Kiefer Sutherland

Personal Life

Kiefer Sutherland and his twin sister Rachel were born to Canadian actors Donald Sutherland and Shirley Douglas in London. When he was still a toddler, his parent’s marriage dissolved, and his mom left the family while they lived in California. She returned a few months later, taking the children to Canada, where they were raised.

The family moved a lot, and Kiefer attended several schools before dropping out of high school to pursue an acting career. He received a Genie Award for his role in The Bay Boy, his first lead. He then moved to New York to pursue acting full time.

Kiefer was married to actress Camelia Kath in the mid 1980s, but it ended in a divorce, after they had one child. He then had a very public relationship with actress Julia Roberts in the late 1980s, but she broke off their engagement just a few days before their planned wedding. He tried marriage again in 1996 to model Kelly Winn, but that also ended in divorce.

Early Career

Kiefer rose to fame with the "Brat Pack" in the 80s

Kiefer was part of Hollywood during a time when a lot of young actors were making names for themselves in coming-of-age films. He appeared in many movies with members of the "Brat Pack", a nickname given to actors including Emilio Estevez, Demi Moore, and Judd Nelson.

His first role in a mainstream movie was in 1986’s Stand By Me, which also starred River Phoenix. Kiefer Sutherland played a tough teenager who was the unofficial leader for a group of local thugs. He played a similar role, though this time as a vampire, in The Lost Boys, which was released the following year.

Taking on a more historic role, Kiefer played real life gunslinger Josiah Gordon 'Doc' Scurlock in Young Guns and Young Guns II which costarred Estevez. In 1990, he starred with Julia Roberts and Kevin Bacon in Flatliners.

Around this time, Kiefer started taking on roles in smaller films, although he also had a part in the blockbuster A Few Good Men with Tom Cruise in 1992. Over the next few years, he played both criminals and detectives in several crime films, and he got involved in directing. Although he was involved in at least two movies a year, they were small films, and Kiefer stayed out of the public eye.

24

Kiefer at an Emmy afterparty

In what many people consider the comeback of a lifetime, Kiefer Sutherland burst onto the scene in 2001 in the experimental Fox action-drama 24. Playing the role of Jack Bauer, a federal agent who has twenty-four hours to save the country from a nuclear explosion, nerve gas attack, or presidential assassination, the show is filmed in real time so each episode captures sixty minutes of drama.

Working out of the fictional Counter Terrorism Unit in Los Angeles, Bauer and his revolving cast of co-workers hunt down bad guys using sophisticated technology and tracking devices. The first five seasons of 24 have been rough on Bauer; his wife is killed by his former lover, he spends time undercover in Mexico tracking drug lords and gets addicted to heroin in the process, he fakes his death to avoid being detained by the Chinese, and he returns to his job to find the former president’s assassin.

In 2006, Kiefer’s hard work paid off with an Emmy win for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series and for Outstanding Drama Series. Kiefer reportedly signed a $40 million contract for three more years of 24, as both an actor and executive producer, and is also developing a 24 movie.

Recent Projects

As if he isn’t already busy enough, Kiefer also starred in several recent films including Phone Booth and The Sentinel. He also owns a recording company and is managing a band called Rocco Deluca & The Burden from Long Beach, California.