- Born
- Died
- Height1.88 m
- Carl Weathers was born on January 14, 1948, in New Orleans, Louisiana. A famous and successful football star at San Diego State, he played with the Oakland Raiders and retired from the sport in 1974, in order to give full attention to his goal: to be a real actor.
Weathers first played small parts in two blaxploitation flicks, Friday Foster (1975) (in which he played "Yarbro") and Bucktown (1975) (playing "Hambone"), both made in 1975 and directed by Arthur Marks. However, his big break came the following year when producers Irwin Winkler and Robert Chartoff chose him to play "Apollo Creed" in the blockbuster "sleeper" Rocky (1976) (real-life boxing legend Ken Norton was originally signed for the part, but it eventually went to Weathers). He went on to play "Creed" in three other "Rocky" movies, and the characters' adversarial relationship eventually evolved into a warm friendship. After Creed's death in Rocky IV (1985), Weathers met with producer Joel Silver and agreed to play an important supporting role in Predator (1987), an action film starring Arnold Schwarzenegger.
The following year, Silver produced Action Jackson (1988), a first starring role for Weathers, but it performed poorly at the box office and was panned by the critics.
During the 1990s, Weathers starred in four In the Heat of the Night (1988) two-hour TV specials that were much better received by critics and viewers alike. In 1996, he played the part of "Chubbs Peterson" in the blockbuster Adam Sandler comedy Happy Gilmore (1996). He returned to his "action roots" in two TV-movies with Hulk Hogan: Les guerriers de l'ombre (1997) and Les guerriers de l'ombre (1999).
In addition to his acting career, Weathers is also a member of the Big Brothers Association and the U.S. Olympic Committee, handling the career of athletes of various sports such as gymnastics, wrestling, swimming and judo.- IMDb mini biography by: Roger alazen
- SpousesJennifer Peterson(March 15, 2007 - January 31, 2009) (divorced)Rhona Unsell(February 20, 1984 - ?) (divorced)Mary Ann Castle(February 17, 1973 - July 22, 1983) (divorced, 2 children)
- ChildrenJason WeathersMatthew Weathers
- ParentsEmanuel N. Weathers Jr.Agnes Mae Weathers
- Towering height and muscular frame
- Good-natured even when the bad guy
- Usually sports a moustache
- During his professional football career, he played for the NFL Oakland Raiders (1970-71) and the CFL B.C. Lions (1971-73).
- His most famous character, the flashy boxer Apollo Creed from the Rocky films, was loosely based on Muhammad Ali.
- One of the original actors that auditioned for the role of Captain Benjamin Sisko on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1993). The role eventually went to Avery Brooks.
- Before his career as an actor, he was a professional football player.
- Attended and graduated from San Diego State University (SDSU) with a masters' degree in theater arts.
- My first love was acting. I went to Sidney Poitier films as a kid. I sat in the theater and dreamed of being an actor.
- I've made some films for the military that are teaching things like cultural awareness and leadership issues, that sort of stuff. And try to, in essence, look at what training they're doing and say, 'This is how you can improve the training from a humanistic point of view.'
- I've been fortunate. I've worked in a lot of things where I had those kinds of experiences with actors who were perceived as very macho guys, everybody from Lee Marvin to Charlie Bronson to Harrison Ford to Robert Shaw.
- I really try to take care of myself. I really put forth the effort to make a regimen just a part of my life. When I can't, for instance if I'm in a location someplace and I can't work out because of the schedule of the picture or whatever it is, as much as I normally do when I'm home, I still do something.
- When I start to get that few pounds, which I try to monitor, then I just pull back. So it's really just being conscious.
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