Nicolas Cage



"Cage is a good actor in good movies, and an almost indispensable actor in bad ones."

- Roger Ebert on Drive Angry

Nicolas Cage (born Nicolas Coppola, January 7, 1964) is an American actor, known for collaborating many times with film producer Jerry Bruckheimer. He changed his last name to Cage because he was related to the great director, Francis Ford Coppola, and didn't want an unfair advantage pursuing success in film on his own efforts.

Cage pursued acting as a career, making his debut on television in 1981. Cage has featured in numerous "bad boy" roles, and has won numerous awards, beginning in 1989 with his Independent Spirit Award, an Academy Award for Best Actor for his lead role in Leaving Las Vegas, and his most recent Toronto Film Critics Association Award in 2002.

Cage has appeared in over 60 films including Face Off (1997), Ghost Rider (2007), and National Treasure (2004).

He is an avid comic book fan, with his surname coming from Marvel Comics' Luke Cage, and naming his second son Kal-El (so his son's full name is Kal-El Coppola Cage). He played Ghost Rider, and was considered for Superman in a movie that struggled and never came out. In 2010, he got a serious fanboy Crowning Moment of Awesome co-starring in Kick-Ass as Crazy Awesome Badass Big Daddy, who wipes out warehouses full of mobsters single-handedly.

Leaving Las Vegas is probably the most noteworthy thing he's been involved with, he has made quite a few lesser works over the years, although this may fall under the category of Ham and Cheese. Which is why he gets some Memetic Mutation. Cracked.com once pitched the theory that he is attempting some sort of experiment where he takes only the best and worst films offered to him. Others might say that he just takes any role offered to him, because he loves what he does. Recently had some serious financial difficulties, so he's probably trying to pay the bills.

Roger Ebert named a specific trope after him; the Nicolas Cage Wig-Out Scene, as nobody plays a grown man throwing a screaming tantrum quite like Mr. Cage, and for a while it seemed an indispensable part of every one of his films. It's been lampshaded and parodied by Saturday Night Live's own Andy Samberg for the Weekend Update segment "Get in the Cage" (once such segment even had the real Nicolas Cage as a clone of Samberg's Cage created so Samberg's Cage can star in every movie ever made).

Cage is also the subject of another popular meme, "Nic Cage as Everyone", which is photo manipulations of Nicolas Cage as film/TV characters, historical figures and current celebrities. Beware, serious Uncanny Valley ahead; albeit done in utterly hilarious fashion. You will not look at The A-Team the same way again. Especially Baracus. He also has several memetic songs made from his lines, which have also become memetic.

He is also the universal constant which unites us all. After all, that was the plan - to give you a boner. And you

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Notable for:

 * Honeymoon In Vegas -- Jack Singer
 * Peggy Sue Got Married -- Charlie Bodell
 * Raising Arizona -- H. I. McDunnough
 * Vampire's Kiss -- Peter Loew (Played so over-the-top that it created a meme.)
 * Leaving Las Vegas -- Ben Sanderson
 * The Rock -- Stanley Goodspeed
 * Con Air -- Cameron Poe
 * Face Off -- Castor Troy/Sean Archer
 * Snake Eyes -- Rick Santoro
 * The Family Man
 * Adaptation. -- Charlie and Donald Kaufman
 * National Treasure series -- Benjamin Franklin Gates
 * The Wicker Man -- Edward Malus
 * Next -- Cris Johnson a.k.a. Frank Cadillac
 * A cameo as Fu Manchu in one of the Grindhouse trailers.
 * Ghost Rider -- Johnny Blaze/Ghost Rider
 * Knowing -- Dr. John Koestler
 * 8mm
 * Lord of War -- Yuri Orlov
 * City of Angels -- Seth
 * The Ant Bully -- Zoc
 * Matchstick Men
 * Moonstruck -- Ronny Camarerri
 * Bad Lieutenant Port of Call New Orleans -- Lt. Terrence McDonagh
 * Kick-Ass -- Big Daddy
 * Wild at Heart -- Sailor Ripley
 * The Sorcerer's Apprentice -- Balthazar
 * Windtalkers -- Sgt. Joe Enders
 * Season of the Witch
 * Drive Angry
 * Bangkok Dangerous (2008) -- Joe
 * Rumble Fish -- Smokey
 * Valley Girl -- Randy