Jason Schwartzman

actor

An exceptional young player from a family of Hollywood royalty, Jason Schwartzman wasn't looking for an acting career. Yet as the star of Wes Anderson's droll comedy *Rushmore* (1998), he proved not only a capable performer, but a powerful screen presence with a promising future. Born on June 26, 1980 in Los Angeles, CA the son of late producer Jack Schwartzman and actress-director Talia Shire, the young actor could count among his clan such notables as cousin Nicolas Cage and uncle Francis Ford Coppola. Although he had auditioned for the role of Tom Hanks' matchmaking son in 1993's "Sleepless in Seattle" (which went to Ross Malinger), acting was not Schwartzman's primary focus. In 1994, he formed a band called Phantom Planet, serving as a drummer and songwriter, hearkening back to another familial influence, his grandfather, Oscar-winning composer Carmine Coppola. Schwartzman chose his subsequent roles carefully, appearing in low-budget, low-profile films which kept their integrity as individual expressions. He appeared in Roman Coppola's directorial debut *CQ* (2001), a period film about a struggling director (Jeremy Davies) making a movie about the future, and the anti-high school comedy *Slackers* (2002). He ended that year appearing in the more mainstream *Simone* (2002), starring Al Pacino as a down-and-out Hollywood director making a last ditch comeback by turning a computer-generated woman (Rachel Roberts) into a star. After gaining recognition for "California," a song he wrote for Phantom Planet that became widely known thanks to the success of the independent film *Orange County* (2002), Schwartzman starred to great effect as a speed freak in the critically acclaimed *Spun* (2003).