“You must know how to function and how to maintain yourself, and you must have a love of what you do. But an actor also needs great good luck. I have had that luck.”
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Kirk Douglas
Kirk Douglas was an American actor and filmmaker. After an impoverished childhood, he made his film debut in The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (1946) with Barbara Stanwyck. Douglas soon developed into a leading box-office star throughout the 1950s, known for serious dramas, including westerns and war films. During his career, he appeared in more than 90 films and was known for his explosive acting…
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entertainment · American actor (1916–2020) · film producer · television actor · film actor · film director · screenwriter · soldier · stage actor · actor · director · philanthropist · also Kirk Douglas, Izzy Demsky, Isador Demsky, Issur Danielovich, Issur Danielovitch Demsky, Douglas
Born 9 December 1916 · Died 5 February 2020 · Q104027
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2026· 2 entries
“talked and kidded with her a bit”
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2025· 1 entry
"Now I'm old enough to understand that you get maybe four really good parts in your life if you're lucky, and that certainly seemed like one of those parts to my father"
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2021· 2 entries
The Guardian: Natalie Wood was sexually assaulted as a teen by Kirk Douglas, her sister writes in memoir
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His wife Anne died at age 102 and was buried next to him and their son
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2020· 13 entries
The Guardian: Stanley Kubrick and Kirk Douglas wanted Doctor Zhivago movie rights
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The Guardian: When I met Kirk Douglas, did I ask if he’d assaulted Natalie Wood? No, and here’s why | Hadley Freeman
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The Guardian: Kirk Douglas remembered at Oscars ceremony
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The Guardian: Kirk Douglas – not the last of the greats | Brief letters
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The Guardian: Kirk Douglas: why his finest role was as a cynical newspaper hack
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The Guardian: How Izzy Demsky became Kirk Douglas: the ultimate Hollywood makeover
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The Guardian: Kirk Douglas obituary
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The Guardian: Kirk Douglas: a career in clips
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The Guardian: Hollywood legend Kirk Douglas: his most memorable roles – video
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The Guardian: Kirk Douglas, Hollywood legend and star of Spartacus, dies aged 103
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The Guardian: Kirk Douglas – a life in pictures
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The Guardian: Kirk Douglas: Hollywood's impossibly handsome Colossus of Rhodes | Peter Bradshaw
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Died 2020-02-05.
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2017· 3 entries
Snopes rated the claim “Actor Kirk Douglas passed away four days before his 101st birthday in December 2017.” False.
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The Guardian: Kirk Douglas: ‘I never thought I’d live to 100. That’s shocked me’
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The couple released a book, Kirk and Anne: Letters of Love, Laughter and a Lifetime in Hollywood, that revealed intimate letters they shared through the years
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2016· 1 entry
Celebrated his 100th birthday at the Beverly Hills Hotel, joined by several of his friends, including Don Rickles, Jeffrey Katzenberg, and Steven Spielberg, along with Douglas's wife Anne, his son Michael and his daug
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2015· 2 entries
Donated another $15 million to help expand the facility with a new two-story Kirk Douglas Care Pavilion
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To celebrate his 99th birthday on December 9, 2015, they donated another $15 million to help expand the facility with a new two-story Kirk Douglas Care Pavilion.
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2014· 1 entry
Celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary at the Greystone Mansion in Beverly Hills
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2006· 1 entry
To stress that "Israel is the only successful democracy in the Middle East
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2004· 3 entries
From an overdose of alcohol and drugs at the age of 46
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Douglas's wife, Anne, converted to Judaism before they renewed their wedding vows in 2004.
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In Culver City, they opened the Kirk Douglas Theatre in 2004.
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2003· 1 entry
Michael and Joel Douglas produced It Runs in the Family, which along with Kirk starred various family members, including Michael, Michael's son Cameron, and his wife from 50 years earlier, Diana Dill, playing his wife
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2002· 1 entry
Received the National Medal of Arts award from President Bush
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2001· 2 entries
Won Golden Bear (2001).
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In September 2001, he helped fund his high school's musical, Amsterdam Oratorio, composed by Maria Riccio Bryce, who won the school Thespian Society's Kirk Douglas Award in 1968.
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2000· 1 entry
For which he received his third nomination for an Emmy Award
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1999· 4 entries
Awarded Lucien Barrière Literary Award (1999).
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Awarded Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award (1999).
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In which he played an old professional boxer who was recovering from a stroke
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Douglas celebrated a second Bar-Mitzvah ceremony in 1999.
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1998· 1 entry
Received the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award
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1996· 2 entries
At age 79, Douglas suffered a severe stroke, which impaired his ability to speak
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After suffering a severe stroke at age 79 which impaired his ability to speak, Douglas still wanted to make movies
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1995· 1 entry
Awarded Academy Honorary Award (1995).
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1994· 2 entries
Awarded Kennedy Center Honors (1994).
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Douglas's accomplishments in the performing arts were celebrated in Washington, D
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1992· 1 entry
A television movie about a grandfather and his grandson who both struggle with dyslexia
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1991· 5 entries
Awarded AFI Life Achievement Award (1991).
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Aged 74, Douglas was in a helicopter and was injured when the aircraft collided with a small plane above Santa Paula Airport
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And then suffering a stroke in 1996, he focused on renewing his spiritual and religious life
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Received the AFI Life Achievement Award
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Said of him: "No other leading actor was ever more ready to tap the dark, desperate side of the soul and thus to reveal the complexity of human nature
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1990· 1 entry
Received the French Légion d'honneur for distinguished services to France in arts and letters
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1988· 1 entry
Douglas starred in a television adaptation of Inherit the Wind, opposite Jason Robards and Jean Simmons
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1986· 1 entry
Reunited with his longtime co-star, Burt Lancaster, in a crime comedy, Tough Guys, with a cast including Charles Durning and Eli Wallach
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1984· 1 entry
Was inducted into the Western Performers Hall of Fame at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
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1981· 2 entries
Won Presidential Medal of Freedom presented by Jimmy Carter (1981).
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Douglas received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from Jimmy Carter
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1980· 3 entries
Awarded Honorary César (1980).
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Starred in The Final Countdown, playing the commanding officer of the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz, which travels through time to the day before the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor
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Douglas flew to Cairo to talk with Egyptian President Anwar Sadat
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1975· 1 entry
The film version was produced by Michael Douglas and Saul Zaentz, and starred Jack Nicholson, as Douglas was then considered too old to play the character as written
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1967· 2 entries
Won Golden Globe Cecil B. DeMille Award (1967).
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Douglas starred with John Wayne in the western film directed by Burt Kennedy titled The War Wagon
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1964· 1 entry
Had not worked well with Lancaster in the past and originally did not want him in this film
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1963· 2 entries
Starred in the Broadway play One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, a story that he purchased and later gave to his son Michael Douglas, who turned it into an Oscar-winning film
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In which he starred and that ran on Broadway for five months
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1960· 2 entries
Awarded star on Hollywood Walk of Fame (1960).
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Douglas played the title role in what many consider his career-defining appearance as the Thracian gladiator slave rebel Spartacus with an all-star cast in Spartacus (1960)
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1958· 4 entries
Earned Silver Shell for Best Actor (1958).
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Was awarded the honorary degree of Doctor of Fine Arts from St
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Douglas formed the music publishing company Peter Vincent Music Corporation, a Bryna Productions subsidiary
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His bride Anne had been quietly pulled aside by Norton and been presented by Norton (without Kirk Douglas's knowledge) with a pre-nuptial agreement
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1957· 1 entry
Won the Best Actor award at the San Sebastian International Film Festival for The Vikings
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1956· 1 entry
Won Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama for Lust for Life (1956).
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1955· 1 entry
Douglas was finally able to get his film production company, Bryna Productions, off the ground
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1954· 1 entry
Douglas starred as the titular character in Ulysses, a film based on Homer's epic poem Odyssey, with Silvana Mangano as Penelope and Circe, and Anthony Quinn as Antinous
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1951· 2 entries
Douglas starred in Detective Story, nominated for four Academy Awards, including one for Lee Grant in her debut film
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Douglas starred as a newspaper reporter anxiously looking for a big story in Ace in the Hole, director Billy Wilder's first effort as both writer and producer
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1950· 1 entry
Douglas played Rick Martin in Young Man with a Horn, based on a novel of the same name by Dorothy Baker based on the life of jazz cornetist Bix Beiderbecke
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1949· 2 entries
Spangler's purse was found near the Fern Dell entrance to Griffith Park in Los Angeles
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In Three Sisters, produced by Katharine Cornell
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1947· 1 entry
Douglas appeared in Out of the Past (UK: Build My Gallows High), playing a large supporting role in this classic noir thriller starring Robert Mitchum and Jane Greer
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1944· 1 entry
For injuries sustained from the premature explosion of a depth charge
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1941· 2 entries
Shortly after the United States entered World War II, where he served as a communications officer in anti-submarine warfare aboard USS PC-1139
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Studied at American Academy of Dramatic Arts (1941).
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1934· 1 entry
Knew he wanted to become a professional actor
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1916· 2 entries
In Amsterdam, New York, the fourth of seven children and the only son of Bryna "Bertha" (née Sanglel; 1884–1958) and Herschel "Harry" Danielovitch (1884–1954)
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Born 1916-12-09.
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