Name : George Timothy Clooney  Born : May 6, 1961(age 50) Birth Place : Lexington, Kentucky, U.S. Residence : Los Angeles Occupation: Actor, director, producer, screenwriter Years active: 1978–present Spouse: Talia Balsam (1989–1993) Parents: Nick Clooney, Nina Bruce (née Warren) Relatives: Rosemary Clooney (aunt),Miguel Ferrer, Rafael Ferrer(cousins)

George Timothy Clooney

About George Timothy Clooney : George Timothy Clooney is an American actor, film director, producer, and screenwriter. For his work as an actor, he has received two Golden Globe Awards and anAcademy Award. Clooney is also noted for his social activism and has served as one of theUnited Nations Messengers of Peace since January 31, 2008.

Though he made his acting debut on television in 1978, Clooney gained fame and recognition by portraying Dr. Douglas "Doug" Ross on the long-running medical drama ER from 1994 to 1999. While working on ER, he started attracting a variety of leading roles in films including Batman & Robin (1997) and Out of Sight (1998), where he first teamed with long-term collaborator Steven Soderbergh. In 2001, Clooney's fame widened with the release of his biggest commercial success, Ocean's Eleven, the first of a profitable film trilogy, a remake of the movie from 1960with the members of The Rat Pack with Frank Sinatra as Danny Ocean. He made his directorial debut a year later with the 2002 biographical thriller Confessions of a Dangerous Mind and has since directed Good Night, and Good Luck (2005), Leatherheads (2008), and The Ides of March(2011). He won the 2006 Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his work in the Middle East thriller Syriana (2005).

Clooney's humanitarian work includes his advocacy of finding a resolution for the Darfur conflict, raising funds for the 2010 Haiti earthquake, 2004 Tsunami and 9/11 victims, and creating documentaries such as Sand and Sorrow to raise awareness about international crises.

Early Life : Clooney was born in Georgetown, Kentucky. His mother, Nina Bruce (née Warren, 1939-),is a former beauty pageant queen; his father,Nick Clooney, is a former anchorman, as well as a game show and American Movie Classics host. Clooney's ancestry includes Irish, German, and English. His paternal great-great-grandparents, Nicholas Clooney (of County Kilkenny) and Bridget Byron, immigrated to the United States from Ireland. Clooney was raised a strict Roman Catholic. He has an older sister, Adelia (also known as Ada); his cousins include actors Miguel and Rafael Ferrer, who are the sons of his aunt, singer Rosemary Clooney, and actor José Ferrer. He is also related to another singer, Debby Boone, who married José Ferrer and Rosemary Clooney's son Gabriel.

Clooney began his education at the Blessed Sacrament School in Fort Mitchell, Kentucky. Spending part of his childhood in Ohio, he attended St. Michael's School in Columbus, and St. Susanna School in Mason, Ohio. In middle school, Clooney developed Bell's palsy, a debilitating condition that partially paralyzes the face. The malady went away within a year. "That was the worst time of my life," he told theDaily Mirror in 2003. "You know how cruel kids can be. I was mocked and taunted, but the experience made me stronger."

His parents eventually moved to Augusta, Kentucky, where Clooney attended Augusta High School. He has stated that he earned all As and a B in school,and was an enthusiastic baseball and basketball player. He tried out to play professional baseball with the Cincinnati Redsin 1977, but was not offered a contract. He did not pass the first round of player cuts.He attended Northern Kentucky University from 1979 to 1981, majoring in Broadcast Journalism, and very briefly attended the University of Cincinnati, but did not graduate from either. He had such odd jobs as selling men's suits and cutting tobacco.

Career : Early work, 1978–94

Clooney's first role was as an extra in the TV series Centennial in 1978. The series was based on the novel of the same name by James Michener and was partially filmed in Clooney's hometown of Augusta, Kentucky. Clooney's first major role came in 1984 in the short-lived sitcom E/R (not to be confused with ER, the better-known hospital drama, on which Clooney also costarred a decade later). He played a handyman on the series The Facts of Life and appeared as Bobby Hopkins, a detective, on an episode of The Golden Girls. His first significant break was a semi-regular supporting role in the sitcom Roseanne, playing Roseanne Barr's supervisor Booker Brooks, followed by the role of a construction worker on Baby Talk and then as a sexy detective on Sisters. In 1988, Clooney also played a role in Return of the Killer Tomatoes.

International success, 2000–present

After leaving ER, Clooney starred in commercially successful projects such as The Perfect Stormand O Brother, Where Art Thou?. In 2001, he teamed up with Soderbergh again for Ocean's Eleven, a remake of the 1960s Rat Pack film of the same name. As of 2011, it was Clooney's most commercially successful movie, earning more than $450 million worldwide.] The film spawned two sequels starring Clooney, Ocean's Twelve in 2004 and Ocean's Thirteen in 2007.

In 2001, Clooney and director Steven Soderbergh co-founded the Section Eight Productions, for which Grant Heslov was president of television. Clooney made his directorial debut in the 2002 filmConfessions of a Dangerous Mind, an adaptation of the autobiography of TV producer Chuck Barris. Though the movie didn't do well at the box office, Clooney's direction showed promise.

In 2005, Clooney starred in Syriana, which was based loosely on former Central Intelligence Agency agent Robert Baer and his memoirs of being an agent in the Middle East. Clooney suffered an accident on the set of Syriana, which resulted in a brain injury with complications arising from a punctured dura. The same year he directed, produced, and starred in Good Night, and Good Luck., a film about 1950s television journalist Edward R. Murrow's famous war of words with Senator Joseph McCarthy. At the 2006 Academy Awards, Clooney was nominated for Best Director and Best Original Screenplay for Good Night, and Good Luck, as well as Best Supporting Actor for Syriana. He became the first person in Oscar history to be nominated for directing one movie and acting in another in the same year. He won the Oscar for his role in Syriana.

Clooney next appeared in The Good German (2006), a film noir directed by Soderbergh that is set in post-World War II Germany. Clooney also received the American Cinematheque Award in October 2006, an award that honors an artist in the entertainment industry who has made "a significant contribution to the art of motion pictures". In August 2006, Clooney and Heslov started the production company Smokehouse Pictures.

On January 22, 2008, Clooney was nominated for an Academy Award (and many other awards) for Best Actor for his role in Michael Clayton (2007). Clooney then directed his third film,Leatherheads (2008), in which he also starred. It was reported on April 4, 2008, in Variety that Clooney had quietly resigned from the Writers Guild of America over controversy surroundingLeatherheads. Clooney, who is the director, producer, and star of the film, stated that he had contributed in writing, "all but two scenes," of the film and requested a writing credit, alongside Duncan Brantley and Rick Reilly, who had been working on the project for 17 years. In an arbitration vote, Clooney lost 2–1 and ultimately decided to withdraw from the union over the decision. Clooney became a "financial corestatus" nonmember, meaning he loses his voting rights, and cannot run for office or attend membership meetings, according to the WGA's constitution.

Clooney next co-starred with Ewan McGregor and Kevin Spacey in The Men Who Stare At Goats, which was directed by Heslov and released in November 2009. Also in November 2009, he voiced Mr. Fox in Wes Anderson's animated feature Fantastic Mr. Fox. The same year, Clooney starred in Up in the Air, which was initially given limited release, and then wide-released on December 25, 2009. For his performance in the film, which was directed by Jason Reitman, he was nominated for a Golden Globe, a Screen Actors Guild Award, BAFTAand an Academy Award.
2010 saw the release of The American, based on the novel A Very Private Gentleman by Martin Booth and directed by Anton Corbijn. Clooney played the lead role as well as being a co-producer for the film.

As of 2011, Clooney is represented by Bryan Lourd, co-chairman of Creative Artists Agency (CAA)

Personal life : Relationships

Clooney was married to actress Talia Balsam from 1989 until they divorced in 1993. Since then, Clooney has said that he will never marry again. After meeting on the set of a Martiniadvertisement in 2000, he had a five-year on-again, off-again relationship with British model Lisa Snowdon. In June 2007, he started dating reality personality Sarah Larson, but the couple broke up in May 2008. From July 2009 to June 2011, Clooney was in a relationship with Italian actress Elisabetta Canalis. Since July 2011, Clooney has been dating former WWE DivaStacy Keibler.

Often featured in People magazine's "Sexiest Man Alive" issue, Clooney's marital status and availability are a running joke among female fans who still fantasize they have a chance to bring him to the altar. Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum in Las Vegas has a "Marrying George Clooney" photo-op in which museum visitors can put on a wedding gown and stand next to a wax statue of the actor in a tuxedo

Homes

Clooney's main home is in Los Angeles. He purchased the 7,354 square feet (683.2 m2) house in 1995 through his George Guifoyle Trust. His villa in Italy is situated in the village of Laglio, on Lake Como, near the former residence of famous Italian author Ada Negri

In the media

Clooney is one of three people to have been given the title of "Sexiest Man Alive" twice by People Magazine, first in 1997 and again in 2006.Clooney has appeared in commercials outside the US for products like Fiat, Nespresso and Martini vermouth, and has lent his voice to a series of Budweiser ads beginning in 2005.

Clooney was named one of Time magazine's 100 Most Influential People in the World in 2007, 2008, and 2009. 

South Park creators Matt Stone and Trey Parker lampooned Clooney, among other stars, in their feature film Team America: World Police. Clooney later said that he would have been offended if he hadn't been made fun of in the film.He was also mentioned in the South Parkepisode "Smug Alert!", which mocks his acceptance speech at the 78th Academy Awards. Clooney has also lent his voice to South Park, however, appearing in the episode Big Gay Al's Big Gay Boat Ride as Sparky the Dog, and as the emergency room doctor in South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut.
Clooney was also caricatured in the American Dad episode Tears of a Clooney, in which Francine sees her plans to destroy Clooney materialize.