Born: September 15, 1946, San Saba, Texas, U.S.
Discovered: Jones moved to New York to become an actor, making his Broadway debut in 1969's A Patriot for Me in a number of supporting roles. In 1970, he landed his first film role, appropriately playing a Harvard student in Love Story (Erich Segal, the author of "Love Story," said that he based the lead character of Oliver on the two undergrad roommates he knew while teaching at Harvard, Jones and Gore).
Career:
In the 1990s, blockbuster hits such as The Fugitive co-starring Harrison Ford, Batman Forever co-starring Val Kilmer, and Men in Black with Will Smith made Jones one of the best-paid and most in-demand actors in Hollywood. His role in The Fugitive won wide acclaim and an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. When he accepted his Oscar, his head was shaved for his role in the film Cobb, a situation he made light of in his speech with: "All a man can say at a time like this is 'I am not really bald.'"
Among his other well-known performances during the 1990s were those as an accused conspirator in the John F. Kennedy assassination in 1991's JFK (earning him another Oscar nomination), as a terrorist who hijacks a U.S. Navy battleship in 1992's Under Siege and as a maximum-security prison warden in way over his head in 1994's Natural Born Killers.
Jones co-starred with director Clint Eastwood as astronauts in the 2000 film Space Cowboys, leading a space rescue mission.
In early 1971, he returned to Broadway in Abe Burrows' Four on a Garden where he shared the stage with Carol Channing and Sid Caesar. Between 1971 and 1975, he portrayed Dr. Mark Toland on the ABC soap opera, One Life to Live. He returned to the stage for a 1974 production of Ulysses in Nighttown with Zero Mostel. In films, he played an escaped convict hunted in Jackson County Jail (1976), a Vietnam veteran in Rolling Thunder (1977) and an automobile mogul, co-starring with Laurence Olivier, in the Harold Robbins drama The Betsy.
Filmography:
Men in Black III (2012) (pre-production) .... Agent Kay
Captain America: The First Avenger (2011) (filming) .... Col. Chester Phillips
The Company Men (2010) .... Gene McClary
In the Electric Mist (2009) .... Dave Robicheaux
In the Valley of Elah (2007) .... Hank Deerfield
No Country for Old Men (2007) .... Ed Tom Bell
A Prairie Home Companion (2006) .... The Axeman
The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada (2005) .... Pete Perkins
Man of the House (2005/I) .... Ranger Roland Sharp
The Missing (2003/I) .... Samuel Jones / Chaa-duu-ba-its-iidan
The Hunted (2003) .... L.T. Bonham
Men in Black II (2002) .... Kevin Brown, Agent Kay
Space Cowboys (2000) .... Hawk Hawkins
Rules of Engagement (2000) .... Col. Hayes 'Hodge' Hodges
Double Jeopardy (1999) .... Travis
Small Soldiers (1998) (VG) (voice) .... Major Chip Hazard
Small Soldiers (1998) (voice) .... Chip Hazard
U.S. Marshals (1998) .... Chief Deputy Marshal Samuel Gerard
Men in Black (1997) .... Kay
Volcano (1997) .... Mike Roark
Batman Forever (1995) .... Two-Face / Harvey Dent
The Good Old Boys (1995) (TV) .... Hewey Calloway
Cobb (1994) .... Ty Cobb
Blue Sky (1994) .... Maj. Henry 'Hank' Marshall
Natural Born Killers (1994) .... Warden Dwight McClusky
The Client (1994) .... 'Reverend' Roy Foltrigg
Blown Away (1994) .... Ryan Gaerity
Heaven & Earth (1993) .... Steve Butler
The Fugitive (1993) .... Samuel Gerard
House of Cards (1993) .... Jake Beerlander
Under Siege (1992) .... William Stranix
JFK (1991) .... Clay Shaw
Fire Birds (1990) .... Brad Little
The Package (1989) .... Thomas Boyette
"Lonesome Dove" .... Woodrow F. Call (4 episodes, 1989)
Gotham (1988) (TV) .... Eddie Mallard
"Hallmark Hall of Fame" .... Moses Cooper (1 episode, 1988)
Stormy Monday (1988) .... Cosmo
Stranger on My Land (1988) (TV) .... Bud Whitman
The Big Town (1987) .... George Cole
Broken Vows (1987) (TV) .... Pater Joseph McMahon
Yuri Nosenko, KGB (1986) (TV) .... Steve Daley
Black Moon Rising (1986) .... Quint
The Park Is Mine (1986) (TV) .... Mitch
The River Rat (1984) .... Billy
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1984) (TV) .... Brick Pollitt
Nate and Hayes (1983) .... Captain Bully Hayes
The Executioner's Song (1982) (TV) .... Gary Mark Gilmore
The Rainmaker (1982) (TV) .... Starbuck
Back Roads (1981) .... Elmore Pratt
Barn Burning (1980) (TV) .... Ab Snopes
Coal Miner's Daughter (1980) .... 'Mooney' Lynn
"One Life to Live" .... Dr. Mark Toland (2 episodes, 1971-1979)
Eyes of Laura Mars (1978) .... John Neville
The Betsy (1978) .... Angelo Perino
Rolling Thunder (1977) .... Johnny Vohden
The Amazing Howard Hughes (1977) (TV) .... Howard Hughes
Smash-Up on Interstate 5 (1976) (TV) .... Officer Hutton
"Family" .... David Needham (1 episode, 1976)
Jackson County Jail (1976) .... Coley Blake
"Charlie's Angels" .... Aram Kolegian (1 episode, 1976)
"Baretta" .... Sharky (1 episode, 1976)
"Barnaby Jones" .... Dr. Jim Melford (1 episode, 1975)
Eliza's Horoscope (1975) (as Tom Lee Jones) .... Tommy Lee
Life Study (1973) .... Gus
Love Story (1970) (as Tom Lee Jones) .... Hank Simpson
Trivia:
Good friends with: Al Gore, Willie Nelson, Gary Busey, Oliver Stone and Robert Duvall.
He is a first cousin of Boxcar Willie, a famous country singer.
Born on the exact same day as filmmaker and good friend Oliver Stone.
Has worked with two "Katharine Hepburns." In The Amazing Howard Hughes (1977) (TV), he played Hughes opposite Tovah Feldshuh as Hepburn. In The Missing (2003/I), his daughter is played by Cate Blanchett, who played Hepburn in The Aviator (2004)-another biopic about Howard Hughes.
Has been friends with actor Tom Berenger since they were both on "One Life to Live" (1968).
Quotes:
"I do not have a sense of humor of any recognizable sort."-Tommy Lee Jones
"I really enjoyed a remark that Howard Hawks once made. He said the most important thing is not to ask an actor to do anything he can't do. Same thing goes for horses." - Tommy Lee Jones
"I love cinema, and I love agriculture." - Tommy Lee Jones
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