Biography for
James Spader

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Date of Birth

7 February 1960, Boston, Massachusetts, USA

Birth Name

James Todd Spader

Nickname

Jimmy

Height

5' 10" (1.78 m)

Mini Biography

Son of teachers Todd and Jean Spader. Attended Phillips Academy in Andover with director Peter Sellars; dropped out in eleventh grade. Bused tables, shoveled manure, and taught yoga before landing his first roles. Graduated from TV movies to Brat Pack Films, playing the bad guy. His performance in Sex, Lies, and Videotape (1989) (Best Actor, Cannes 1989) led to bigger and more varied roles.

IMDb Mini Biography By:

Spouse

Victoria Spader

(1987 - 2004) (divorced) 2 children

Trivia

Children: Sebastian Spader (born 1989) and Elijah Spader (born 1992).

Greatly admires the work of Charles Laughton.

Has two unsuccessful TV pilots, Diner (1983) (TV) and Starcrossed (1985) (TV), to his credit.

Is known to prefer being called "Jimmy".

His wife, Victoria Spader, was the set decorator for Sex, Lies, and Videotape (1989).

Refuses to watch any of the movies he's appeared in.

Born on the same date (7 February 1960) as "Saturday Night Live" (1975)'s "TV Fun House" writer/cartoonist Robert Smigel, best known as the voice of 'Triumph the insult comic dog' from "Late Night with Conan O'Brien" (1993).

Loves cooking and is an excellent chef.

Has very poor eyesight, and cannot wear contact lenses. Has said that in roles in which he does not wear his eyeglasses, he can barely make out the face of the actor across from him in the scene.

First performer to win Leading Actor Emmy's for portraying the same character (Alan Shore) on two different shows ("The Practice" (1997) and "Boston Legal" (2004)) without one of the Emmy wins being for guest actor/actress.

Is quick to point out that, unlike the sleazy, slime ball characters he is best known for playing, he is actually a nice, friendly guy in real life.

Good friends with actor Eric Stoltz.

Is a huge Bob Dylan fan.

Auditioned for the film Taps, but eventually lost the part to Sean Penn.

He was working as a janitor at a rehearsal studio in Times Square when he landed his first feature film, Endless Love.

His father died two weeks before he began production on Critical Care.

Has a photographic memory. He can look at a script and he remembers what the pages look like. As he films a scene he "reads" the page. The only reason he screws up a line is if very similar words (e.g. it and is) are written fairly close together.

Personal Quotes

"If I don't need the money, I don't work. I don't mind going to somebody and saying, 'Okay, this is how much money I need to pay my bills for the next six months. If you pay me that, I'll do the film'."

("Why did he accept the lead in 'Sex, Lies & Videotape'?"): "I took the film because I was interested in doing that part. Looking at work as stepping stones is something I don't have any time or energy for. It seems a shame to look at your work as some sort of means to an end, because the end is death, you know? The means is the flesh and blood, so you'd better enjoy it. F--- the end."

"If I don't need the money, I don't work. I'm going to spend time with my family and friends, and I'm going to travel and read and listen to music and try to learn a little bit more about how to be a human being, as opposed to learning how to be somebody else."

"Studio people are afraid of 'Crash.' It makes a statement about whoever releases the film. Miramax took a lot of flak for releasing Kids. The same will happen for whoever releases 'Crash.'"

"I have my own artistic sensibilities and Crash complements them. It is a provocative, challenging, disturbing film made for adults. It's not a skeleton in the closet for me."

(His sadomasochistic scenes in the new movie "Secretary"): "I did something in that scene that I'd never done in a film before but that's been the case with so many of my movies."

"You just want to work. I like playing character roles and I do not mind being a real son-of-a-bitch, or embarrassing myself. But as you go along you begin to realize that the work has a criterion and as your choices get broader you start cutting out the things that are not worth the time. On the whole I have been lucky; I do not look back with a huge amount of distaste for the work I have done."

"Acting is a great way to make a living, especially when I consider what my alternatives were and probably still are. I mean, you are only making movies. It is a lot less pressure than being a surgeon; although it seemed like the only other thing that I was qualified for was manual labour."

"Sometimes with people their work is the most important thing to them, and sometimes the work enables you to do other things that are more important to you. I probably am closer to that."

"I've had a lazy career, sometimes one film a year, sometimes none. I'm walking around in the street and doing this other thing, living, that I'm much more interested in. I just do some acting on the side." - 2005

"I played cops and robbers and pirates and all the rest when I was a kid, but I didn't want to grow up and be an actor and play cops and robbers and pirates. I wanted to grow up and be that, be cops and robbers and pirates."

"I grew up a Red Sox fan. I grew up going to Fenway Park and the Museum of Fine Arts and the Science Museum and Symphony Hall and going to the Common, walking around. My whole family at different times lived and worked in Boston."

"You know, when you choose to make your living as an actor, it's all fine and good to look at it as some kind of artistic endeavor. At its best, it is that. But the fact is, most of the actors out there don't earn $3 million a picture and can't afford to take two years off between films and look for the right thing. Most of us are tradesmen. Acting for me, is a passion, but it's also a job, and I've always approached it as such. I have a certain manual-laborist view of acting. There's no shame in taking a film because you need some money. No shame in taking a film because you have always wanted to visit China. I was thinking about this last night as I was driving home. I started to go back through the different films I've done, and the television movies I've done and I started to think about why I chose them at that time. And I realized, every single film I've ever done I've taken because of the money. Every single one. I'm not ashamed to say that." - 1990.

"I had real trouble, actually, for a long time, getting people to hire me. My anxiety used to manifest itself in strange ways. I'd go in to read for some innocent, vulnerable character, and the feedback would be, 'Well, we met Jimmy...and he scared us.'" - 1990.

"I'm not eager at all to present my life out there for public consumption. I like to do one or two films a year and then do what is absolutely obligatory in terms of promoting them. My life outside of films is vital to me." - 1995.

"I didn't have a great knowledge of this genre. The only demand I was putting on the picture was that my paycheck came in and that I had fun making it. It seemed like it would be rather light-hearted. And it was. I'm not a big fan of films that take themselves seriously." - On doing Stargate.

"I drove a truck for a while for a meat packing plant. I shoveled manure at the Clarmont Riding Academy in New York. Mopped floors for a while. I uploaded railroad cars and trailers at a warehouse. I wasn't really qualified for anything else." - On his menial jobs before acting.

Salary

Secretary (2002)

$400,000 + gross points

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