William J. Dafoe was born on the 22nd July 1955, in Appleton, Wisconsin, USA, to a father of French and English descent, and mother of Irish, Scottish and German descent. He is an actor, known for his roles in over 100 films, particularly “Platoon”, “The Last Temptation Of Christ”, “Shadow Of The Vampire”, and “Spider-Man”. He is also recognized as a voice actor, known for providing the voice in “Finding Nemo” and “The Simpsons”.
Have you ever wondered how rich is Willem Dafoe, as of early 2016? According to sources, it is estimated that the overall amount of Willem’s net worth is over $25 million, mainly accumulated from his career in the theatre and movie industries now spanning over 40 years.
Willem Dafoe Net Worth $25 Million
Willem Dafoe was one of seven children, the son of Dr. William Alfred Dafoe, a surgeon, and Muriel Isabel, a nurse. He attended Einstein Junior High School, and then Appleton East High School, from which he was expelled for shooting a pornographic film. Thus, his career began, but he also continued his education, studying Drama at the University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee, but only for a year, in order to join the theatre company Theatre X, and begin his professional acting career. Soon after, he moved to New York and became a part of the theatre troupe The Performance Group. However, Willem soon got involved with Elizabeth LeCompte in a romantic relationship, although she was 11 year older than him. She left the Performance Group, and started her own theatre group, entitled “Wooser Group”, which Willem joined within a year of its creation.
His acting career began back in 1980, when he was selected for a small role in the film “Heaven’s Gate”, but he was edited out. Anyway, he stayed in the acting world, soon acquiring a role in the film “The Loveless” (1981). Since then, his career has only gone upwards, and he has appeared in over 100 film titles, which became the main source of his net worth over the years. During the 1980s, he appeared in films such as “Streets Of Fire” (1984), “Roadhouse 66” (1985), “Platoon” (1986), “Off Limits” (1988), and “Mississippi Burning” (1988), among others. The role of Sergeant Elias in “Platoon” led Willem to a nomination for an Oscar award and added a lot to his overall wealth.
The 1990s only increased the number of films in which Willem appeared, and also increased his overall net worth. He was featured in over 15 films, some of those are “Cry Baby” (1990), “Wild At Heart” (1990), and “Light Sleeper” (1992) – for which he won Sant Jordi Award for Best Foreign Actor – “Clear And Present Danger” (1994), “The English Patient” (1996), “Speed 2: Cruise Control” (1997), and “The Boondock Saints” (1999), among others.
In the 1990s, Willem also began ‘voice acting’, making his debut in the popular TV series “The Simpsons” in 1997, and was soon featured in animated films such as “Globehunters” (2000) and “Finding Nemo” (2003).
In the 2000s, his career became even bigger, as he was in constant demand by directors. Willem was cast in “Shadow of the Vampire” (2000), a horror film directed by E. Elias Merhige, portraying Max Schreck, and being nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, plus winning several awards, such as Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Male, and Los Angeles Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting Actor. Among Other films in which he was cast are “Spider-man” (2002) followed by “Spider-man 2” (2004) and “Spider-man 3” (2007); “The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou” (2004), “Before It Had A Name” (2005), “Inside Man” (2006), “Mr. Bean’s Holiday” (2007), , “Go Go Tales” (2007), “Antichrist” (2009), “The Hunter” (2011), “Out OF The Furnace” (2013) his net worth rose steadily.
Most recently, Willem’s net worth has been increased by appearances in films “Bad Country” (2014), “John Wick” (2014), “The Fault In Our Stars” (2014), “The Grand Budapest Hotel” (2014), “My Hindu Friend” (2015). At the moment, he is filming “The Great Wall”, “The Headhunter’s Calling”, “What Happened To Monday”, and “Dog Eat Dog”, all of which are scheduled to be released by the end of 2016, demonstrating that he is still in high demand, and undoubtedly raising his net worth.
Regarding his personal life, Willem Dafoe has been married to Giada Colagrande, a director and actress, since 2005. With his previous partner, Elizabeth LeCompte (1977-2004), Williem has a son. At the present day, he lives with Giada and they divide their time between New York, Los Angeles, and Italy. Willem spends his free time practicing Yoga.
Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Male, Bodil Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role, Los Angeles Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting Actor, Satellite Award for Best Supporting Actor – Comedy or Musical
Nominations
Academy Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role, Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture, Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture, Critics' Choice Movie Award for Best Acting Ensemble, MTV Movie Award for Best Villain, Screen Acto...
Movies
Justice League, Spider-Man, Antichrist, The Great Wall, The Grand Budapest Hotel, Platoon, John Wick, The Fault in Our Stars, John Carter, Finding Dory, The Hunter, The Boondock Saints, Death Note, Finding Nemo, XXX: State of the Union, Dog Eat Dog, Speed 2: Cruise Control, Spider-Man 3, American Ps...
TV Shows
Fishing with John, Festival Pass with Chris Gore
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Trademark
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Deeply lined face that can be contorted to frightening effect
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Prominent cheekbones
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Characters that often meet a grim fate
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Psychotic unstable characters
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Low-key, yet gravelly voice
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Quote
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There's a funny perception that I play bad guys, but if you really know my movies, the big and small ones, the truth is often I play good guys. But they're good guys that are flawed, good guys who are outside of society. They're odd or they're criminals, but morally they tend to function as good people.
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I'm always very fond of laconic, cut-off characters that have a rich inner life, and you have to restrain that.
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[2004, on selection parts] I'm always looking for an adventure-I try not to work just to work. I always try to find people that are burning to tell a story and then help them do it. I try to avoid anyone that pokes around-filmmaking should be an opportunity to make something that's very thrilling and, you know, exciting. On some level, I'm a sensation junkie.
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On The Last Temptation of Christ (1988): It had a profound influence on me. Marty [Scorsese] had made this movie in his head for years, and I felt privileged to be involved.
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I always like to mix it up. It's like anything. If you're eating pasta for a week, eventually, you crave something else. A balanced diet of different roles and different stories and movies - I think it's the way to stay healthy artistically and career wise. It does a funny thing because you're not refining one way of seeing you. That's one way to have a career. You can make a persona, corner a market, and make yourself almost a thing. You can use that and that can be interesting iconographical but I still am that actor who likes to bend myself to the material rather than find material to support some idea of who I am or some persona that I've made, or some mask that I've made. - On his career.
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Most of the work happens when you're on the set. It's like going to a cocktail party - you know who's going to be there, you have certain expectations about the topics of conversation and the social dynamic. At the same time, when you arrive, you've got to be able to abandon those preconceptions and be mercurial. But sometimes the most important thing is just having a good costume. - On preparation for the characters he plays.
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On principle I don't have favorites. To pass judgment on something you've done is a face-saving act, and I think it kinda stinks. There are all kinds of movies, all kinds of impulses and all kinds of needs for people watching movies, and sometimes I'll do a movie that I don't particularly care for, but then I'll run into someone that it speaks to and they love it. So for me, to give my personal take on it, could mean ruining that movie for someone else, because they can find pleasure where I can't. - On his favorite roles.
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Sometimes I envy their power and money, and other times I feel sorry for them since they have a gun to their head. They have so much to protect that they have to be very careful, thus very certain every step of the way, and that leaves out a lot of work of any freshness. I don't want to do that - I'm not that kind of actor. - On top Hollywood actors.
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It's one of those invented things. I spend a lot of time in Germany so it's in my head. I didn't feel the need to go to a dialogue coach and be very strict with it because that's not in the spirit of how it should be approached. My take was that it should be played with and invented. It's my idea of a Germanish accent - On his accent in The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004).
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Sometimes I have a desire to control what I do a little bit, especially when I do a smaller movie. But basically, my impulses are the impulses of a child. I like being the thing itself. I don't like thinking about it. And that doesn't mean I'm not analytical or that I'm anti-intellectual. I'm not trying to say I'm a totally intuitive kind of guy. It's just that my real pleasure, where I feel vital and everything drops away, is when I'm in the middle of doing it, and I look for that opportunity untainted by other responsibilities. But I'm getting too serious. When I try to explain what I do, I get a little bit disgusted with myself because I come off too earnest. In the simplest terms, it's a pleasure to borrow someone else's body and someone else's life. That's the craft, and it's a bit like voodoo, because you don't know exactly how you do it. - On his acting style.
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All the time, as an actor, you want to be asking what's next and where things are going. If you're not asking those questions you're not growing.
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When you look back at your experiences, it's true that sometimes the most horrendous experiences can translate into being your best work.
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Any actor who tells you that he makes choices, absolutely, is wrong. You find work and work finds you.
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I'm an optimist. I hope if a movie's good that it will be a success, but as we know, that's not always true, just because of popular taste, advertising, distribution patterns, there's lots of reasons. When something doesn't do better than it deserves to in your mind, it's pretty transparent, you usually know why. Is that a comfort? Yes, because it's logical. Does it make you happy? No, because if you think a movie is beautiful or interesting, you want to share it. It's really true; there's no accounting for taste. Sometimes you make very interesting movies that aren't meant for everybody. But this is a capitalist society, so everything conspires to put value on whether it sells or not. While we have a very strong popular culture, the roots of our culture are very shallow, and we put emphasis on how a movie does as far as the box office goes. Many years ago, it would have been vulgar to print box-office grosses in the paper. Now The New York Times does it, and it's the big story for people interested in arts and entertainment on Monday. Which is why emphasis has shifted away from filmmakers and fallen on movie stars and business people.
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I never act. I simply bring out the real animal that's in me.
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[on why he became an actor]: "You know, it shifts. When it starts out in the beginning, I think it's purely a social thing. The thing you get reinforcement for, it's a way of acting out. It's a way of getting attention. It's a way of just fitting in socially. And then, as I get older, it transforms into something else."
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[on whether good actors help other actors]: "You're always looking for good people to work with, because you feed each other. That's all."
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...it's very clear that a lot of people that have really strong instincts as actors are very often inarticulate...Sometimes, you know, classically, if someone's very intellectual, they aren't as connected to the doing of things. And the doing is really the key to finding the emotionality and the spirit of things.
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I'm one of those people who when I go over a bridge, I want to jump. It's just this intense tickle in the back of my throat. It's like I'm on the verge the whole time I'm walking over that bridge, and I'm not going to get a release until I jump.
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The worst thing is to get involved with people who aren't passionate about what they're doing.
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Weirdness is not my game. I'm just a square boy from Wisconsin.
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I wish to Christ I could make up a really great lie. Sometimes, after an interview, I say to myself, 'Man, you were so honest - can't you have some fun? Can't you do some really down and dirty lying?' But the puritan in me thinks that if I tell a lie, I'll be punished.
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Casting people feel that they have to get someone who looks a certain way, and I think that the jury is still out whether people find me attractive or not.
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I don't think people want to see me as a regular guy, besides, I'm a regular guy in real life. I guess I just want to be reckless in my work.
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[on his role in The Last Temptation of Christ (1988)]: "To this day, I can't believe I was so brazen to think I could pull off the Jesus role."
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Fact
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He received an Honorary Doctorate from the Cleveland Institute of Art.
He has English, Irish, Scottish, German, Swiss, and French ancestry.
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Built sets and acted with experimental Milwaukee, Wisconsin group Theatre X, before moving to New York in 1977, where he worked with the Wooster Group at the Performing Garage.
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To date he has shot 18 films in Europe. [2007]
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Provided his voice on Lou Reed's 2003 album "The Raven". On it, he performs a re-written and reworked, spoken-word version of Edgar Allan Poe's poetry.
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Was involved for decades (from 1977) with theater director and actress Elizabeth LeCompte, who was also a member and director of the Wooster Group. He later married an Italian writer/director in 2005.
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Member of Jury for 2007 Berlin International Film Festival.
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Was a candidate for the role of the Joker in Batman (1989).
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Visited Sarajevo Film Festival (in post-war Bosnia) together with Steve Buscemi in year 2000.
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Was offered the role of Senator Roark in Sin City (2005).
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Was listed as a potential nominee on the 2006 Razzie Award nominating ballot. He was listed as a suggestion in the Worst Supporting Actor category for his performance in the film xXx: State of the Union (2005) However, he failed to receive a nomination. (Had he gotten the nomination, it would have been his third overall. He was previously nominated for Worst Supporting Actor at the 1998 Razzie Awards for his role in Speed 2: Cruise Control (1997), and for Worst Actor at the 1994 Razzie Awards for his performance in Body of Evidence (1993).)
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Brother, Donald Dafoe, is an accomplished transplant surgeon.
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While doing a blocking run-through on Wild at Heart (1990) (for the scene in which Dafoe's character threatens to rape Laura Dern's character), Dafoe playfully sang his lines. Director David Lynch loved this, and wanted Dafoe to actually sing his lines in the scene, when they shot it. The idea did not actually go through, however.
John Malkovich, Nicolas Cage, and Dafoe were all approached to play the Green Goblin in Spider-Man (2002). Dafoe and Malkovich starred in Shadow of the Vampire (2000) together, while Cage produced the film. Dafoe ended up getting the Spider-Man role.
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Often portrays soldiers or eccentric characters.
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The only actor to ever be nominated for an Oscar for playing a vampire, for his role as Max Schrek in Shadow of the Vampire (2000).
Attended Appleton East High School in Appleton, Wisconsin.
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He was delirious for 24 hours after coming down with yellow fever on the set of Platoon (1986).
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He did practically all of his own stunts on the glider in Spider-Man (2002). So when you see the Green Goblin moving around on it, when it's not CG, then it's Willem pretty much the whole time.
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He attended Einstein Junior High School in Appleton, Wisconsin, where he was known as "Billy."
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Says he feels like he's missed out on more conventional roles because he's perceived as an eccentric actor in dark little films, kind of the boy-next-door type - if you lived next door to a mausoleum.
$25 Million
