Nicolas Cage won an Academy Award for his performance

NICOLAS CAGE

Nicolas Cage won an Academy Award for his performance as a suicidal alcoholic in the drama Leaving Las Vegas, directed by Mike Figgis. His work also earned him Golden Globe and Best Actor awards from the New York Film Critics Circle, the Los Angeles Film Critics Association, the Chicago Film Critics and the National Board of Review.
Cage further solidified his leading-man status when he received Academy Award, Golden Globe, Screen Actors Guild and BAFTA nominations for his dual role in Spike Jonze’s comedy Adaptation, co-starring Meryl Streep and Chris Cooper.

Cage most recently starred in Sony Pictures’ worldwide box office hit Ghost Rider, directed by Mark Steven Johnson, Oliver Stone’s acclaimed World Trade Center for Paramount Pictures and The Wicker Man, a mystery-thriller directed by Neil LaBute. Other recent starring roles include Gore Verbinski’s The Weather Man opposite Michael Caine, Andrew Niccol’s controversial Lord of War, Matchstick Men, directed by Ridley Scott and Next directed by Lee Tamahori.

Cage has just wrapped production on the first sequel of his career with National Treasure: Book of Secret” the follow-up to the hugely successful film National Treasure” which finds him starring as ‘Benjamin Franklin Gates’ a descendant of a family of treasure-seekers hunting for a war chest hidden by the Founding Fathers after the Revolutionary War. The film will again be directed by Jon Turteltaub for Disney and is set for a December 2007 release.

In 2002, Cage directed his first feature film, Sonny, starring Golden Globe winner James Franco, Mena Suvari, Brenda Blethyn and Harry Dean Stanton. The film was accepted into the 2002 Deauville Film Festival.

Also in 2002, Cage’s production company, Saturn Films, produced The Life of David Gale, starring Kevin Spacey, Kate Winslet and Laura Linney. Saturn Films also produced Shadow of the Vampire, for which Willem Dafoe earned an Academy Award nomination.
In 2002, Cage starred in John Woo’s World War II film Windtalkers. Other notable starring roles include Captain Correlli’s Mandolin, The Family Man, the 2000 remake of Gone in 60 Seconds opposite Angelina Jolie and Giovanni Ribisi, Martin Scorsese's Bringing Out the Dead opposite Patricia Arquette and John Goodman, Eight Millimeter with Joaquin Phoenix, the romance City of Angels, opposite Meg Ryan, Brian De Palma’s Snake Eyes and Face/Off, opposite John Travolta. Face/Off earned him a Blockbuster Entertainment Award for Favorite Actor in an Action/Adventure movie as well as three MTV Movie Award nominations for Best Male Performance, Best On-Screen Duo (with Travolta) and Best Villain.

Cage has also starred in Con Air, opposite John Cusack and John Malkovich, the blockbuster action film The Rock, with Sean Connery and Ed Harris, Guarding Tess with Shirley MacLaine, acclaimed film noir Red Rock West, romantic comedy It Could Happen to You with Bridget Fonda and Rosie Perez and Barbet Schroeder’s thriller Kiss of Death.

Cage first established himself as a serious actor with his portrayal of a tormented Vietnam vet in Birdy. He went on to earn a Golden Globe nomination as Best Actor for his role as Cher’s lover in Moonstruck. David Lynch’s Wild at Heart, in which Cage starred with Laura Dern, won the Palme d’Or at the 1990 Cannes Film Festival.
Cage received another Golden Globe nomination for his role in the romantic comedy Honeymoon in Vegas, which also starred Sarah Jessica Parker and James Caan.

Among his other honors are the Montreal World Film Festival’s prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award, the first ever Distinguished Decade in Film Award at ShoWest and the American Cinematheque 2001 Moving Picture Ball Award, which has also been awarded to such actors as Sean Connery, Mel Gibson and Jodie Foster.
His other film credits include Valley Girl, Cotton Club, Racing with the Moon, The Boy in Blue, Peggy Sue Got Married, Joel and Ethan Coen’s Raising Arizona, Vampire's Kiss and Fire Birds.

Cage was raised in Long Beach, California and moved to San Francisco when he was 12. He began acting at age 15 at San Francisco’s American Conservatory Theatre, where he appeared in the school’s production of “Golden Boy.” He later moved to Los Angeles, and while still a high school student landed a role in the television film “The Best of Times.” He made his feature film debut in Rumble Fish in 1983.
Cage currently resides in Los Angeles with wife Alice Cage