By Sabrina Mason
FROM WIKIPEDIA COMMONS
Viggo Peter Mortensen Jr. R (Danish: [ˈviko ˈmɒːtn̩sn̩]; born October 20, 1958) is an American actor, musician, and filmmaker. He is the recipient of various accolades, including nominations for three Academy Awards for Best Actor, three BAFTA Awards, four Golden Globe Awards, and an Independent Spirit Award.
Born in Watertown, New York, and raised mainly in Argentina and New York, Mortensen made his film debut in a small role in Peter Weir‘s 1985 thriller Witness. He went on to play supporting roles in several notable films during the 1990s, including The Indian Runner (1991), Carlito’s Way (1993), Crimson Tide (1995), Daylight (1996), The Portrait of a Lady (1996), G.I. Jane (1997), A Perfect Murder (1998), A Walk on the Moon (1999), and 28 Days (2000).
Mortensen gained international attention for playing Aragorn in the fantasy trilogy The Lord of the Rings (2001–2003). He gained acclaim for his collaborations with filmmaker David Cronenberg in the thrillers A History of Violence (2005), Eastern Promises (2007), for which he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor, and A Dangerous Method (2011). He gained additional Academy Award nominations for his leading roles as an anarchist father in Captain Fantastic (2016) and as Tony Lip in Green Book (2018). Mortensen made his directorial debut with Falling (2020), in which he also starred, and which was nominated for the Goya Award for Best European Film.
Aside from acting, Mortensen has explored fine arts, photography, poetry, and music. In 2002, he founded the Perceval Press to publish both his works and the works of little-known artists and authors. Mortensen sang and composed for part of The Lord of the Rings soundtrack and has collaborated with guitarist Buckethead on several albums.
TODAY’S ALMANAC
Question of the Day
Advice of the Day
Home Hint of the Day
Word of the Day
Puzzle of the Day
Born
- Sir Christopher Wren (architect) –
- John Dewey (philosopher) –
- Charles Ives (composer) –
- Jelly Roll Morton (jazz musician) –
- Arlene Francis (actress) –
- Grandpa Jones (country music performer) –
- Art Buchwald (journalist) –
- Dr. Joyce Brothers (psychologist) –
- Mickey Mantle (baseball player) –
- Michael McClure (poet) –
- Jerry Orbach (actor) –
- Tom Petty (musician; Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers) –
- Keith Hernandez (baseball player) –
- Viggo Mortensen (actor) –
Died
- Sir Richard Burton (explorer) –
- Herbert Hoover (31st U.S. president) –
- Jane Wyatt (actress) –
- Oscar de la Renta (fashion designer) –
Events
- The town clock in Halifax, Nova Scotia, began keeping time–
- Louisiana Purchase ratified by U.S. Senate–
- 49th parallel determined as western U.S/Canadian border–
- Last day of Prince of Wales’s North American tour, Portland, Maine–
- Canadian newspaper La Presse debuted–
- The first cork-centered baseball, invented by Benjamin Shibe, was used in the World Series in Chicago–
- Laurel and Hardy’s The Flying Deuces debuted–
- Jacqueline Kennedy married Greek shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis–
- John Bardeen became the first person to win two Nobel Prizes in the same field. He received the awards in 1956 and 1972 for his theory of superconductivity and development of electronic transistors–
- A plane carrying the group Lynyrd Skynyrd crashed in Mississippi–
- Oakland/Berkeley firestorm began in California–
- The Boston Red Sox made baseball history by becoming the first baseball team to lose the first three games of a best-of-seven series, then come back with four victories to win it–
- ABC-TV pulled the plug on Miss America, leaving the famous beauty pageant without a network television sponsor for the first time in 50 years–
Weather
- Sheridan, Wyoming, experienced a bad snowstorm–
COURTESY www.almanac.com
