirit of a man whose calculations often go against his inclinations."
**Combined filmography
Sounds
Articles
Pics
**Filmography From Internet Movie Database