Bruce Willis

Walter Bruce Willis (Idar-Oberstein, West Germany, March 19, 1955) is an American actor, producer and musician, whose career began in the television industry during the 1980s. comedic, dramatic and action roles. He is known for his portrayal of Officer John McClane in the Die Hard saga, which garnered critical acclaim and considerable grosses upon the first film's release in 1988. He has also appeared in more than sixty films, including blockbusters such as Pulp Fiction, Sin City, Twelve Monkeys, The Fifth Element i>, Armageddon, The Sixth Sense, The Protected One, Glass, Looper, Lucky Number Slevin or The Expendables.

Movies in which Willis has appeared have grossed $7.5 billion at the worldwide box office, making him one of the most profitable actors in a starring or supporting role. performances, he has been the recipient of several awards, including two Emmy Awards, a Golden Globe and four Saturn Awards.

As for his private life, he married actress Demi Moore, with whom he had three daughters before their divorce in 2000, after thirteen years of marriage; some time later he married model Emma Heming.

In March 2022 his family announced that he would retire from acting after being diagnosed with aphasia, a language disorder that affects a person's ability to communicate. However, in February 2023 they reported that his condition had progressed and that they had a more specific diagnosis: frontotemporal dementia, known as FTD.

Biography

Early Years

Although Willis was born in Germany, his family moved to New Jersey when Willis was only two years old. After taking part in some theatre productions, in 1976 he left his university studies and moved to New York, to finally settle in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan; in photography, view of the Ninth Avenue in that neighborhood.

Willis was born in Idar-Oberstein, West Germany, the son of Marlene, a German-born bank worker in Kassel, and David Willis, an American soldier. He is the eldest of four children: Florence, David, and Robert—the latter died of pancreatic cancer in 2001, at the age of 42. His paternal family is of predominantly English descent and to a lesser extent Dutch, French, Welsh, and Irish. After leaving the army in 1957, Robert Willis's father took his family from a German military base where they were based to the settlement of Carneys Point, New Jersey, where he got jobs as a welder and factory worker. By then, Bruce Willis was barely two years old. Some time later, in 1972, a period in which Willis was a teenager and lived in Penns Grove, New Jersey, his parents divorced. Around the same time, he began his studies from Penns Grove High School, where he suffered from stuttering and was nicknamed Buck-Buck by his classmates because of it. British writer John Parker, in his book Bruce Willis: The Unauthorized Biography (1997), mentions that Willis resorted, on the advice of his drama teacher at school Jerry Rockwood, to a kind of "exercises" to build his confidence, taught by a school speech specialist, and that's how he lost his stutter. According to Willis himself (as quoted in the aforementioned work): «He could hardly speak. It took me three minutes to complete a single sentence. It was overwhelming for someone who wanted to express himself to others and who wanted to be heard but just couldn't. It was scary. It wasn't until I took on the role of a character, in a play, that I lost my babbling. It was phenomenal."

On this difficult aspect of his life, the book Bruce Willis: Overcoming Adversity (2001), written by Sandy Asirvatham, mentions that Willis was sometimes reluctant to discuss his childhood in some interviews, since this stage had been painful for him. Parker details in his book that, for Willis, an early solution to deal with his babbling was to become the young prankster of his school; In this same work, a Penns Grove High School teacher adds that “by the time most kids were finding their identity, Willis was going through a difficult period. His stammering was a problem so, in the end, he decided to make up for it by playing pranks on others." After overcoming his stuttering problem, he began appearing in small roles until becoming president of the drama club and student council in 1971. Although Willis turned to school plays to overcome his stuttering problem, he was not yet considering becoming an actor. In 1972 he enrolled in his school's wrestling class, where he was to tear his shoulder shortly afterwards and, as a result, he would have a scar. Just a year later, at the age of 18, he was suspended for a period of three months from Penns Grove High School, after becoming involved in what was known among the student community as "the annual riot".

Upon graduating from Penns Grove High School in 1973, Willis took a job at the DuPont Chambers Works factory in Deepwater, New Jersey. However, he resigned after one of his colleagues died in the work area, and he regularly visited bars in the region after that event, where he also began to play the harmonica together with an R&B band called Loose Goose. Months later he was hired as a security guard at the Salem Nuclear Power Plant, which was under construction at the time.

He returned to acting after briefly serving as a private investigator, a role he would play in the television series Luz de luna and in the film The Last Boy Scout (1991). He completed his undergraduate studies at Montclair University by joining a drama program and became more interested in acting. There, he was cast in the production of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, where his performance was praised. Willis is even known to have studied with the well-known professor Stella Adler. Three years later, in 1977, he decided to drop out of college to move to New York City—where he got an apartment which he shared with actress Linda Fiorentino—and shortly after settling in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan, New York. Regarding the above, the actor commented: "A school certificate is just a trophy. I have some bowling trophies that I think are just as valuable as diplomas."

To survive financially, the actor again sought employment in bars and restaurants, this time to obtain a part-time job at the West Bank Café, located in the Manhattan Plaza complex. After numerous auditions, in 1977 he made his Theatrical debut in the off-Broadway production (i.e., a play performed in New York, but independent of the Broadway concept) of Heaven and Earth. in the play Fool for Love, written by screenwriter Sam Shepard, where he participated in more than a hundred plays, as well as in one of the first commercials for the Levi's company to promote their 501 Blues jeans model.

Career

1980-1990

Willis at the Oscar Awards in 1989.

He made his film debut in 1980 when he participated as an extra in the production The First Deadly Sin, starring Frank Sinatra. Later, he left New York City for California, where he participated in auditions for television shows. In November 1984, he appeared in an episode of the series Miami Vice titled "No Exit", belonging to the first season, where he played Tony Amato, a arms dealer. Likewise, coincidentally when making a trip to Los Angeles to participate in the film Desperately Seeking Susan , starring Madonna (although in the end he was not chosen), he became involved in the casting for the role of David Addison Jr, one of the characters in Moonlight (1985-1989), where he competed against a total of 3,000 actors who wanted the same role This role helped establish him as a comedic actor and the show reached a total of five seasons. Due to its success, the alcoholic beverage manufacturer Seagram hired Willis, along with Sharon Stone, to promote their Golden Wine Cooler products on television. Although his new job in said advertising campaign earned him a salary of between 5 and 7 million USD for the next two years, he determined not to renew his contract for a third year, since he had stopped drinking in 1988. In 1985, he acted in the episode "Shatterday", the first of the remake The Twilight Zone from the 1950s series of the same name. Two years later, on Memorial Day weekend in 1987, he was arrested for disturbing the peace and assaulting an officer; however, the charges were dropped after he apologized to the police officer. Some sources mention that this was the real reason Seagram fired him.

One of his first notable leading roles was in the film Blind Date (1987), directed by Blake Edwards and also starring actors Kim Basinger and John Larroquette. Upon its release, the film grossed a total of US$39,321,715 domestically, and according to Variety: "[In Blind Date], Bruce Willis leaves his TV mugger persona in order to impersonate a funny, kind, hard-working and ambitious financial analyst in Los Angeles. [...] The concept of natural chaos develops well due to the chemistry in the main trio of actors, Willis, Basinger and Larroquette." Edwards hired him again for a production of his, Murder in Beverly Hills (1988), where Willis plays the cowboy and actor Tom Mix. The film had a resoundingly negative result at the box office, grossing only USD 4.5 million, considering that the estimated budget to produce it was USD 16 million. Likewise, it received poor reviews generally; for example, Vincent Canby of the New York Times noted: “It is a story that unravels itself, without characters, without anything, not even with a point of view. He's a zombie.” It wasn't until he was cast in the film Die Hard (1988) that Willis was catapulted to fame. It is worth mentioning that he performed his own stunts in the film, which, upon its release, grossed a total of USD 138,708,852 worldwide, as well as garnering rave reviews, instantly calling it one of the best action movies of contemporary cinema. This can be seen on the Rotten Tomatoes website, where 94% of the reviews are positive, achieving an overall average of 8.2/10.

Following the success of Die Hard, he was given a supporting role in the drama In Country, which premiered in September 1989, in which he played the veteran of the Vietnam War Emmett Smith. This film had its world premiere at the Toronto Film Festival, which Willis attended and where he even dedicated the film's debut to all Canadian war veterans who fought in Vietnam. The film grossed a total of $3,531 971 in the United States and received good reviews upon its release, in addition to achieving an 82% rating on Rotten Tomatoes; Roger Ebert mentioned in his review: “The film is like a ticking time bomb. You sit there, interested, absorbed, sometimes entertained, other times excited, but you think in the back of your mind about where the story is going to end. That's when you find out." In turn, USA Today praised Willis' work, commenting that his "supporting performance as Emily Lloyd's reclusive guardian uncle is admirably short on exhibitionism". Shortly after, he lent his voice to the talking baby in the film Look Who's Talking (1989), which earned an estimated US$296,999,813 worldwide; in his review, Chris Willman of Los Angeles Times, stressed: «Films where animals, babies or other beings without a voice can say their thoughts aloud rarely work, however part of the strength of Look who's talking It lies in the fact that Willis, like the sperm/fetus/baby, is not always speaking". which grossed $47,789,074 in the United States and, unlike its predecessor, was listed as one of the actor's ten worst films.

Willis in 2002, after being awarded the Hasty Pudding Man of the Year.

In 1987, Willis achieved moderate success by making his debut as a musician and recording a pop-blues album, on the Motown label, entitled The Return of Bruno, which included the single "Respect Yourself". ", which became a hit , as well as being promoted by a parody in the style of "Spinal Tap", which showed scenes of himself singing at famous events, such as the Woodstock festival. Although his subsequent recordings were not as successful or popular, he returned to the recording studios repeatedly. On October 3, 1989, he released his second musical album blue eyed soul called If It Don't Kill You, It Just Makes You Stronger, which was recorded again with Motown and contains a repertoire of ten songs. According to the Allmusic website: "Instead of trying to please everyone and create vanity projects, Willis, one of the many actors who decided to give the music world a try, has decided to give the music he wants a try." he likes it the most and has achieved a good result in this second launch. Willis is no operatic tenor, but he does have a powerful bluesy scream (not to mention his talents on the harmonica) that warrants his thunderous presence in generally thunderous mixes." separated from the musical stages to appear, from time to time, at the inaugurations of some Planet Hollywood restaurants, the same in which he has performed part of his repertoire.

1990-2000

In the early 1990s, his acting career suffered a brief decline when he appeared in flops as The Bonfire of the Vanities (based on the book of the same name written by American Tom Wolfe; it grossed almost $15.7 million, out of a total budget of $47 million), a film co-written by him and titled The Great Falcon (whose plot combines conspiracy theories, secret societies, historical mysteries, and post-cyberpunk wacky technology; grossed $17.2 million and had a budget of $65 million), Striking Distance (playing a Pittsburgh cop; released 1993, grossed $24.1 million), Mortal Thoughts (in which he starred alongside Demi Moore, who was his wife by then) and Billy Bathgate (directed by Robert Benton), among others. In 1990, the sequel to Die Hard was released, where Willis reprized the role of Officer John McClane. The film had a mixed reception from critics; for example, the Time Out website praised Willis's performance, commenting in their review: "No one can carry the weight of a single line better than Willis. Furthermore, he is unusual among Hollywood action men in that he can look vulnerable while also looking invincible," while critic Jonathan Rosenbaum of the Chicago Reader categorically stated in his assessment: "If your idea of a good time is watching a lot of stupidity and nasty people insulting and brutalizing others, then you'll like this movie." Die Hard 2 grossed little more than USD 240 million worldwide and had a budget of USD 70 million. Two years later, the actor participated in the production Death Becomes Her, directed by Robert Zemeckis, where he played the role from a plastic surgeon. Despite mixed reviews, the film grossed well upon its release, earning over $149 million.

Between 1992 and 1994, Willis participated in television commercials for the Subaru Legacy car, designed by the Japanese Subaru, which decided to launch a limited number of models under the nickname "Subaru Legacy Touring Bruce", in honor of the actor. In that period he obtained the starring role, together with the English Jane March, of the sexual thriller Color of Night (1994) which, according to the publication Entertainment Weekly, despite receiving poor critical reception after its theatrical release, achieved notability when it was released on video. That same year, he landed a supporting role in Pulp Fiction, Quentin Tarantino's acclaimed film, with which he gave a new boost to his career as an actor, by playing the role of Butch Coolidge. According to American journalist Peter Bart: "By taking Willis on a modest-budget film, his salary was going to be reduced and, therefore, his status as an actor was also at risk, but the strategy... paid off well: Pulp Fiction not only brought a new level of respect to Willis as an actor, but also earned him several million dollars as a result of its box office grosses." Willis' appearance and physical presence were crucial aspects for Tarantino to hire him: "Bruce has the look of a 1950s actor. I can't think of any other actor who has that look". 214 million USD, when his budget was only eight million USD. Additionally, in 1996 he served as executive producer of the animated series Bruno the Kid, in which a representation of him appeared in CGI format. In a total of 37 episodes, he voiced an eleven-year-old boy who becomes a secret spy for an organization called the Globe.

Later, he took on the leading roles in the science fiction films Twelve Monkeys (1995) and The Fifth Element (1997). In the first, directed by Terry Gilliam and inspired by the French adaptation La Jetée (1962), he plays James Cole, a convict living in a sinister post-apocalyptic future. Gilliam cast Willis because he felt the actor evoked Cole's personality, as "someone strong and dangerous, but also vulnerable". Upon its release, it grossed nearly $170 million worldwide; stuntman Roger Ebert mentioned in his review: "The film is a celebration of madness and doom, with a hero trying to prevail against the chaos of his condition, and it's inadequate [...] This is a cold, dark and despondent version, and even the romance between Willis and Madeleine Stowe feels hopeless, beyond jubilant. It's all very well done and the more you know about the movies (especially the technical side), the more you're willing to admire them. And as entertainment, the tape appeals more to the mind than to the senses". On the other hand, in The Fifth Element, directed by Luc Besson, Willis personifies a taxi driver and ex-soldier of the specials'; prior to its theatrical release, it opened the 1997 Cannes Film Festival. It grossed a total of $263 million worldwide, three times its estimated budget of $80 million. It should be noted that 76% of the profits came from outside the United States.

Willis interpreting a musical theme during a presentation with his band The Accelerators (also known as Blue Devils) in 2003.

Despite previous box office successes in which he was involved, by the end of the decade his career began to fall into another decline as the following films he participated in were negatively reviewed, such as The Jackal, Mercury Rising and Breakfast of Champions. However, Armageddon, directed by Michael Bay, became the highest-grossing film of 1998 worldwide, despite poor reviews. An example of the latter is that Roger Ebert has listed it as one of the most detestable films he has ever seen and added in his evaluation: "The film is an attack on the eyes, the ears, the brain, common sense and the mind." human desire for good entertainment". Also, that year Willis lent his voice and image in the video game Apocalypse for the PlayStation console. In 1999, he starred in the M. Night Shyamalan film The Sixth Sense, where he played the role of child psychologist Malcolm Crowe. The aforementioned film garnered both a good box office and critical acclaim, something that helped in some way to increase his interest in his acting career. Between 1999 and 2000, he served as the spokesperson for the Police sunglasses company and appeared in a series of print advertisements.

2000-2010

In 2000, Willis won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series for his role on Friends (where he played one of Rachel Green's boyfriends). It also earned him a 2001 American Comedy Award nomination for "Funniest Guest Actor in a Television Series," but was beaten by Christopher Walken and his appearance on Saturday Night Live, in 1975. Although he had originally been cast as Terry Benedict in Ocean's Eleven (2001), he turned down the role in order to work on composing a new music album. Said compilation, Bruce Willis - The Universal Masters Collection, was released on January 3, 2000 and belongs to the blues rock genre. It was recorded with the Musicrama record label and contains a total of 18 tracks, including two different versions of the hit "Respect Yourself". Beyond an original compilation, The Universal Masters is a compilation of the main singles from his two previous record productions. Despite the fact that this prevented him from participating in Ocean's Eleven , in the 2004 sequel he makes a brief appearance as himself. In 2007, he appeared in the film Planet Terror , the first of a double feature film known as Grindhouse , where he plays the main antagonist, Lieutenant Muldoon, who turn is a mutant soldier. This marked his second collaboration with filmmaker Robert Rodriguez, after Sin City. Upon its release, Planet Terror grossed $10.8 million worldwide. According to critic Kevin Maher of The Sunday Times: "It's a fascinating legacy to cinema." horror and moronic compensation for a certain generation of fans obsessed with breasts, guns and bloodshed".

Willis is a regular on The Late Show with David Letterman; since its first appearance, on September 13, 1993, it has appeared in up to 21 different broadcasts, while its last intervention in it occurred on October 4, 2010. In many of its presentations it makes elaborate jokes, such as dressing at some point in a luminescent orange suit in honor of the exhibition "The Tickets" in 2005, appearing with half of his face full of simulated gunshot wounds after a shooting in 2006, when the then US Vice President Dick Cheney accidentally shot lawyer Harry Whittington while they were participating in a quail hunt on a Texas ranch, and taking the place of host David Letterman, who was ill, in the broadcast broadcast on February 26, 2003, even when it was announced that Willis was one more guest. In another moment, Willis tried to break a record by staying underwater, in a kind of parody of David Blaine, for only two seconds. On April 12, 2007, he appeared again on the show, this time wearing a wig reminiscent of Sanjaya Malakar. Months later, on June 25, he reappeared wearing a mini wind turbine strapped to his head, as part of a prank made in around his fictional documentary titled An Unappealing Hunch ("An unattractive hunch", alluding to the production An Inconvenient Truth). In late 2008, he appeared in a brief video clip (projected in the middle of the Letterman program) where he made a parody of the tape High School Musical 3: Senior Year, while, on June 8, 2009, he made a new appearance on the show by playing, in parody form, one of the show's new employees. On February 1, 2010, he made a comedic segment where he claimed to have "invented" a pair of "exploding pants"; in the end, his own pants ended with two holes just below the front pockets. In his most recent appearance, in October 2010, he again wore a wig, only this time it was made of meat, to perform a parody. of the dress, bag, and hat made from raw beef steaks that Lady Gaga wore at the 2010 MTV Video Music Awards.

Willis at the German debut Over the Hedgein 2006.

It is also worth mentioning his interventions in four films alongside fellow actor Samuel L. Jackson (Loaded Weapon 1, Pulp Fiction, Die Hard with a Vengeance and El protegido), with whom he had also planned to work on Black Water Transit, although in the end this could not materialize. Willis also worked with his eldest daughter, Rumer Glenn, in the thriller Hostage (2005), where he played a former SWAT special unit officer who is a hostage negotiator, and which grossed a total of US$77.9 million worldwide. Joshua Tyler of the Cinema Blend website commented in his analysis: "Do we need the Bruce from the Die Hard era again? >? My gut answer is no. He is no longer as young as he once was. At some point, like Silvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger, Willis is going to have to retire from those action roles. Also by then, he'll have too many wrinkles to figure as a believable action hero. In fact, he's already close to that." It should be noted that in said film, her daughter Rumer asked her father to give her a role in the film, as long as she specifically played the protagonist's kidnapped daughter.. However, in an interview with the Chicago Sun-Times newspaper, he told her: "Honey, I'm not going to give you the role just like that, even though I'm one of the producers of the film.". Due to this, Rumer had to do her own audition and, in the end, she was chosen. alongside Halle Berry, which grossed just over $73 million. However, the film received poor reviews; according to E!: "Halle Berry and Bruce Willis stumble in this ill-conceived thriller about a journalist investigating the death of an old friend. A sure contender for this year's worst awards."

That same year, he starred in the crime drama Alpha Dog, alongside Sharon Stone (playing the father of a young drug dealer; he earned an estimated $32.1 million worldwide, while that critics considered the performances of Willis and Stone to have been "over the top"), as well as in Live Free or Die Hard, where he returned to play John McClane. On the television show Ebert & Roeper, critics Richard Roeper and Katherine Tulich gave the film a fair rating; the former mentioned about it: "It's not the best installment Die Hard nor the most exciting, but it's a lot of fun", noting that it was his favorite sequel to the original Die Hard, as well as stressing that Willis was "at the pinnacle of his career as John McClane". The film grossed a total of $383.5 million worldwide and had a budget of $110 million. Also, he appeared in the films Something Happens in Hollywood (2008) and Surrogates (2009). The former, co-starring Robert De Niro and Sean Penn, grossed nearly $6.7 million, while the latter grossed more than $120 million during its theatrical run. In Something Happens in Hollywood, De Niro plays a Hollywood film producer and Willis plays himself. Upon its release, it garnered mixed reviews; on Rotten Tomatoes it got 52% positive reviews. Regarding Willis's performance in Surrogates, Peter Cowell of the Toronto Star newspaper said: "The image The film's promotional poster of a gray-and-grizzled Willis is a warning that Surrogates is not about another psychic performance from the actor [...] He's on double duty here, both as a human as a robot, and actually sweats and approaches the verge of tears."

On the other hand, despite the fact that he had been summoned to play the American general William R. Peers in the film Pinkville, a drama that was going to be directed by Oliver Stone about the investigation in around the Mỹ Lai massacre (occurred in 1968), this project never came to fruition due to the Hollywood writers' strike of 2007-2008. In 2008, he participated in the album North Hollywood Shootout by the rock band Blues Traveler, giving a spoken word rendition in a blues-rock instrumental arrangement, even which ended up incorporated into the single "Free Willis (Ruminations from Behind Uncle Bob's Machine Shop)". In early 2009, he was again involved in another advertising campaign to promote the name change of the insurer Norwich Union to Aviva. In 2010 the comedy Cop Out was released, in which he starred alongside Tracy Morgan, directed by Kevin Smith, about two police officers investigating the theft of a baseball card. Shortly thereafter, he was seen in the music video for the song "Stylo" by the band Gorillaz. In March 2010, This video clip set a new record by being viewed 900,000 times on its opening day on YouTube, making it the most successful promotional music video on YouTube. That same year, he appeared briefly in the film The Expendables along with Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger, trio that owns the Planet Hollywood restaurant chain, along with other renowned actors. Said intervention was the first time that those mentioned appeared together in the same film; despite being a short scene, it was one of the most anticipated in the production. It was filmed at the end of 2009, inside a church. Later, he participated in Red, an adaptation of the homonymous comic book miniseries in which he plays Frank Moses and which premiered in United States on October 15, 2010.

Post 2010

One project the actor is scheduled to star in is the film adaptation of the video game Kane & Lynch: Dead Men. On May 5, 2010, Die Hard 5 was confirmed for production, and Willis has been considered to once again play Officer John McClane.

In 2012, Willis was cast in the sequel to The Expendables 2. Stallone had previously expressed interest in Willis reprising his character in the sequel but in a larger role; Willis confirmed his involvement in the film on September 6, 2011. The film was the highest grossing of the three, grossing $311 million.

Private life

Marriages and family

Willis together with Anne Heche and Demi Moore, who was married from 1987 to 2000.

Willis met actress Demi Moore at the premiere of the film Illegal Procedure; by then, Moore was dating the actor Emilio Estévez, who participated in said film. Still, on November 21, 1987, Willis married Moore and they had three daughters: Rumer Willis (b. August 16, 1988), Scout LaRue Willis (b. July 20, 1991), and Tallulah Belle Willis (b. No. 3 February 1994).

The couple divorced on October 18, 2000, without offering any public reason for their breakup. About it, he mentioned: "I felt like I had failed as a father and as a husband by not being able to make this work." He even thanked actor Will Smith for helping him deal with the problem. After their separation, rumors spread that both would remarry; however, Moore married Ashton Kutcher, fifteen years her junior. Since then, Willis has maintained a close relationship with both Moore and Kutcher, even attending their wedding. Today, he and Moore legally share custody of their daughters; Willis considered Kutcher as one more member of his " extended family".

Once the divorce process was finalized, Willis dated models María Bravo Rosado and Emily Sandberg; he also became engaged to Brooke Burns, with whom he ended in 2004, after months of dating.

On March 21, 2009, he married Emma Heming for the second time in the Turks and Caicos Islands, an event attended by his three daughters, Moore and Kutcher. Because the ceremony was not legally binding, the couple remarried in a civil ceremony held in Beverly Hills, California, just six days after the wedding on the aforementioned islands. In some statements, Willis had expressed interest in having more children. In 2012, he announced that his wife gave birth to a girl named Mabel Ray; This would be his fourth daughter, since the actor has three daughters from his previous marriage, and the first for the actress. By 2014, his wife gave birth to their second daughter, named Evelyn Penn.

In early 2022, Bruce's family, including his ex-wife Demi Moore, released a statement signaling the actor's retirement due to his diagnosis of aphasia, a speech disorder that can be caused by a stroke or stroke. trauma, among others. However, in February 2023 they reported that his condition had progressed and that they had a more specific diagnosis: frontotemporal dementia.

Religion

At some point, the actor was a Lutheran (he specifically belonged to the Missouri Synod Lutheran Church), although he stopped practicing that religion after declaring the following in an interview conducted for the American magazine George, in July 1998:

The organized religions are, in my general opinion, moribunda aspects [...] They were all more important when we didn’t know why the Sun was moving, why the climate changed, why the hurricanes occurred or what the volcanoes generated [...] Contemporary religion is the final path of modern mythology. Although there are people who interpret the Bible literally. I choose not to believe that way. And that's what makes America so interesting, do you realize?

Bruce Willis

Business interests

Willis is the tenant of an apartment in Trump Tower (in New York City), and another in the Riverside South department complex (also known as Trump Place), as well as the owner of a store in Los Angeles, a house in Malibu (California), a ranch in Montana, a beach house on Parrot Cay (a small island located in the Turks and Caicos group) and numerous properties in the winter resort Sun Valley (Idaho). In 1997, Willis he co-founded the Company of Fools, a non-profit theater company based in Idaho.

Similarly, he owns his own film production company called Cheyenne Enterprises, founded in 2000 with his partner Arnold Rifkin. Similarly, he co-founded the production company Willis Brothers Films in Los Angeles with his brother David Willis and the businessman Stephen Eads. He owns several small businesses in Hailey, Idaho, including The Mint Bar and The Liberty Theater, co-founding Planet Hollywood with actors Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone. In 2009 he signed a contract to become a the international face of Sobieski vodka, from the company Belvedere SA, in exchange for 3.3% of its shares.

Other interests

As a fan of the New Jersey Nets basketball team, Willis made a series of controversial comments on April 29, 2007, during a Nets playoff game that was broadcast by the Canadian cable channel TSN, by repeating a characteristic phrase from Die Hard: "Yippee-Ki-Yay, son of a bitch", towards the end of the interview they did to him. Reacting later, he excused himself by blaming jet lag and saying, "Sometimes, I overestimate my ability to be active under pressure by getting insufficient sleep."

On May 5 of that same year, someone used the alias "Walter_B" to answer detailed questions on the website Ain't it Cool News, where netizens were discussing the fact that Live Free or Die Hard received a PG-13 rating, instead of an R (as was the case with the previous three films in the Die Hard franchise). Among those responses there was exclusive information about the still unreleased film, the theme of the series, direct criticism of the cast members of other films and various trivial sentences about the cinema. At first, many were skeptical of the idea that "Walter_B" was Willis, however, on May 9, the actor revealed his identity in a video call session (using iChat).

Political ideology

Willis at a meeting with George H. W. Bush in 1992.

In 1988, Moore and Willis campaigned for then-Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis for president. Four years later, in 1992, he supported the re-election of President George H. W. Bush, also appearing as a critic of Bill Clinton. However, in 1996 he declined to endorse Clinton's opponent, Republican Bob Dole, because the latter criticized Moore's performance in the tape Striptease. He was also a guest speaker at the National Convention Republican in 2000, actively supporting George W. Bush later. Despite this, the actor did not make any contribution during the 2008 presidential campaign; In several interviews granted in June of the previous year, he stated that he still held to some Republican Party ideologies.

In 2006 he proposed that the United States should invade Colombia, in order to put an end to drug trafficking. Willis has said in multiple interviews that he supports the initiative to offer better salaries to teachers and police officers, although at the same time he disapproves of guardianship and his country's dealings with Native Americans. He also stated that he is a great supporter of the right to own guns:

"Everyone has the right to use weapons [in American territory, according to the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution]. If you remove the weapons from their owners who, legally, can use them, then the only ones who can have them will be the criminals [...] Even a pacifist would get violent if someone tried to kill him. [... you would definitely fight for your life."

Willis has criticized the Christian right and its influence on the Republican Party. In February 2006, she appeared in Manhattan to discuss the film 16 Blocks with the media. One of the reporters tried to ask his opinion on current events, but was interrupted by Willis mid-questioning him:

"I am sick of answering this damn question. I'm a Republican only because I want a smaller government, that is, less government interference. I want you to stop shitting my money and your money and the taxes we give you of 50% of... every year. I want you to be fiscally responsible and those damn pressure groups are out of Washington. Do that and I'll say I'm a Republican... I hate the government, okay? I'm a politician. Write that down. I am not a Republican."

Willis's name was incorporated into an ad published in the Los Angeles Times on August 17 of that same year, condemning Hamas and Hezbollah and supporting Israel in the Lebanon War from 2006.

Military Interests

Willis greeting members of the United States Navy on 25 July 2002.

Throughout his film career, Willis has played various military characters in films such as The Siege, Hart's War, Tears of the sunshine and Grindhouse. Raised in a military family, the producer has also been seen selling Boy Scout cookies for members of the US armed forces. In 2002, his youngest daughter, Tallulah, suggested that he buy Girl Scout cookies to send to the troops. At this, Willis purchased a total of 12,000 boxes of cookies, which were then distributed to the sailors aboard the USS John F. Kennedy, as well as to other troops stationed in the Middle East. The following year, he visited Iraq as part of a USO tour, where he sang for the troops, accompanied by his band The Accelerators. At one point, he even considered joining the military to fight in the second Iraq war, without However, he was deterred by his age (48 at the time). Furthermore, he was believed to have offered a total of $1 million to any non-combatant who provided useful information on terrorist leaders Osama bin Laden, Ayman al -Zawahiri or Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. However, in June 2007, in the respective issue of Vanity Fair magazine, he clarified that he had made this statement hypothetically and, in no case, should it be taken literally. Likewise, he criticized the media for its coverage of the war, considering that the press focused more on the negative aspects of the conflict:

I went to Iraq to see that those who were there were soldiers — mostly young people — helping other people; they helped them regain power, open hospitals, get water again, and you don't listen to any of that on the news. They only inform you of 'X number of people were killed today', which I think is a huge service. It's like spitting all those young people out there fighting to help this country.

In 2005, Willis mentioned that he wanted to "make a pro-war film where American soldiers are portrayed as fearless fighters seeking freedom and democracy." The project was to recount the experiences of members of the 24 ° Infantry Regiment, who spent considerable time in Mosul, being commended for it upon their arrival in the United States. In addition, he would be inspired by the writings of blogger Michael Yon, a former Green Beret soldier, who had been commissioned as a correspondent in charge of reporting on the activities of the Regiment. Willis described the film's story as being about "those guys who are forced to do what they do for very little money to defend and fight for what they consider to be freedom". made any announcement regarding said production.

Cultural references

In 1996, Roger Director, one of the scriptwriters and producers of Moonlight, wrote a roman à clef (that is, a novel that describes the life of someone from the combination of real facts and fictional events) about the actor, entitled A Place to Fall. Later, in his autobiography published in 2000, called Cybill Disobedience, Cybill Shepherd commented that Willis was angry with Director, since his character had been described as a "peculant, neurotic actor".

Two years later, in 1998, Willis participated in the video game Apocalypse, for the PlayStation console; at first, it was said that he would appear as a supporting character and not the lead. However, the company in charge of its production redesigned the game again, this time using Willis's physical appearance and voice, completely changing the original design, so that the actor would serve as the star character of the plot.

In almost all the interpretations of Bruce Willis, the actor Ramón Langa dubs him in Spanish from Spain.

Filmography

Cinema:

Television:

Producer

He was also featured in the music video "Stylo" by Gorillaz.

Discography

• The Return of Bruno, 1987, Razor & Tie, OCLC 16657516
• If It Don't Kill You, It Just Makes You Stronger, 1989, Motown / Pgd, OCLC 21322754
• Classic Bruce Willis: The Universal Masters Collection, 2001, Polygram Int'l, OCLC 71124889

Bruce Willis's performance has been positively compared to that of Vince Neal, whom he claimed to have inspired to locate his vocals.

Awards and recognitions

Star of the actor on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Willis has earned a considerable variety of recognitions and honors throughout his careers in television and film. For his work on the television series Moonlighting, he won an Emmy (“Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series”) and a Golden Globe (“Best Performance by an Actor in a Television Series – Comedy or Musical"), as well as several additional nominations at other ceremonies. He was also nominated for another Golden Globe for "Best Supporting Actor" for his role in the film In Country. On the other hand, Maxim magazine cataloged her sex scenes in Color of Night (1994) as the best of their kind in the entire history of cinema. For her performance in Maxim i>thriller The Sixth Sense (1999) won a Blockbuster Entertainment Award (“Favorite Actor: Thriller”) and a People's Choice Award (“Favorite Actor in a Drama”); He also earned nominations at the Saturn Awards in the "Best Actor" category, as well as two more at the MTV Movie Awards for "Best Actor" and "Best Big Screen Duo." In 1998 he received the Razzie Award for worst actor for Armageddon and Mercury Rissing .

In February 2002, he was recognized with the Hasty Pudding Man of the Year Award by Harvard's Hasty Pudding Theatricals. According to this body, the award is given to those who contribute significantly to the world of entertainment. That same year, he served as a national spokesperson for Children in Foster Care as part of an office commissioned by then-President George W. Bush. Later, via online, the actor commented: "I saw in Foster Care a way to help my country in a system whereby shining a little light could benefit children who they were, literally, under the tutelage of the Government». In April 2006 he was honored by the French Government for his contribution to the film industry, being named "Officier Dans L'ordre Des Arts Et Des Lettres" (Officer in the Order of Arts and Letters), in a ceremony held in Paris. The Prime Minister of France said in this regard: "This is the way in which France pays tribute to an actor who embodies the strength of American cinema, the power of emotions that he invites us to share on screens around the world and the energetic personalities of its already legendary characters". On October 16 of that year he was also honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Said recognition is found specifically at the address Hollywood Boulevard 6,915, being the number 2,321 star awarded in its entire history. Regarding this, Willis said: “I used to come up here and look at all these stars, and I could never figure out what you were supposed to do to get one… Time has passed and now that I find myself doing this; I am very excited. I feel excited to be an actor."

ACCA Awards Circuit Community Awards

Independent Spirit Award Film Independent Spirit Awards

Golden Globes Awards

Goldene Camera

Gold Derby Awards

Gotham Awards

Chlotrudis Awards

Critics Choice Awards Broadcast Film Critics Association Aritics Awards

COFCA Award Central Ohio Film Critics Association

Primetime Emmy Awards

Hasty Pudding Theatricals

Phoenix Film Critics Society Awards

OFTA Television Awrd Online Film & Television Association

SLFCA Award St. Louis Film Critics Association