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John Travolta |
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John Travolta was one of the six children born
to Helen and Salvatore Travolta. John grew up in
John Joseph Travolta is an American actor of Irish and Italian ancestry.
He became famous for his appearance in Saturday Night Fever and Grease at the height of the disco era, as well as for his portrayal of Vinnie Barbarino on the television sitcom Welcome Back, Kotter, in which his real-life actress sister Ellen Travolta also occasionally appeared (as "Horshack's mother"). After that, his career more or less slumped until he played Vincent Vega in Quentin Tarantino's cult hit Pulp Fiction, for which he received an Academy Award nomination.
Travolta also played a lead role in the panned Battlefield Earth (which, oddly enough, is based in a work of pulp fiction), in which he plays the leader of a group of aliens that enslave humanity on a bleak future Earth. The film received almost
universally negative reviews and did poorly at the box office. Travolta, who is a Scientologist (converted 1975) and idolizes the late L. Ron Hubbard, had hoped that the film would be well-received and be the first in a series of Hubbard film adaptations.
Travolta is a qualified pilot, and owns five airplanes, including a former Qantas Boeing 707-138. The plane bears the name "Jett Clipper Ella". Pan Am was a large operator of the 707 and used Clipper in their names. The plane is named for his son Jett and daughter Ella. His house in Ocala, Florida has its own runway and taxiway right to the door. In 1993 Travolta successfully performed an emergency landing of a plane with electric trouble at Washington Reagan National Airport.
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Ranked #21 in Empire (UK) magazine's "The Top 100 Movie Stars of All Time" list. [October 1997] He appeared on the cover of "Rolling Stone" magazine 4 times, the most for any actor (through
1994) He was named Man of the Year by Harvard's Hasty Pudding Club in 1981. Richard Gere practically owes his film career to Travolta. Travolta turned down the leads for Days of Heaven (1978), American Gigolo (1980) and An Officer and a Gentleman (1982), all of which went to Gere. Travolta married Kelly Preston twice. Their first wedding on 5 September 1991, by a French Scientologist minister, was declared illegal. The
couple met during the filming of The Experts (1989). Jett was conceived during a weekend at the home of Demi Moore and Bruce Willis. (source: Premiere August 1996, p.60) Listed as one of twelve "Promising New Actors of 1976" in John Willis' Screen World, Vol. 28. In July 1978 he became the very first male to make the cover of "McCall's" magazine. His second child with Kelly Preston, daughter Ella Bleu was born, weighing in at 4.08 kilos (nine pounds). [3 April 2000] Did yoga and boxing to cut his love handles for the film Swordfish (2001). His favorite movie is Un homme et une femme (1966). His favorite movie as a child was Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942). Was told to gain thirty pounds for his role in the movie Primary Colors (1998). Owns homes in Santa Barbara, California, Florida, Maine and in his wife's home state of Hawaii.
Main residence is in Ocala, Florida where he owns a large home, complete with airstrip for his planes. Spent nine months learning how to dance to disco music while filming Saturday Night Fever (1977). While filming the movie Blow Out (1981), he started to suffer from insomnia, which he had since he was a child waiting up for his mother to come
home from late acting jobs. He learned to play the violin to calm his nerves. He was voted the 64th Greatest Movie Star of all time by Entertainment Weekly. Ranked #3 in TV Guide's list of "TV's 25 Greatest Teen Idols" (23 January 2005 issue). Is Oprah Winfrey's favorite movie star. His best female friend is Kirstie Alley. Owned a three-bedroom beach front oceanfront estate, on Oahu in Hawaii from 1986-2005. He and
his wife Kelly Preston sold it to Kathy Ireland for $3 million U.S. and she plans to rent the private residence out as one of several Kathy Ireland Worldwide company vacation villas. Turned down several offers from the producers of Chicago (2002) to play the role of Billy Flynn. Richard Gere accepted the role and won a Golden Globe for his performance.
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