Actor, born February 8, 1941, in Omaha, Nebraska. He was raised in Iowa and Nebraska, the son of Frank Nolte, an irrigation pump salesman and Helen Nolte (nee King), a department store buyer. He showed little interest in theater and movies growing up, finding the football field the best outlet for his hefty build and aggression. He attended Arizona State University to play football, but flunked out and proceeded to fail academically at four other colleges in an attempt to continue playing (Nolte did not learn to read until adulthood). At age 21, he was arrested and received a suspended sentence of 5 years in prison for selling fake draft cards. After seeing a production of Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman in 1962, Nolte finally realized his true calling. The process of acting seemed to mirror his self-questioning at the time and eased his discomfort with his environment, which he deemed “violent, aggressive, hostile, competitive.”
Nolte spent over ten years acting in regional theatres and taking small TV roles. He and actress Sheila Page married in 1966, but their relationship ended in divorce in 1971; the first in a long and painful string of failed relationships, which Nolte claimed were “very difficult to sustain, when they’re about what a society thinks a relationship should be.” His big career break came in 1975, playing the hunky wastrel Tom Jordache in the TV mini-series Rich Man, Poor Man, for which he won an Emmy award. Nolte was 35 when he played Jordache, and although he appeared ten years younger, his maturity lent a unique depth and complexity to the role. After this stellar achievement, Nolte began to appear in a string of mildly successful films including Jaws copy-cat The Deep, Who’ll Stop the Rain, North Dallas Forty, in which he got back to his football roots, and the artistically notable Heartbeat. His first commercial hit came in 1982, when he starred alongside Eddie Murphy in the Hollywood action-comedy 48 Hours. Nolte became known for his intense character research and his practice of thoroughly immersing himself during filming. While making Down and Out in Beverly Hills, he completely embraced his role as a fortunate bum, leading costar Bette Midler to exclaim, “Method is one thing, but he stinks!” He often adopted physical props in order to go deeper into a role.