Eugene Allen Hackman was born in San Bernardino, California, United States, the son of Eugene Ezra Hackman and Anna Lyda Elizabeth (née Gray).[4] He has a brother named Richard. Hackman has Pennsylvania Dutch, English, and Scottish ancestry. His mother was born in Sarnia, Ontario, Canada.[5] Hackman's family moved frequently, finally settling in Danville, Illinois, where they lived in the house of his English-born maternal grandmother, Beatrice.[6] His father operated the printing press for the Commercial-News, a local newspaper. Hackman decided that he wanted to become an actor at age 10.[7] His parents divorced when he was 13 and his father subsequently left the family.[8][9]
Hackman lived briefly in Storm Lake, Iowa, and spent his sophomore year at Storm Lake High School.[10] He left home at age 16 and lied about his age to enlist in the United States Marine Corps. He served four and a half years as a field-radio operator. Hackman was stationed in China (Qingdao and later in Shanghai). When the Communist Revolution conquered the mainland in 1949, he was assigned to Hawaii and Japan. Following his discharge in 1951,[11] Hackman moved to New York City and had several jobs.[12] His mother died in 1962 as a result of a fire she accidentally started while smoking.[13] He began a study of journalism and television production at the University of Illinois under the G.I. Bill, but left and moved back to California.[14]
Acting was something I wanted to do since I was 10 and saw my first movie, I was so captured by the action guys. Jimmy Cagney was my favorite. Without realizing it, I could see he had tremendous timing and vitality.
In 1956, Hackman began pursuing an acting career. He joined the Pasadena Playhouse in California,[12] where he befriended another aspiring actor, Dustin Hoffman.[12] Already seen as outsiders by their classmates, Hackman and Hoffman were voted "The Least Likely To Succeed",[15][12] and Hackman got the lowest score the Pasadena Playhouse had yet given.[16] Determined to prove them wrong, Hackman moved to New York City. A 2004 article in Vanity Fair described Hackman, Hoffman, and Robert Duvall as struggling California-born actors and close friends, sharing NYC apartments in various two-person combinations in the 1960s.[17][18] To support himself between acting jobs, Hackman was working at a Howard Johnson's restaurant[19] when he encountered an instructor from the Pasadena Playhouse, who said that his job proved that Hackman "wouldn't amount to anything".[20] A Marine officer who saw him as a doorman said "Hackman, you're a sorry son of a bitch". Rejection motivated Hackman, who said:
It was more psychological warfare, because I wasn't going to let those fuckers get me down. I insisted with myself that I would continue to do whatever it took to get a job. It was like me against them, and in some way, unfortunately, I still feel that way. But I think if you're really interested in acting there is a part of you that relishes the struggle. It's a narcotic in the way that you are trained to do this work and nobody will let you do it, so you're a little bit nuts. You lie to people, you cheat, you do whatever it takes to get an audition, get a job.[19]
Hackman began performing in several Off-Broadway plays, starting with The Saintliness of Margery Kempe in 1959 and including Come to the Palace of Sin in 1963.
In 1963 he made his Broadway debut in Children From Their Games which only had a short run, as did A Rainy Day in Newark. However, Any Wednesday with actress Sandy Dennis was a huge Broadway success in 1964. This opened the door to film work. His first credited role was in Lilith, with Jean Seberg and Warren Beatty in the leading roles.
Hackman returned to Broadway in Poor Richard (1964–65) by Jean Kerr, which ran for over a hundred performances. He continued to do television - The Trials of O'Brien, Hawk, The F.B.I. - and had a small part as Dr. John Whipple in the epic film Hawaii. He had small roles in features like First to Fight (1967), A Covenant with Death (1967) and Banning (1967).
Hackman was originally cast as Mr. Robinson in the 1967 Mike Nichols film The Graduate, but Nichols fired him three weeks into rehearsal for being "too young" for the role; he was replaced by Murray Hamilton.[21]
In 1967 he appeared in an episode of the television series The Invaders entitled "The Spores".
A return to Broadway, The Natural Look (1967), only ran for one performance. He did Fragments and The Basement Off Broadway the same year.
Hackman was in episodes of Iron Horse ("Leopards Try, But Leopards Can't") and Insight ("Confrontation"). In 1968, he appeared in an episode of I Spy, in the role of "Hunter", in the episode "Happy Birthday... Everybody". That same year he starred in the CBS Playhouse episode "My Father and My Mother" and the dystopian television film Shadow on the Land.[22]
In 1969 he played a ski coach in Downhill Racer and an astronaut in Marooned. Also that year, he played a member of a barnstorming skydiving team that entertained mostly at county fairs, a film which also inspired many to pursue skydiving and has a cult-like status amongst skydivers as a result: The Gypsy Moths. Hackman supported Jim Brown in two films, The Split (1968) and Riot (1969),
Hackman nearly accepted the role of Mike Brady for the TV series The Brady Bunch,[23] but his agent advised that he decline it in exchange for a more promising role, which he did.
After The French Connection, Hackman starred in ten films (not including his cameo in Young Frankenstein) over the next three years, making him the most prolific actor in Hollywood during that time frame. He followed The French Connection with leading roles in Cisco Pike (1972) and Prime Cut (1972) and then was in the disaster film The Poseidon Adventure (1972) and Francis Ford Coppola's The Conversation (1974), which was nominated for several Oscars and won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival.[12] That same year, Hackman appeared in what would become one of his most famous comedic roles, as Harold the Blind Man in Young Frankenstein.[24] Hackman also appeared in Scarecrow (1973) alongside Al Pacino, Zandy's Bride (1974), and Night Moves (1975) for director Arthur Penn.
Hackman showed a talent for both comedy and the "slow burn" as criminal mastermind Lex Luthor in Superman: The Movie (1978), a role he would reprise in its 1980 and 1987 sequels.
1980s
Hackman (right) with President Ronald Reagan in 1987
Gene is someone who is a very intuitive and instinctive actor ... The brilliance of Gene Hackman is that he can look at a scene and he can cut through to what is necessary, and he does it with extraordinary economy—he's the quintessential movie actor. He's never showy ever, but he's always right on.
Hackman alternated between leading and supporting roles during the 1980s. He appeared opposite Barbra Streisand in All Night Long (1981) and supported Warren Beatty in Reds (1981). He played the lead in Eureka (1983) and a supporting role in Under Fire (1983). Hackman provided the voice of God in Two of a Kind (1983) and starred in Uncommon Valor (1983), Misunderstood (1984), Twice in a Lifetime (1985), Target (1985) for Arthur Penn, and Power (1986). Between 1985 and 1988, he starred in nine films, making him the busiest actor, alongside Steve Guttenberg.[26]
Hackman starred in Mississippi Burning (1988), for which he was nominated for a second Best Actor Oscar.[28] After this he appeared in The Package (1989).
On July 7, 2004, Hackman gave a rare interview to Larry King, where he announced that he had no future film projects lined up and believed his acting career was over.[citation needed] In 2008, while promoting his third novel, he confirmed that he had retired from acting.[33]
Speaking on his retirement in 2009, Hackman said:
"The straw that broke the camel’s back was actually a stress test that I took in New York. The doctor advised me that my heart wasn’t in the kind of shape that I should be putting it under any stress."[34]
When asked during a GQ interview in 2011 if he would ever come out of retirement to do one more film, he said he might consider it "if I could do it in my own house, maybe, without them disturbing anything and just one or two people."[35] He briefly came out of retirement to narrate two documentaries related to the Marine Corps: The Unknown Flag Raiser of Iwo Jima (2016)[36] and We, the Marines (2017).[37]
Writing
Hackman at a book signing in 2008
Together with undersea archaeologist Daniel Lenihan, Hackman has written three historical fiction novels: Wake of the Perdido Star (1999),[38] a sea adventure of the 19th century; Justice for None (2004),[39] a Depression-era tale of murder; and Escape from Andersonville (2008) about a prison escape during the American Civil War.[40] His first solo effort, a story of love and revenge set in the Old West titled Payback at Morning Peak, was released in 2011.[41] His most recent novel Pursuit, a police thriller, followed in 2013.
Hackman has been married twice. He has three children from his first marriage.
In 1956, Hackman married Faye Maltese (1929–2017),[42][43] with whom he had one son and two daughters: Christopher Allen, Elizabeth Jean, and Leslie Anne Hackman.[44] He was often out on location making films while the children were growing up.[45] The couple divorced in 1986, after three decades of marriage.[46]
In 1991, he married classical pianist Betsy Arakawa (b. 1961).[47] They share a Santa Fe, New Mexico home,[48] which Architectural Digest featured in 1990. At the time, the home blended Southwestern styles and crested a twelve-acre hilltop, with a 360-degree view that stretched to the Colorado mountains. As of 2022[update], Hackman continues to attend Santa Fe cultural events.[49]
Architecture and design are another of Hackman's interests. As of 1990, he had created ten homes, two of which were featured in Architectural Digest. After a period of time, he moves onto another house restoration. "I don't know what's wrong with me," he remarked, "I guess I like the process, and when it's over, it's over."[48][58]
As of 2018, Hackman remains an active cyclist.[59]
Health
In 1990, Hackman underwent an angioplasty.[60] In 2012, 82-year-old Hackman was struck by a pickup truck while he was bicycling in the Florida Keys. It was initially reported that he had suffered serious head trauma, however, his publicist stated that his injury was nothing more than "bumps and bruises".[61]
Hackman, Gene, and Daniel Lenihan. Escape from Andersonville: A Novel of the Civil War. New York: St. Martin's Press, 2008. ISBN978-0-312-36373-4. OCLC191865890.
Hackman, Gene. Payback at Morning Peak: A Novel of the American West. New York: Simon & Schuster Inc, 2011. ISBN978-1-451-62356-7. OCLC798634411.
^His middle name is "Allen", according to the California Birth Index, 1905–1995. Center for Health Statistics, California Department of Health Services, Sacramento, California. At Ancestry.com
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