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This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (January 2012)

Russell Ira Crowe (born 7 April 1964) is a New Zealand born Australian actor, film producer and musician. He came to international attention for his role as Roman General Maximus Decimus Meridius in the 2000 historical epic film Gladiator, directed by Ridley Scott, for which he won an Academy Award for Best Actor, a Broadcast Film Critics Association Award for Best Actor, an Empire Award for Best Actor and a London Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actor and ten further nominations for Best Actor. Crowe appeared as the tobacco firm whistle blower Jeffrey Wigand in the 1999 film The Insider, for which he received five awards as Best Actor and seven nominations in the same category. In 2001, Crowe's portrayal of mathematician and Nobel Prize winner John F. Nash in the biopic A Beautiful Mind brought him numerous awards, including an BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role, a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor category Motion Picture Drama and a Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Leading Role.
Crowe's other films include L.A. Confidential (1997), Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (2003) Cinderella Man (2005), American Gangster (2007), 3:10 to Yuma (2007) and Robin Hood (2010). Crowe's work has earned him several accolades, including a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, three Academy Award nominations in a row (1999-2001), one Golden Globe Award for Best Actor, one BAFTA, and an Academy Award. Due to his success and character variety, critics have often called him a "virtuoso" actor. He is also co-owner of South Sydney Rabbitohs, an Australian National Rugby League team.

Early life
Crowe was born on 7 April 1964 in Wellington, New Zealand, the son of Jocelyn Yvonne (née Wemyss) and John Alexander Crowe, both of whom were movie set caterers; his father also managed a hotel. Crowe's maternal grandfather, Stan Wemyss, was a cinematographer who was named an MBE for filming footage of World War II. Crowe's maternal great-great-grandmother was Māori, and his paternal grandfather was from Wrexham, Wales; Crowe also has Scottish, Norwegian, English, and German ancestry. His cousins, Martin and Jeff Crowe, are former New Zealand cricket captains.
When Crowe was four years old, his family moved to Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, where his parents pursued a career in film set catering. The producer of the Australian TV series Spyforce was his mother's godfather, and Crowe at age five or six was hired for a line of dialogue in one episode, opposite series star Jack Thompson (in 1994 Thompson played Crowe's father in The Sum of Us). Crowe also appeared briefly in serial The Young Doctors.
He was educated at the Sydney Boys High School. When he was fourteen, Crowe's family moved back to New Zealand, where he (along with his brother Terry) attended Auckland Grammar School with cousins Martin Crowe and Jeff Crowe. He then continued his secondary education at Mount Roskill Grammar School, which he left at the age sixteen to pursue his ambitions and childhood dreams of becoming a successful actor.
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This text is based on a article from the open encyclopedia Wikipedia and stands under GNU license for free documentation. On Wikipedia there is List of the authors Available. Image: Andre Luis at http://www.flickr.com/photos/35982589@N07/