Top 10 Interesting Facts about John Cusack

Photo by Georges Biard. Wikimedia Commons.

Top 10 Interesting Facts about John Cusack

John Paul Cusack is an American actor, producer, screenwriter and political activist. He is a son of filmmaker Dick Cusack, and his older sisters are actresses Joan and Ann Cusack.

Cusack was born in Evanston, Illinois into an Irish Catholic family. His father Richard Cusack was a writer-actor-producer and documentary filmmaker. He was originally from New York City. On the other hand, his mother Ann Paula  was a former mathematics teacher and political activist.

1. He has a level 6 blackbelt in kickboxing

Photo by Gerald Geronimo. Wikimedia Commons.

Cusack trained in kickboxing for over 20 years. This was done under the instructions of former world kickboxing champion Benny Urquidez. Cusack began training under Urquidez in preparation for his role in Say Anything.

He currently holds the rank of a level six black belt in Urquidez’s Ukidokan Kickboxing system. Benny Urquidez is an American kickboxer, martial arts choreographer and actor. He was nicknamed “The Jet” and he pioneered full-contact karate fighting in the United States.

2. He left his parent’s guardianship at 16 to play a role

After he was cast in The Sure Thing at 16, it became a challenge since he was not legally permitted to remain on set without a parent. The director of the film Rob Reiner became reluctant to have him on set. Later on, Jane Jenkins and Janet Hirshenson, convinced Reiner to give Cusack the audition.

Cusack managed to secure the iconic role. He had to leave his parent’s legal guardianship since he was underage throughout the film’s creation. The film creation was based in California, and his family was based in Illinois. His family got paperwork for producer Roger Birnbaum to become his legal guardian during the filming.

3. He loves helicopter snowboarding

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Cusack’s hobby includes helicopter snowboarding. The sport involves flying out to mountains that are too remote to reach via a cable car. His on-screen roles sometimes include exploring snowy vistas.

In the comedy Hot Tub Time Machine, Cusack plays one of three friends who discover a time machine at a ski resort. The movie’s filming took place at the Fernie Alpine Resort in Canada. Cusack’s character Lane also takes a tumble while skiing in Better Off Dead.

4. During his childhood he was friends with Jeremy Piven

Jeremy Piven’s parents ran a theatre workshop in Illinois. Since he had an interest in acting, Cusack attended the workshop. While Piven’s parents were working on a production of The Seagull, Cusack and Piven took it in turns to play the role of the child.

The two worked together from the age of 8 years old. They became good friends, and eventually lived together in an apartment in Chicago. They later became co-stars, appearing in ten films together including Serendipity and The Grifters.

5. He is a Chicago Cubs fan

Together with his siblings, Cusack has long supported the Chicago Cubs. Cusack tries to attend every game at Wrigley Field. “It’s hard for people who have normal sports relationships to teams to understand,” he told MLB. “Rooting for a team that’s never won [the World Series] in your lifetime, in your father’s lifetime, it’s just different. The vibe around Wrigley is just different.”

6. He is on the Hollywood Walk of Fame

Photo by Ivan Bessedin. Wikimedia Commons.

Actor John Cusack received the 2,469th star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. This was done on Tuesday, April 24th at 11:30 a.m in 2012 in front of Larry Edmunds Bookshop. Cusack received a Golden Globe award nomination for best actor in a comedy or musical in 2000 for his starring role in “High Fidelity,” for which he helped write the screenplay.

7. His favorite film of all time is the 1979 classic “Apocalypse Now”

In the movie, Captain Willard is sent to Cambodia on a dangerous mission to assassinate a renegade colonel who has won the trust of a local tribe. The best screenplays he has read during his career were “Being John Malkovich” and “Max.”

8. He took Being John Malkovich because he wanted something “unproduceable” and “bizarre”

Photo by Michele Devlin. Wikimedia Commons.

Cusack his agent William Morris, “Give me the craziest, most unproduceable script you can find… give me something that is just the most bizarre thing you’ve ever read.”

The producer presented him with the script to Being John Malkovich, and Cusack was instantly hooked. Cusack had to take lessons in marionette puppetry. Cusack’s character, an out-of-work puppeteer in NYC, is named Craig Schwartz.

9. His siblings are actors too!

Cusack’s father, Richard Cusack, was an actor and filmmaker and his five children followed in his footstep. In fact, four of the siblings John, Joan, Bill and Ann appear in Grosse Pointe Blank.

This is a 1997 black comedy that John helped to write. John’s second eldest sister is Joan Cusack, the award-winning comedian and screenwriter. Working with siblings isn’t always easy. On working with Joan for Grosse Pointe Blank, John Cusack told CBR: “I basically write some stuff on the page and get on set, and then she says whatever she wants.”

10. Cusack prefers to modify characters to suit his instincts

John Cusack at the premiere of Love and Mercy, Toronto Film Festival 2014. Photo by GabboT. Wikimedia Commons.

Cusack is willing to go against the director’s wishes if his gut tells him that his character should act differently. “They want you to be a straight leading man,” he told The New York Times, “but your instinct is to do weirder stuff.”

He once challenged what screenwriter Jim Brooks was saying about his character from “Say Anything.” In an interview with The Current, Cusack said he was convinced that Lloyd Dobler “didn’t have enough dimension” the way he was written. Cusack felt that the current version of the script didn’t put enough thought into Lloyd’s personal views. He  wanted to know more about Lloyd’s life outside of his role in the plot.