Biography for
Mike Nichols (I)

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Date of Birth

6 November 1931, Berlin, Germany

Birth Name

Michael Igor Peschkowsky

Height

5' 11" (1.80 m)

Mini Biography

He, along with the other members of the "Compass Players" including Elaine May, Paul Sills, Byrne Piven, Joyce Hiller Piven and Edward Asner helped start the famed "Second City Improv" company. They used the games taught to them by fellow cast mate, Paul Sills 's mother, Viola Spolin. He later worked in legitimate theater as an actor before entering into a very successful comedy duo with Elaine May. The two were known as "the world's fastest humans".

IMDb Mini Biography By:

Spouse

Diane Sawyer	(29 April 1988 - present)
Pat Scot	(8 June 1957 - ?) (divorced)
Margo Callas	(? - ?) (divorced) 1 child
Annabel Davis-Goff	(? - ?) (divorced) 2 children

Trade Mark

Often includes extremely long starting and/or ending shots taken from high in the air, for example Working Girl (1988) and "Angels in America" (2003).

Trivia

Back in Berlin, Mike's father was part of a young intellectual circle that included Russian immigrants such as Vladimir Nabokov's sister and Boris Pasternak's parents.

Fled from Berlin with his family in 1939.

One of Directors Guild of America annual Honorees, 2000.

When he won two Emmys in 2001, he joined an elite circle of peers who have won at least one of every major show business award (Oscar, Emmy, Tony, Grammy). Some of the other performers to have done this includes Rita Moreno and Mel Brooks. There are currently nine people who have won all four awards in standard competitive categories.

Has won seven Tony Awards: as Best Director (Dramatic), in 1964 for "Barefoot in the Park," in 1965 for "Luv" and "The Odd Couple," in 1968 for "Plaza Suite," and in 1972 for "The Prisoner of Second Avenue;" as Best Director (Play) in 1984 for Tom Stoppard's "The Real Thing," Best Director (Musical) in 2005 for "Spamalot;" and in 1977 as one of the producers of Best Musical winner "Annie." He has also been Tony-nominated seven other times: in 1967 as Best Director (Musical) for "The Apple Tree," in 1974 as Best Director (Dramatic) for "Uncle Vanya;" in 1977, twice as Best Director (Play), for "Comedians" and for David Rabe's "Streamers;" in 1978, as Best Director (Play) and as one of the producers of Best Play nominee "The Gin Game;" and in 2003 as co-producer of Special Theatrical Event nominee "The Play That I Wrote."

One of 5 recipients of the 2003 Kennedy Center Honors; other recipients were James Brown, Carol Burnett, Loretta Lynn and Itzhak Perlman.

Lost much of his body hair in early childhood due to a bad batch of whooping cough vaccine.

Biography in: John Wakeman, editor. "World Film Directors, Volume Two, 1945-1985". Pages 704-710. New York: The H.W. Wilson Company, 1988.

Directed Postcards from the Edge (1990), which was written by Carrie Fisher and based on her relationship with her real-life mother, Debbie Reynolds. He later directed Closer (2004/I), with featured Fisher's on-screen Star Wars mother, Natalie Portman.

Directed 17 different actors in Oscar-nominated performances:Elizabeth Taylor, Sandy Dennis,Richard Burton, George Segal,Dustin Hoffman, Anne Bancroft,Katharine Ross, Ann-Margret, Meryl Streep,Cher, Melanie Griffith, Sigourney Weaver,Joan Cusack, Kathy Bates, Natalie Portman, Clive Owen, and Philip Seymour Hoffman. Taylor and Dennis won Oscars for their performances in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966).

According to Jack Nicholson's April 1972 Playboy Magazine interview, Nichols asked Nicholson and other cast members not to smoke marijuana while filming Carnal Knowledge (1971) on location in Vancouver, British Columbia, where cannabis was easily available. Nichols thought that it dulled an actor's performance.

Worked at the Howard Johnson's restaurant in New York's Times Square when he was 17 years old.

Father of Daisy (born in 1964), Max Nichols (born in 1974) and Jenny Nichols (born in 1977).

Since the early 1960s, he has been a well-renowned figure among Arabian Horse fans - breeder of over 400 registered Arabians and has bred and owned many US National Champion horses.

Received the first $1,000,000 director salary for Catch-22 (1970).

He was awarded the American National Medal of the Arts in 2001 by the National Endowment of the Arts in Washington D.C.

Two of his films are on the American Film Institute's 100 Most Inspiring Movies of All time. They are Working Girl (1988) at #87 and Silkwood (1983) at #66.

Was interested to direct First Blood (1982) with Dustin Hoffman as John Rambo.

Attended the University of Chicago.

Became a naturalized US citizen in 1944.

Formed a comedy team with Elaine May, appearing in nightclubs, on radio and television and most notably at President Jimmy Carter's inauguration gala.

Teaches occasionally at The New Actor's Workship in New York City.

Son Max is married to ESPN reporter Rachel Nichols.

When he won his first Oscar as Best Director for The Graduate (1967), the statuette was presented to him by actress Leslie Caron.

Personal Quotes

"A movie is like a person. Either you trust it or you don't."

"It's not a film-maker's job to explain his technique, but to tell his story the best way he can."

"I've never understood that aspect of DVDs, where you suddenly put back the things you took out that could go. Why ruin your movie? With material that you've taken out? I never get that. I don't have that impulse... To put them back seems very unpleasant to me. And pointless. It's like when you've written something, when you cut a paragraph, doesn't it seem dead to you? Doesn't it look like something you'd never want to include, because the point is, it could go? You'll never see anything in my pictures, the stuff that came out, stays out."

"If everybody's adorable, you can't go anywhere, you can't have any events."

"I love to take actors to a place where they open a vein. That's the job. The key is that I make it safe for them to open the vein."

"When I was 17, for my first job, I worked at the midtown Howard Johnson's. A customer asked me what our ice-cream flavor of the week was, which was a dumb question, because there was a huge banner showing that it was maple. So I told him that it was chicken. The customer laughed, but the manager fired me immediately. They were bastards there."

[Part of 2005 Tony Award acceptance speech] "God, my head is totally empty. I had a thing I was going to say, and I have forgot it, because I had given up so long ago. But the first thing to say is thank you. To the other members of my category, my friends Jack and James and Bartlett, I guess you are thinking age before beauty, me too! My congratulations to the winners. My love to those who have not won tonight. I just want to remind you of my motto: Cheer up, life isn't everything. It always stands me in good stead."

[on working with Orson Welles on "Catch-22"] We were talking about Jean Renoir one day on the set and Orson said, very touchingly, that Renoir was a great man but that unfortunately Renoir didn't like his pictures. And then he said, "Of course, if I were Renoir I wouldn't like my pictures either."

[on Jack Nicholson] Jack is the sort of guy who takes parts others have turned down, might turn down, and explodes them into something nobody could have conceived of. All his brilliance of character and gesture is consumed and made invisible by the expanse of his nature.

[on Elizabeth Taylor] There are three things I never saw Elizabeth Taylor do: Tell a lie; be unkind to anyone; and be on time.

Salary

Catch-22 (1970)	$1,000,000
Teach Me! (1968)	$1,000,000 + 10% of profits
The Graduate (1967)	$500,000
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966)	$250,000

Where Are They Now

(February 2005) Director of hit Broadway musical 'Monty Python's Spamalot' ("lovingly ripped off from Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975).")

(June 2005) Won a Tony Award for directing.

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