Chris Cooper

Biography: Chris Cooper

Having spent much of his youth on his father's Missouri cattle ranch, it is not surprising that supporting and leading actor of stage, screen, and television Chris Cooper has specialized in playing cowboys, ranchers, and other hardworking men. His rugged Everyman demeanor has best been put to use by filmmaker John Sayles, who cast him in a number of his films, beginning with 1987's Matewan. Cooper's interest in the theater began in his late teens, when he designed and constructed sets for a community group. Following high school, he studied agriculture and acting at the University of Missouri before moving to New York City in hopes of making it on the stage. It took awhile, but by 1980 he was starring in productions like Of the Fields Lately, The Ballad of Soapy Smith, and Cobb, in which he played the title role. His film debut came in 1980, in Nicholas Roeg's Bad Timing: A Sensual Obsession. He didn't get his big break until seven years later, when Sayles cast him as Joe Kenehan, a member of the coalminer's union who is sent to a tiny mountain town to organize the workers in Matewan (1987). He again worked with Sayles in City of Hope (1991) and then in Lone Star (1996), for which he won great acclaim playing the enigmatic Sam Deeds, the prodigal son of a tiny Texas town's sheriff who solves a mystery and comes to grips with his relationship with his late father. Subsequently, Cooper -- who had also made his mark on the small screen as cowboy July Johnson in Lonesome Dove (1989) -- appeared as a deputy in a A Time to Kill (1996), Robert Redford's younger brother in The Horse Whisperer (1998), and Ethan Hawke's brother-in-law in Great Expectations. In 1999, the actor again demonstrated his impressive range, first playing a coalminer in October Sky and then turning in a chilling performance as Kevin Spacey's unbalanced neighbor in American Beauty. If Cooper was somewhat lost in the shuffle of 2002's Interstate 60, his Oscar winning performance in that same years' Adaptation would find Cooper receiving lavish praise for his portrayal of a lively orchid hunter. Cast opposite Meryl Streep, Cooper's toothless performance was in turns hilarious, sad and poetic, providing the perfect showcase for his impressive range and offering an enticing glimpse of what may be in store for the underappreciated Cooper. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide less

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Remember Me (2010)
Cast: Pierce Brosnan Chris Cooper Lena Olin Allen Coulter Emilie de Ravin
Tags: Romantic Drama Drama
Length: min
Twilight's Robert Pattinson stars in this omantic drama from director Allen Coulter and Summit Entertainment. Emilie de Ravin, Chris Cooper, Lena Olin, and Pierce Brosnan co-star. ~ Jeremy Wheeler, All Movie Guide
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American Experience: The Assassination of Abraham Lincoln (2009)
Cast: Chris Cooper Barak Goodman
Tags: Biography Law & Crime History
Length: 90min
This in-depth documentary explores the death of Abraham Lincoln, the first American president to be assassinated. Gunned down in the second month of his triumphant and markedly peaceful second term, Lincoln's death had tremendous effects on the...
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Hurricane Mary (2008)
Cast: Chris Cooper William H. Macy Patricia Clarkson Laura San Giacomo Dakota Fanning
Tags: Docudrama Drama
Length: min
A devoted Irish-American mother (Patricia Clarkson) wages a tenacious battle to get her two disabled twin daughters (Dakota and Elle Fanning) into the public school system in director Arvin Brown's heartfelt docudrama. William H. Macy, Chris Cooper,...
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The Kingdom (2007)
Cast: Jamie Foxx Chris Cooper Peter Berg Danny Huston Jennifer Garner
Tags: Political Drama Drama
Length: 109min
In the aftermath of a deadly attack on American forces in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, diplomats are slow to act, but meanwhile, FBI special agent Ronald Fleury (Jamie Foxx) assembles a secret team of U.S. counter-terrorism investigators to enter the city...
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New York, I Love You (2008)
Cast: Julie Christie Andy Garcia Chris Cooper Natalie Portman John Hurt
Tags: Comedy Drama Romantic Drama Ensemble Film Slice of Life
Length: 110min
Some of the world's most-respected directors align forces to pay tribute to the city of the New York in this unconventional omnibus sister film to 2006's Paris, Je T'Aime. Broken into short segments, New York, I Love You is comprised of 10 films, most...
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Primo Levi's Journey (2006)
Cast: Andrzej Wajda Chris Cooper Davide Ferrario Umberto Orsini Ruslana Bilozir
Tags: Biography History Social History Culture & Society Social Issues
Length: 93min
Primo Levi's harrowing memoir -If This Is a Man appeared in the U.S. in 1959 as Survival in Auschwitz; historians now regard it as the most critically important written conveyance of the horrors within the Nazi concentration camps. But the account in...
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Capote (2005)
Cast: Chris Cooper Bruce Greenwood Catherine Keener Philip Seymour Hoffman Bob Balaban
Tags: Period Film Crime Drama Biopic Drama
Length: 115min
The creation of one of the most memorable books of the 1960s -- and the impact the writing and research would have on its author -- is explored in this drama based on a true story. In 1959, Truman Capote (played by Philip Seymour Hoffman) was a...
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Breach (2007)
Cast: Chris Cooper Laura Linney Dennis Haysbert Tak Fujimoto Gary Cole
Tags: Spy Film Docudrama Unglamorized Spy Film
Length: 110min
Shattered Glass director Billy Ray directs Chris Cooper and Ryan Philippe in this fact-based drama concerning the FBI traitor who carried out what many historians refer to as the most notable national security breach in U.S. history. A key member of...
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Married Life (2007)
Cast: Pierce Brosnan Chris Cooper Patricia Clarkson David Wenham Rachel McAdams
Tags: Comedy Drama Period Film Black Comedy
Length: 90min
After entering into a passionate affair with a much younger woman, an unhappily married man resorts to murder as a means of sparing his frigid wife the humiliation of divorce in director Ira Sachs' suspenseful film noir. Set in the 1940s, Marriage...
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Syriana (2005)
Cast: Chris Cooper William Hurt Matt Damon George Clooney Stephen Gaghan
Tags: Docudrama
Length: 128min
Oil drives greed in Oscar-winning Traffic screenwriter Stephen Gaghan's labyrinthine sophomore directorial effort that traces the corruption of the global oil industry from the backrooms of Washington, D.C., to the petroleum-rich fields of the Middle...
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Chris Cooper

Biography: Chris Cooper

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