Jack Nicholson Research Paper

Jack Nicholson, an American actor, producer, screenwriter and director, is a three-time Academy Award winner and 12-time nominee. Nicholson is also notable for being one of two actors - the other being Michael Caine - who have received Oscar nods in every decade from 1960s through the 2000s.

Nicholson was born on April 22, 1937 in Neptune, New Jersey. He was raised believing that his grandmother was his mother, and that his mother, June Frances Nicholson, a showgirl, was his older sister. He discovered the truth in 1975 from a Time magazine journalist who was researching a profile on him. His biological father is believed to have been either Donald Furcillo, an Italian-American showman, or Eddie King (Edgar Kirschfeld), born in Latvia and also in showbusiness. Jack's mother's ancestry was Irish, English, as well as German, Scottish, and Welsh.

Nicholson made his film debut in a B-movie titled The Cry Baby Killer (1958). His rise in Hollywood was far from meteoric, and for years, he sustained his career with guest spots in television series and a number of Roger Corman films, including The Little Shop of Horrors (1960).
Before that, he wrote the screenplay for The Trip (1967), and co-wrote Head (1968), a vehicle for The Monkees. His big break came with Easy Rider (1969) and his portrayal of liquor-soaked attorney George Hanson, which earned Nicholson his first Oscar nomination. Nicholson's film career took off in the 1970s with a definitive performance in Five Easy Pieces (1970). Nicholson's other notable work during this period includes leading roles in Roman Polanski's noir masterpiece Chinatown (1974) and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975), for which he won his first Best Actor