Nicolas Cage is an award-winning American actor, director and producer born on January 7, 1964 in Long Beach, California. His father, August Coppola (brother of award-winning filmmaker Francis Ford Coppola), is a literature professor while his mother, Joy Vogelsang, is a dancer and choreographer. His parents divorced in 1976. He attended Beverly Hills High School but eventually dropped out to pursue a career in acting. He had his first acting debut in his school’s production of Golden Boy. In order to avoid accusations of nepotism, he changed his surname to Cage, in reference to the Marvel Comics character Luke Cage. He had his big screen debut in 1982, when he did a small role in Fast Times at Ridgemont High, opposite Sean Penn.
Nicolas Cage received his fist Academy Award for Best Actor for his outstanding performance in the 1995 romantic drama film Leaving Las Vegas. In the movie, Cage played the suicidal alcoholic Ben Sanderson who falls in love with the hooker Sera, played by Elisabeth Shue. Cage further earned artistic recognition when he portrayed Charlie and Donald Kaufman in the 2002 comedy-drama satire Adaptation, in which he earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor. The film also stars Meryl Streep, Chris Cooper, Cara Seymour, Brian Cox, Tilda Swinton, Ron Livingston and Maggie Gyllenhaal. Cage also starred in the 1996 widely acclaimed action film The Rock, alongside Seann Connery and Ed Harris. In the movie, Cage played FBI chemical weapons expert Dr. Stanley Goodspeed.
In 2004, after starring in a string of not-so-successful films, Cage starred in the adventure film National Treasure, playing the eccentric historian Benjamin Franklin Gates. The film also stars Diane Kruger, Justin Bartha, Sean Bean, Jon Voight, Harvey Keitel and Christopher Plummer. He later reprised this role for the film’s sequel National Treasure 2: Book of Secrets released in 2007.