Actor’s Spotlight: Thomas Jane

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Thomas Jane, 48, was born on February 22, 1969 in Baltimore, Maryland, as Thomas Elliott to Cynthia, an antique’s dealer and Thomas Elliott Jr., a genetic’s engineer.

After graduating high school, he moved to Hollywood to pursue his dream of becoming an actor. Soon afterwards he landed a small role in the gay-themed drama I’ll Love You Forever…Tonight which was followed by a small part in the 1992 film, Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Two short years later, Jane stepped into the lead for the quirky crime comedy entitled At Ground Zero and a role in the ill-fated Crow sequel, The Crow: City of Angels followed in 1996. The next year, he was cast in the starring role of real-life beatnik Neal Cassady for the independent film, The Last Time I Committed Suicide with Keanu Reeves.

By late 1997, Jane’s star was steadily rising thanks to supporting parts in Face/Off and Boogie Nights. In 1999, with his role as a shark wrangler in the open-water thriller Deep Blue Sea, he graduated to a semi noticeable Hollywood star.  In 2001, he portrayed baseball legend Mickey Mantle in the acclaimed, made-for-HBO feature 61*. Though performances in The Sweetest Thing (2002) and Dreamcatcher (2003) went largely unseen due to poor box-office performances, audiences could be rest assured that they would see plenty of the actor again when he donned the famous skull T-shirt and loaded up his guns to rid the streets of crime in the eagerly anticipated comic book adaptation of The Punisher in 2004. While Jane’s performance as an infamous gangster was solid in the action thriller Give ‘Em Hell Malone, he wouldn’t find true success with mainstream audiences until he took on the leading role in HBO’s Hung (2009-2012), which was a dark comedy following a history teacher who moonlights as a prostitute. He currently stars in Syfy’s critically acclaimed space mystery, The Expanse.

Jane has one child, Harlow Olivia Calliope, whom he shares custody with former wife Patricia Arquette. He currently lives in Los Angeles, California.