Marlon Brando, Actor. Omaha, NE.

Marlon Brando (April 1924 – July 2004 ) was born in Omaha. His father was a traveling salesman and his mother was an amateur actress at the Omaha playhouse. Despite a troubled youth plagued by domestic abuse and his mother’s alcoholism, Brando showed talent from early on and excelled in theater. After being expelled from two different high schools (once for riding his motor cycle down the school hallways), Brando spent a summer digging ditches before making the move to New York City in 1943. There he began seriously studying acting with Stella Adler and the Actors Studio.

In 1947 Brando’s young career was rocketed to new heights when he was cast as Stanley Kowalski in the Broadway production of Tennessee Williams’ new play, A Streetcar Named Desire. He quickly made the transition to Hollywood, reviving the role of Stanley a few years later in the screen adaptation of Streetcar, a performance that earned him his first Academy Award nomination. Brando followed with a string of critical and commercial successes, earning a Best Actor nod for his performance in Julius Caesar and a win for On The Waterfront. His career slowed in the 1960s before resurging in 1972 with his Oscar-winning turn as Don Vito Corleone in The Godfather.