Last 'Golden Boy' of Hollywood Kirk Douglas Celebrates His 100th Birthday!

Kirk Douglas has outlived all his famous contemporaries. Just like in his films, whether playing the role of a detective, boxer, or fighter for justice – he always stays on his feet and survives.

The oldest star of Hollywood is celebrating his milestone 100th birthday. He will celebrate with his Hollywood dynasty of famous actors, his son Michael Douglas and daughter-in-law Catherine Zeta-Jones.

While Michael confirms that his father is „feeling great“, Catherine adds that he is „more handsome and charming than ever“. The fact is that the Hollywood titan has still not lost the sparkle in his eye and his ever-ready humor. When told he is a living legend, the veteran replies – „At least I'm alive“. Even in his late 90s, he was able to perform scenes from his famous film Spartacus in a way that leaves no one indifferent.

Early Decisions

He decided to pursue acting at the age of 7, when he got a role in a school play. „They applauded me, and since then I have been constantly searching for that feeling,“ he said in one of his many interviews.

However, as in everyone's life, not everything went smoothly in Kirk's – he survived a helicopter crash and a stroke after which he had to relearn how to speak.

His path to success begins in Amsterdam, a city in New York State, where he was born into a family of Russian Jews who immigrated to the USA. Issur Danielovitch, his birth name, was the only boy among 7 children. He longed to escape family poverty, neighborhood anti-Semitism, and the stifling „female atmosphere“ at home – his father, of difficult temperament and with a drinking problem, was rarely home.

With $163 and not exactly smelling fresh after a ride on a manure truck, he came to enroll at St. Lawrence University. Soon after, he changed his name and won a scholarship to the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. His fellow student, also a student, Lauren Bacall, seeing the condition of his coat, asked her uncle to give him one of his own, which Kirk wore for two whole years.

Lauren Bacall intervened in Kirk's life once more when she recommended him to a Hollywood producer.

In just 10 years, Kirk Douglas earned 3 Academy Award nominations, for the films Champion (1949), The Bad and the Beautiful (1952), and Lust for Life (1956).

By then, his first marriage to former college sweetheart Diana had already fallen apart.

- He was an incredibly dynamic, charismatic, very masculine man who loved women, and my mother quickly discovered that, his son Michael explained in an interview with the Guardian. „In just 18 months he spent in California, she saw quite enough to decide on a divorce.“

Kirk later married Anne Buydens, a film publicist of Belgian-German origin, and remained in a happy marriage with her.

The actor, who has made more than 85 films, can also be proud of his humanitarian work. Besides the millions he has given for these purposes, his last donation of $15 million was given last year to a center for the treatment of Alzheimer's disease.

However, wealth could not protect him from tragedy. In 1991, he barely survived a helicopter crash in which two people died. In 2004, he lost his son Eric, who died of a drug overdose.

He survived a stroke and wrote about it in one of his 10 books – „My Stroke of Luck“. He spoke for the first time after his illness at the 1996 Academy Awards. Rehearsed to say „thank you,“ he felt he had to say something more before the 2,000 people standing and applauding him, so he managed to say

- This is for my wife Anne. I love you.

(Hello Magazine)