BT-06. Conversation + Tribute with Bruce Dern

Bruce Dern’s tremendous career is made up of playing both modern- day heroes and legendary villains. Through decades of critically acclaimed performances, Dern has acquired the reputation of being one of the most talented and prolific actors of his generation.

A celebrated stage actor, Dern was trained by famed director Elia Kazan at The Actor’s Studio and made his film debut in Kazan’s Wild River (1960). In the 1960s, Dern appeared regularly in contemporary Western TV series, as well as Alfred Hitchcock’s television series. Hitchcock was such a fan of Dern that he cast him in both Marnie and Family Plot (Hitchcock’s final film).

During the 1960s, Dern went on to work with director Roger Corman and appeared in several of his classic and decade-defining films, including Wild Angels. He received critical success for films such as They Shoot Horses, Don?t They? and Drive, He Said, and went down in history for his role as Long Hair in The Cowboys in which he became the first man ever to kill John Wayne. Dern went on to star in such classic films like The King of Marvin Gardens, as well as playing Tom Buchanan in The Great Gatsby (for which he received a Golden Globe nomination). It was his brilliant and powerful performance in Hal Ashby’s Coming Home that earned him both Academy Award and Golden Globe nominations.

Dern co-starred with Charlize Theron in Monster, one of the most critically acclaimed independent films of all time, and has recently worked with iconic directors Francis Ford Coppola in Twixt and Quentin Tarantino in Django Unchained. Most recently, he worked with Tarantino in The Hateful Eight. Dern won the 2013 Best Actor Award at the Cannes Film Festival, and garnered another Academy Award nomination for Best Actor in Nebraska directed by Alexander Payne.