He could not find work equal to his talents, either due to his post-Oscar salary demands or a lack of perception in the industry that he truly was leading man material. Making the first Godfather was more laughs than making Godfather II. All the atrocities against blacks in the South were committed by Democratic sheriffs. He is the son of Mildred Virginia (Hart) and William Howard Duvall. ", As Duvall reviewed his career from "To Kill a Mockingbird" (1963) to "Tender Mercies" (1983), his acting approach was clearly revealed: He believes in giving himself over to the character. While jets thunder overhead, helicopters make close passes and shells go off within yards of Duvall, he remains totally unaffected. | Duvall was accompanied onstage by Gene Siskel and me, on a guided tour of clips from a lot of his best movies, and when we got to one of his key scenes in "The Godfather" (1971), you could have heard a pin drop. I got right into acting and then studied. Occasionally this actor's actor got the chance to assay a lead role, most notably in Tomorrow (1972), in which he was brilliant as William Faulkner's inarticulate backwoods farmer. He is the son of William Howard Duvall(father) and Mildred Virginia(mother). Duvall began his professional acting career with the Gateway Playhouse, an Equity summer theater based in Bellport, Long Island, New York. It was "Tomorrow," a 1972 adaptation of a William Faulkner short story. Duvall, unlike Hackman, also has directed pictures, including the documentary We're Not the Jet Set (1977), Angelo My Love (1983) and Assassination Tango (2002). Veteran actor and director Robert Selden Duvall was born on January 5, 1931, in San Diego, CA, to Mildred Virginia (Hart), an amateur actress, and William Howard Duvall, a career military officer who later became an admiral. Robert Duvall has long been known as an accomplished actor, but the range of his acting career was dramatized by the three-hour program. The scene was the famous one where Duvall, as Tom Hagen, Don Corleone's trusted family lawyer, goes to Hollywood to persuade a studio boss to give Johnny Fontane, the mob-connected singer, a starring role in a movie. Directed by Martha Coolidge. It's a body of work that few actors can equal, let alone surpass. It was like the Corleone family having dinner. He also, along with James Caan and Marlon Brando, … He has won an Academy Award, two Emmy Awards, four Golden Globe Awards and a BAFTA over the course of his career. Because my parents were so religious, I attended church regularly. See more ideas about robert duvall, duvall, robert. • Roger Ebert / August 25, 1983 They honored Robert Duvall the other night at the Festival of Festivals in Toronto, dedicating their annual Tribute to an actor's actor who is only now entering into stardom after two decades of great character performances. Well, our hero, coming up, was Brando. Jon C. Hopwood, Other Works Put up $5 million of his own money to finance. Does it help. That made it all the more extraordinary, because the scene is not only an exercise in logistics, but a demonstration of physical courage. Some scenes in. | I said, Hobbies, hobbies, and more hobbies. Robert Duvall, Actor: The Apostle. It has something to do with a whole scene. That was incredible pressure for him to work under. Robert Duvall: "Napalm, son. He wants his Hollywood studio, and a vineyard in Northern California, and an apartment in Paris. It's political. Not in an indulgent way, but in a beneficial way. Robert Duvall is an actor, director, producer, screenwriter, scientist, and tv actor in the Hollywood industry. I always considered myself as a character actor. Wearing a Panama hat, he marched down the aisle, took a seat on the stage and shared his notions of acting, directing, Duvall and "The Godfather. He was the husband of Jean E. Tittle Duvall, with whom he would have celebrated 61 years of marriage on New Year's Eve. A young woman who exudes sexuality battles temptation. "Subsequently, Duvall proved one of the few established character actors to move from supporting to leading roles, with his Oscar-nominated turns in The Great Santini (1979) and Tender Mercies (1983), the latter of which won him the Academy Award for Best Actor. His father was born in Virginia and his mother was born in Missouri. I worked with Olivier twice, and that was interesting. It's a coffee shop near the Recoleta where Evita's buried. The film brought Duvall back to the front ranks of great actors, and was followed by a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nod for A Civil Action (1998).Robert Duvall will long be remembered as one of the great naturalistic American screen actors in the mode of Spencer Tracy and his frequent co-star Marlon Brando. He was buried at burial place, Arkansas. ", After two more clips from "Godfather, Part Two," we viewed perhaps the most famous single scene Coppola or Duvall has ever been involved with: The beach landing in "Apocalypse Now" that begins with a flight of helicopters playing Richard Wagner over loudspeakers, and ends with Duvall's famous line: "I love the smell of napalm in the morning. Robert Duvall: Age, Parents, Siblings, Ethnicity, Nationality He was born on 5th January 1931 in San Diego, California, US. When I knew nothing, I thought I could do anything. A friend is Gene Hackman. Owns a large estate in rural Virginia, where some skirmishes of the Civil War were fought (he has found shells and other artifacts on the property).