James Stewart
20 May, 1908
| 1.91 m
Actor
Director
Producer
Biography
James Maitland Stewart was born on May 20, 1908, in Indiana, Pennsylvania, to Elizabeth Ruth (Johnson) and Alexander Maitland Stewart, who owned a hardware store. He was of Scottish, Ulster-Scots, and some English descent. Stewart was educated at a local prep school, Mercersburg Academy, where he was a keen athlete (football and track), musician (singing and accordion playing), and sometime actor.In 1929, he won a place at Princeton University, where he studied architecture with some success and became further involved with the performing arts as a musician and actor with the University Players. After graduation, engagements with the University Players took him around the northeastern United States, including a run on Broadway in 1932. But work dried up as the Great Depression deepened, and it was not until 1934, when he followed his friend Henry Fonda to Hollywood, that things began to pick up.After his first screen appearance in Art Trouble (1934), Stewart worked for a time for MGM as a contract player and slowly began making a name for himself in increasingly high-profile roles throughout the rest of the 1930s. His famous collaborations with Frank Capra, in Cieszmy się życiem (1938), Pan Smith jedzie do Waszyngtonu (1939), and, after World War II, To wspaniałe życie (1946) helped to launch his career as a star and to establish his screen persona as the likable everyman.Having learned to fly in 1935, he was drafted into the United States Army in 1940 as a private (after twice failing the medical for being underweight). During the course of World War II, he rose to the rank of colonel, first as an instructor at home in the United States, and later on combat missions in Europe. He remained involved with the United States Air Force Reserve after the war and officially retired in... show more
Movies
A house and wheelchair-bound photographer, his fashion model girlfriend and his visiting Nurse spy on neighbors from his courtyard window. Despite skepticism by his PD Detective friend, they're convinced one of his neighbors is a murderer.
An angel is sent from Heaven to help a desperately frustrated businessman by showing him what life would have been like if he had never existed.
A former San Francisco police detective juggles wrestling with his personal demons and becoming obsessed with the hauntingly beautiful woman he has been hired to trail, who may be deeply disturbed.
Two men try to convince themselves they've committed the perfect murder by hosting a dinner party after strangling a former classmate to death.
A naive youth leader is appointed to fill a vacancy in the U.S. Senate. His idealistic plans promptly collide with corruption at home and subterfuge from his hero in Washington, but he tries to forge ahead despite attacks on his character.
A senator returns to a Western town for the funeral of an old friend and tells the story of his origins.
After a rich woman's ex-husband and a tabloid-type reporter turn up just before her planned remarriage, she begins to learn the truth about herself.
An upstate Michigan lawyer defends a soldier who claims he killed an innkeeper due to temporary insanity after the victim raped his wife. What is the truth, and will he win his case?
An American doctor and his wife, a former singing star, witness a murder while vacationing in Morocco, and are drawn into a twisting plot of international intrigue when their young son is kidnapped.
Due to his insistence that he has an invisible six foot-tall rabbit for a best friend, a whimsical middle-aged man is thought by his family to be insane - but he may be wiser than anyone knows.
Two employees at a gift shop can barely stand each other, without realizing that they are falling in love through the post as each other's anonymous pen pal.
Fievel's family decides to move out to the West, unaware that they are falling into a trap perpetrated by a smooth-talking cat.
The son of a snobbish Wall Street banker becomes engaged to a woman from a good-natured but decidedly eccentric family not realizing that his father is trying to force her family from their home for a real estate development.
A family saga covering several decades of Westward expansion in the 19th century, including the Gold Rush, the Civil War, and the building of the railroads.
After an oil company plane crashes in the Sahara, the survivors are buoyed with hope by one of the passengers, an airplane designer who plans for them to build a flyable plane from the wreckage.
A cowboy's obsession with a stolen rifle leads to a bullet-ridden odyssey through the American West.
The dramatic lives of trapeze artists, a clown, and an elephant trainer are told against a background of circus spectacle.
A modern-day witch likes her neighbor but despises his fiancée, so she enchants him to love her instead.
A bounty hunter trying to bring a murderer to justice is forced to accept the help of two less-than-trustworthy strangers.
Deputy sheriff Destry tames the town of Bottle Neck, including saloon singer Frenchy.