Smokin’ Joe: DA MAN Style Icon Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Success as a child actor doesn’t always translate directly to success as an adult actor—see Gary Coleman or Danny Bonaduce or Macaulay Culkin—but in the case of Joseph Leonard Gordon-Levitt it has.
As the 30-year-old star of recent hit films such Hesher, 500 Days of Summer, 50/50 and Inception matures, he becomes more successful, not to mention more fashionable. Recently featured by a highly respected fashion journal, JGL debuted on the big screen at the age of six working with Brad Pitt in the Robert Redford-directed film A River Runs Through It (1992), for which he received the Young Artist Award for “Best Actor Under Ten.”
But his talent as an entertainer isn’t strictly as an actor. The stylish gent also sings, plays guitar and has a music/social media/collaborative project called hitRECord. He also dabbles in producing and directing films (his first as director was the short entitled Sparks, which was selected for the 2009 Sundance Film Festival.
In 2010, he directed another short film, Morgan and Destiny’s Eleventeenth Date: The Zeppelin Zoo). Upcoming projects include a role in The Dark Knight Rises, Premium Rush, Looper and Lincoln, the latter of which he stars alongside the great Daniel Day-Lewis and Tommy Lee Jones in film directed by Steven Spielberg. Another hotly anticipated project is entitled Django Unchained and has JGL alongside Leo DiCaprio, Samuel Jackson and Christoph Waltz.
Equally cool with long, rocker hair (as he was in Hesher), a bald guy (as he is in 50/50) or the slicked-back professional businessman (as he was in Inception), JGL has a knack for looking suave. Not often seen in suits when younger, now he can pull off a tailored Armani, Gucci or Dior Homme suit with the best of them. For that, JGL is a Style Icon.
JGL Quotes
I’ve played the smart kid, the funny one, the nice sweet one, even the angry one, but never the sexy one.
Actors didn’t use to be celebrities. A hundred years ago, they put the theaters next to the brothels … Don`t get me wrong. I love movies. But this myth of celebrity has nothing to do with movies.
If you’re going to put yourself above everybody else, you might end up alone.
Hollywood has the idea that movies have to be dumb. But especially movies for or about teenagers have to be really dumb!
Success is not important to me, nor are power or money. If the script feels good, then I’m in. It`s that simple.
I was [recently] watching baby videos of me and I was obviously an exhibitionist.
Personally, when I watch mysteries, I never follow all the plot twists the first time, whether it be Citizen Kane or Chinatown. I never guessed who done it because I’m too wrapped up in the characters and their feelings.
My advantage is that I know the system. Big budgets don’t impress me. They might`ve done when I was 13, but I`ve been working since I was six.
One of the hardest things about playing a soldier is kind of acknowledging that I’ve never done, and might never do anything that brave.
When I was a teenager I loved acting, but I really just loved it for myself. I didn’t like the fact that anyone else saw the work I was doing.
The only thing I want to do is stuff with people who care about what they’re doing, which sounds obvious, but it’s really not.
To me, a sex scene in a movie generally means a gratuitous scene that doesn’t serve the story but gives a kind of excuse—we’ve got these two actors, we want to see them naked, so let’s bring in the music and the soft light.
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