Jack Nicholson Jack Nicholson John Joseph Nicholson (born April 22, 1937) is an American actor and film-maker who has performed for over sixty years. He is known for playing a wide range of starring or supporting roles, including satirical comedy, romance, and dark portrayals of anti-heroes and villainous characters. In many of his films, he has played the "eternal outsider, the sardonic drifter", someone who rebels against the social structure. His most known and celebrated films include the road drama "Easy Rider" (1969); the dramas "Five Easy Pieces" (1970) and "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" (1975); the comedy-dramas "The Last Detail"
Jack Nicholson top five, including Nicholson's first for Best Actor. The role seemed perfect for Nicholson, with biographer Ken Burke noting that his "smartass demeanor balances his genuine concern for the treatment of his fellow patients with his independent spirit too free to exist in a repressive social structure". Forman allowed Nicholson to improvise throughout the film, including most of the group therapy sequences. Reviewer Marie Brenner notes that his bravura performance "transcends the screen" and continually inspires the other actors by lightening their mental illnesses with his comic dialogue. She describes his performance: Also in 1975, Nicholson starred in Michelangelo Antonioni's