Ashton Kutcher

Ashton Kutcher

Kutcher at the Time 100 Gala, May 4, 2010
Born Christopher Ashton Kutcher
February 7, 1978 (1978-02-07) (age 33)
Cedar Rapids, Iowa, U.S.
Occupation Actor/Producer
Years active 1998–present
Spouse Demi Moore (2005-present)

Ashton Kutcher (pronounced /ˈkʊtʃər/; born February 7, 1978) is an American actor, producer and former fashion model, best-known for playing Michael Kelso in the Fox sitcom That '70s Show. He also created, produced and hosted Punk'd, and played lead roles in the Hollywood films Dude, Where's My Car?, Just Married, The Butterfly Effect, The Guardian, and What Happens in Vegas. He is also the producer and co-creator of the supernatural TV show Room 401 and the reality TV show Beauty and the Geek, as well as appearing as the guest host of WWE Monday Night Raw. He is married to actress Demi Moore.

Contents

Early life

Kutcher was born Christopher Ashton Kutcher in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, to Larry Kutcher, a worker at a General Mills factory, and Diane (née Finnegan), a Procter & Gamble worker.[1][2][3] He is of part Irish ancestry on his mother's side.[2] Kutcher was raised in a conservative Roman Catholic family,[4][5] with an older sister, Tausha, and a fraternal twin, Michael, who had a heart transplant when the brothers were young children. Kutcher attended Washington High School in Cedar Rapids for his freshman year, before his family moved to Tiffin, Iowa, where he attended Clear Creek-Amana High School. In high school he played on the football team as a wide receiver and appeared in school plays.[6] However, his brother suffering from cardiomyopathy caused his home life to become increasingly stressful. He has stated that "I didn't want to come home and find more bad news about my brother" and "kept myself so busy that I didn't allow myself to feel".[7] Kutcher admitted that during adolescence, he contemplated committing suicide. At thirteen, he attempted to jump from a Cedar Rapids hospital balcony, with his father intervening in the incident.[8] Kutcher's home life worsened as his parents divorced when he was sixteen. During his senior year, he broke into his high school at midnight with his cousin in an attempt to steal money; he was arrested leaving the scene. Kutcher was convicted of third-degree burglary and sentenced to three years' probation and 180 hours of community service. Kutcher stated that although the experience "straightened him out", he lost his girlfriend and anticipated college scholarships, and he was ostracized at school and in his community.[6]

Kutcher enrolled at the University of Iowa in August 1996, where his planned major was biochemical engineering, motivated by the desire to find a cure for his brother's heart ailment.[3] At college, Kutcher was kicked out of his apartment for being too "noisy" and "wild".[9] Kutcher stated, "I thought I knew everything but I didn't have a clue. I was partying, and I woke up many mornings not knowing what I had done the night before. I played way too hard. I am amazed I am not dead."[10] He is a member of the Delta Chi fraternity. To earn money for his tuition, Kutcher worked as a college summer hire in the cereal department for the General Mills plant in Cedar Rapids, and sometimes donated blood for money.[11] During his time at UI he was approached by a scout at a bar called "The Airliner" in Iowa City and was recruited to enter the "Fresh Faces of Iowa" modeling competition. After placing first, he dropped out of college and won a trip to New York City to the International Modeling and Talent Association (IMTA) Convention. Following his stay in New York City Ashton returned to Cedar Rapids before relocating to Los Angeles to pursue a career in acting.[9]

Career

After participating as a modeling contestant in an IMTA competition (losing to Josh Duhamel) in 1998, Kutcher signed with the Next modeling agency in New York, appeared in ads for Calvin Klein, modeled in Paris and Milan, and appeared in a Pizza Hut commercial.

After some success in modeling, Kutcher moved to Los Angeles and, after his first audition, was cast as Michael Kelso in the television series That '70s Show, which debuted in 1998 and ended in 2006. Kutcher was cast in a series of film roles; although he auditioned but was not cast for the role of Danny Walker in Pearl Harbor (2001),[12] he starred in several comedy films, including Dude, Where's My Car? (2000), Just Married (2003), and Guess Who (2005). He briefly appeared in the 2004 family film, Cheaper By The Dozen, playing a self-obsessed actor. His 2004 film The Butterfly Effect was an unusually dramatic role for Kutcher, playing a conflicted young man who fell in love with a girl called Kayleigh; the film received mixed to negative reviews, but was a box-office success.[6]

In 2003, Kutcher produced and starred in his own series on MTV's Punk'd as the host. The series involved various hidden camera tricks performed on celebrities. Kutcher is also an executive producer of the reality television shows Beauty and the Geek, Adventures in Hollyhood (based around the rap group Three 6 Mafia), and The Real Wedding Crashers and the game show Opportunity Knocks. Many of his production credits, including Punk'd, come through Katalyst Films, a production company he runs with partner Jason Goldberg.[13]

Because of scheduling conflicts with the filming of The Guardian, Ashton was forced not to renew his contract for the eighth and final season of That 70s Show, although he did appear in the first four episodes of it (credited as a special guest star) and returned for the show's series finale.[6]

Kutcher was part of the management team for Ooma, a tech start-up launched in September 2007. Ooma is in the Voice over Internet Protocol business and Ashton's role was as Creative Director. He was spearheading a marketing campaign and producing viral videos to promote this service. Kutcher has also created an interactive arm of Katalyst called Katalyst Media with his partner from Katalyst Films, Jason Goldberg. Their first site is the animated cartoon Blah Girls. Ooma revamped its sales and marketing strategy with a new management team in the summer of 2008, replacing Ashton Kutcher as their creative director. Rich Buchanan, from Sling Media, became Ooma's Chief Marketing Officer.

Kutcher produced and starred in the 2010 action comedy, Killers, in which he played a hitman.[14]

Kutcher guest hosted WWE Monday Night Raw on May 31, 2010.

He also currently advertises for Nikon cameras.

Personal life

Kutcher and Moore, September 2008

In 2003, Kutcher began dating Demi Moore. Moore and Kutcher married on September 24, 2005, in a private ceremony conducted by a rabbi of the Kabbalah Centre; the wedding was attended by about 150 close friends and family of the couple, including Bruce Willis, Moore's ex-husband.[15]

Kutcher has invested in an Italian restaurant, Dolce[6] (other owners include Danny Masterson and Wilmer Valderrama) and a Japanese-themed restaurant named Geisha House located in Atlanta and Los Angeles. Kutcher is a Chelsea F.C. fan.[16]

Kutcher is a self described fiscal conservative and social liberal.[17]

On September 17, 2008, Kutcher was named the assistant coach for the freshman football team at Harvard-Westlake School in Los Angeles. However, he was unable to return in 2009 because he was filming Spread.[18][19]

Twitter presence

On April 16, 2009, Kutcher ("aplusk") became the first user of Twitter to have more than 1,000,000 followers,[20] beating out CNN in the "Million followers contest".[21][22][23] Kutcher announced via Twitter that he would be donating $100,000 to a charity to fight malaria. However, there have been several reports that Twitter manipulated the contest's results by preventing users from "unfollowing" Kutcher or CNN.[24]

Filmography

Actor

Year Film Role Notes
1998–2006 That '70s Show Michael Kelso 180 episodes
1999 Coming Soon Louie
2000 Down to You Jim Morrison
Reindeer Games College Kid
Dude, Where's My Car? Jesse Montgomery III
2001 Just Shoot Me! Dean Cassidy 1 episode
Texas Rangers George Durham
2002 Grounded for Life Cousin Scott 1 episode
2003–2007 Punk'd Himself/Host
2003 Just Married Tom Leezak
My Boss's Daughter Tom Stansfield
Cheaper by the Dozen Hank Supporting
2004 The Butterfly Effect Evan Treborn Main Role
2005 Guess Who Simon Green
A Lot Like Love Oliver Martin
Robot Chicken various voices
2006 Bobby Fisher
The Guardian Jake Fischer
Open Season Elliot Voice
2008 Miss Guided Beaux 1 episode
What Happens in Vegas... Jack Fuller lead role
2009 Spread Nikki Harper
Personal Effects Andrew Wakefield[25] main role
2010 Valentine's Day Reed Bennet
Killers Spencer Aimes

Producer

Year Title Episodes Notes
2003–2007 Punk'd 69 Episodes executive producer/host
2003 My Boss's Daughter co-producer
2004 The Butterfly Effect executive producer
You've Got a Friend 8 Episodes executive producer
2005–2008 Beauty and the Geek 48 Episodes executive producer
2007 Adventures in Hollyhood 8 Episodes executive producer
Miss Guided 7 Episodes executive producer
Game Show in My Head executive producer
The Real Wedding Crashers 7 Episodes executive producer
Room 401 8 Episodes executive producer
2008 Pop Fiction executive producer
2008–2009 Opportunity Knocks TV series (executive producer)
2009 True Beauty executive producer
The Beautiful Life 2 Episodes
Spread
2010 Killers executive producer

Video games

Awards

References

  1. ↑ "Ashton Kutcher Biography". Filmreference.com. http://www.filmreference.com/film/49/Ashton-Kutcher.html. Retrieved 2008-10-29. 
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 "DVD Interview: Ashton Kutcher". Movies.ie. http://www.movies.ie/html/article.aspx?articleid=2327. Retrieved 2008-10-29. 
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 "Interview With Ashton Kutcher — Part 2". America's Intelligence Wire. 2006-09-06. http://www.accessmylibrary.com/coms2/summary_0286-18727013_ITM. Retrieved 2008-10-29. 
  4. ↑ "Living The Dream – The Making of Spread" (Commentary with Ashton Kutcher saying; "I'm from the Mid West. I'm from a Catholic family, from a relatively conservative environment."), Spread on DVD, Katalyst Films, 2009.
  5. ↑ "itn". www.itn.co.uk. http://itn.co.uk/0c74c75dfcdaa29bc124727ef55227d8.html. 
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 "Ashton Kutcher: More than meets the eye?"
  7. ↑ "USA Weekend". Profile: Ashton's great balancing act. http://www.usaweekend.com/05_issues/050410/050410ashton_kutcher.html. Retrieved September 23, 2006. 
  8. ↑ "Hollywood.com". Profile: Ashton Kutcher Contemplate. Archived from the original on 2005-04-14. http://web.archive.org/web/20050414182642/http://www.hollywood.com/news/detail/article/2439108. Retrieved October 6, 2007. 
  9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 Meers, Erik (2001). "Dude - He's a star." Papermag.com. Retrieved October 6, 2006.
  10. ↑ "Cosmopolitan". Profile: Ashton Kutcher on past party days and his rock-solid relationship. February 1, 2001. http://www.accessmylibrary.com/coms2/summary_0286-11778752_ITM. Retrieved October 11, 2007. 
  11. ↑ Weitzman, Elizabeth (March 2000). "Kutcher in the Rye". Interview. Archived from the original on 2008-03-12. http://web.archive.org/web/20080312131953/http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1285/is_3_30/ai_60025371. Retrieved 2007-02-02. 
  12. ↑ "Pearl Harbor (2001)". Imdb.com. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0213149/trivia. Retrieved 2008-10-29. 
  13. ↑ "Two New Producers, Lots of New Projects"
  14. ↑ ""Ashton Kutcher to Shoot 'Five Killers'"". Movies.tvguide.com. 2008-10-22. http://movies.tvguide.com/Movie-News/Ashton-Kutcher-Shoot-27547.aspx. Retrieved 2010-09-05. 
  15. ↑ Oldenburg, Ann (September 27, 2006). "Changing of the 'Guardian'". USA Today. http://www.usatoday.com/life/people/2006-09-26-kutcher-costner-chat_x.htm. Retrieved 2006-09-30. 
  16. ↑ Mark Lawford. "''Daily Mail'' report". Dailymail.co.uk. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-1083477/Charlize-Theron-Will-Ferrell-cheer-Chelsea--Blues-lead-way-famous-fans-club-star-supports-team.html. Retrieved 2010-09-05. 
  17. ↑ Real Time with Bill Maher. August 14, 2009.
  18. ↑ L.A. Times report on Kutcher
  19. ↑ "''L.A. Times'' blogsite". Latimesblogs.latimes.com. 2009-09-01. http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/varsitytimesinsider/2009/09/football-no-more-coach-kutcher-at-harvardwestlake.html. Retrieved 2010-09-05. 
  20. ↑ "Inside Ashton Kutcher's world of Twitter". London: The Guardian. 2009-04-21. http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2009/apr/21/ashton-kutcher-celebrity-twitter. Retrieved 2009-04-22. 
  21. ↑   John D. Sutter. "CNN report on Kutcher". Cnn.com. http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/04/15/ashton.cnn.twitter.battle. Retrieved 2010-09-05. 
  22. ↑ "Fox News report on Kutcher". Foxnews.com. 2009-04-17. http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,516930,00.html. Retrieved 2010-09-05. 
  23. ↑ Kaufman, Gil (2009-04-17). "MTV article on Kutcher". Mtv.com. http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1609461/20090417/story.jhtml. Retrieved 2010-09-05. 
  24. ↑ Needleman, Rafe. "How to unfollow Ashton Kutcher". News.cnet.com. http://news.cnet.com/how-to-unfollow-ashton-kutcher. Retrieved 2010-09-05. 
  25. ↑ "Ashton Kutcher". 10starmovies.com. http://10starmovies.com/profiles/Ashton_Kutcher_158202/. Retrieved 2010-09-05. 

External links