Robert Duvall
Born: 5th January 1931
Where: San Diego, California, USA
The late-blooming actor has been Oscar-nominated for Apocalypse Now and The Godfather...but picked up his only Academy Award for Tender Mercies.
He was 31 when he made his acclaimed debut as Arthur 'Boo' Radley in To Kill A Mockingbird in 1962, and was 41 by the time he appeared in Francis Ford Coppola's The Godfather.
After attending Principia College in Elsah, Illinois, where he studied drama and history, he joined The Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre in New York in 1955.
Duvall began acting on TV in the early 1960s, racking up guest slots on series like The Outer Limits, The Twilight Zone, Route 66 and The Defenders.
In 1962, he made his film debut as the retarded Boo Radley in To Kill a Mockingbird.
His five-picture collaboration with Coppola began with The Rain People, and included The Godfather, The Godfather, Part II, and The Conversation, and Apocalypse Now.
The son of a Navy admiral, he served in the US Army and drew on that for such performances as Lieutenant Colonel Kilgore in Apocalypse Now, and similarly for his role in The Great Santini.
In 1975, Duvall directed the award-winning documentary We're Not the Jet Set, about a Nebraska rodeo family.
Horton Foote's Oscar-winning Tender Mercies was not only Duvall's producing debut, but also brought him a Best Actor Oscar in 1983.
In 1998 he played in three big movies, The Gingerbread Man, Deep Impact, and A Civil Action, for which he got a Supporting Actor Oscar nomination.
Duvall lent a bit of gravitas to car caper Gone in 60 Seconds and bizarelly played a Scottish football manager in A Shot At Glory.
He starred opposite Arnold Schwarzenegger in The 6th Day and in the crime thriller John Q with Denzel Washington.
In 2003, he played General Robert E Lee (from whom he is actually descended) in the overblown Gods & Generals and portrayed a grizzled brother to Michael Caine in Secondhand Lions.
Recent work included Kevin Costner's epic Western Open Range (during shooting he broke six ribs in a fall) with Annette Bening and Michael Gambon.
