Black & White Portraits #28 Harvey Keitel

Black & White Portraits #28

Harvey Keitel

Born May 13, 1939, in Brooklyn, New York, USA

Mini Bio

American actor and producer Harvey Keitel was born on May 13, 1939 in Brooklyn, New York City, to Miriam (Klein) and Harry Keitel. An Oscar and Golden Globe Award nominee, he has appeared in films such as Martin Scorsese's Mean Streets (1973) and Taxi Driver (1976), Ridley Scott's The Duellists (1977) and Thelma & Louise (1991), Peter Yates' Mother, Jugs & Speed (1976), Quentin Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs (1992) and Pulp Fiction (1994), Jane Campion's The Piano (1993), Abel Ferrara's Bad Lieutenant (1992), Robert Rodriguez's From Dusk Till Dawn (1996), James Mangold's Cop Land (1997), Paolo Sorrentino's Youth (2015). He is regarded as one of the greatest method actors ever. Along with actors Al Pacino and Ellen Burstyn, he is the current co-president of the Actors Studio.

Keitel studied under both Stella Adler and Lee Strasberg and at the HB Studio, eventually landing roles in some Off-Broadway productions. During this time, Keitel auditioned for filmmaker Martin Scorsese and gained a starring role as "J.R.", in Scorsese's first feature film, Who's That Knocking at My Door (1967). Since then, Scorsese and Keitel have worked together on several projects. Keitel had the starring role in Scorsese's Mean Streets (1973), which also proved to be Robert De Niro's breakthrough film. Keitel re-teamed with Scorsese for Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore (1974), in which he had a villainous supporting role, and appeared with Robert De Niro again in Scorsese's Taxi Driver (1976), playing the role of Jodie Foster's pimp.

- IMDb Mini Biography By Pedro Borges

Born in Brooklyn, Harvey Keitel was a delinquent who was thrown out of vocational school for truancy. This ultimately led him to Lebanon with the U.S. Marine Corps. When he got returned home, he studied with Lee Strasberg and Stella Adler. As a struggling actor, he landed some acting roles off-off-Broadway while making a living as a court stenographer and as a shoe salesman.

Fate struck at 26 when he answered the newspaper ad of an N.Y.U. student director, Martin Scorsese. Keitel was cast in Scorsese's thesis film, and then in Mean Streets, Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore and Taxi Driver. Over time, Keitel became typecast as an intense, back-alley thug (Wise Guys and Bad Lieutenant ), a stereotype that proved impossible to transcend with his biblical role in Scorsese's The Last Temptation of Christ. He earned an Oscar nomination for his portrayal of gangster Mickey Cohen in Bugsy (1991) and finally managed to drop the thug persona in 1993 in The Piano, Jane Campion's award-winning film. He put in a strong performance in Reservoir Dogs, for a then-unknown Quentin Tarantino, and his involvement in Pulp Fiction helped get that hit movie made. He and Tarantino reunited once again in 1996 for the vampire flick From Dusk Till Dawn.

Keitel filled his 1997 roster with City of Industry, Head Above Water, Cop Land, and Fairy Tale: A True Story. An extremely prolific actor, he's appeared since then in films such as U-571 (2000), National Treasure (2004), Inglourious Basterds (2009) and The Last Godfather (2010). Recently, he's been seen in 2012 releases Moonrise Kingdom with Bruce Willis and Edward Norton and A Beginner's Guide to Endings alongside Scott Caan and Paulo Costanzo. However, his latest credits include the Oscar-nominated Youth (2015) with Michael Caine and Rachel Weisz, The Comedian (2017) with Robert De Niro and Leslie Mann and Madame with Toni Collette.

Harvey has a son with his wife, Daphna Kaster, whom he met at the Toronto Film Festival. He also has a daughter born in 1985, with ex-girlfriend Lorraine Bracco, and a son born in 2001, with ex-girlfriend Lisa Karmazin.