Oliver Stone Biography Quotes 30 Report mistakes

Early Life
William Oliver Stone was born on September 15, 1946, in New York City. He grew up the only child of Louis Stone, a Wall Street stockbroker, and Jacqueline, his French-born mother, moving between the structure of Manhattan life and extended stays in France. The dual heritage and the contrast between business pragmatism at home and a broader, European cultural perspective shaped his outlook. He attended elite preparatory schools and briefly enrolled at Yale University before leaving to travel and work. Drawn to Southeast Asia, he spent time in Vietnam as a civilian, an experience that preceded a decisive shift in his life.

Vietnam and Film School
Stone enlisted in the U.S. Army and served in Vietnam from 1967 to 1968. Combat duty left him wounded and decorated, including the Bronze Star and two Purple Hearts. The war marked him deeply, supplying the moral urgency and firsthand detail that would drive his later work. After returning to the United States, he studied filmmaking at New York University, where Martin Scorsese was among his teachers. At NYU he began to translate battlefield memory, political skepticism, and a love of cinematic experiment into narrative craft.

Early Career and Breakthrough as a Writer
Stone's first features as a director, Seizure (1974) and The Hand (1981), were small and edgy, signaling an appetite for psychological intensity. His major breakthrough came as a screenwriter with Midnight Express (1978), directed by Alan Parker and produced by David Puttnam, which earned him the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. He followed with the screenplay for Scarface (1983), collaborating with director Brian De Palma and producer Martin Bregman, forging a visceral, contemporary gangster saga anchored by Al Pacino.

Ascent in the 1980s
Reentering directing with political immediacy, Stone made Salvador (1986), starring James Woods and Jim Belushi, a ferocious account of U.S. entanglement in Central America. That same year he released Platoon (1986), drawn from his Vietnam experience and featuring Charlie Sheen, Willem Dafoe, and Tom Berenger. Produced by Arnold Kopelson, Platoon won the Academy Award for Best Picture, and Stone won his first Best Director Oscar. The momentum continued with Wall Street (1987), co-written with Stanley Weiser, starring Michael Douglas and Charlie Sheen; Douglas's portrayal of Gordon Gekko won him an Academy Award. Talk Radio (1988), adapted with Eric Bogosian, probed media culture's volatility. Stone closed the decade with Born on the Fourth of July (1989), starring Tom Cruise as veteran Ron Kovic, a film that brought Stone his second Best Director Oscar.

1990s: Experiment, Controversy, and Collaboration
The Doors (1991), led by Val Kilmer as Jim Morrison, showed Stone's flair for musical mythmaking. Later that year, JFK (1991), with Kevin Costner, ignited debate about historical narrative and state power; Stone and co-writer Zachary Sklar fused investigative drama with frantic montage. Heaven and Earth (1993) offered a Vietnamese perspective on war's aftermath. Natural Born Killers (1994), with Woody Harrelson and Juliette Lewis, pushed visual experimentation and media critique to extremes. Nixon (1995), anchored by Anthony Hopkins, rendered presidential psychology with Shakespearean density. U Turn (1997) and Any Given Sunday (1999), featuring Al Pacino and Jamie Foxx, extended his interest in American institutions. Throughout these years, cinematographer Robert Richardson was central to Stone's look, while editors such as Joe Hutshing and Pietro Scalia and producer A. Kitman Ho helped shape the films' muscle and rhythm.

2000s to 2010s: History, Power, and New Subjects
Stone's ambitions widened with Alexander (2004), which he revisited across multiple cuts to refine scope and emphasis. World Trade Center (2006), starring Nicolas Cage, adopted a restrained, survivor-centered approach to 9/11. W. (2008), led by Josh Brolin, examined George W. Bush's political ascent. Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps (2010) returned Michael Douglas to Gekko amid a post-crisis financial landscape. Savages (2012) explored crime at the U.S.-Mexico border. Snowden (2016), with Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Shailene Woodley, depicted the whistleblower's path and the surveillance state.

Documentaries and Nonfiction
Stone has also chronicled power through documentaries. Comandante (2003) and Looking for Fidel (2004) captured conversations with Fidel Castro; South of the Border (2009) profiled Latin American leaders including Hugo Chavez. With historian Peter Kuznick, he created The Untold History of the United States (2012), a series reexamining 20th-century geopolitics. The Putin Interviews (2017) extended his method of long-form, direct engagement with world leaders, as he pursued a controversial, access-driven approach to political portraiture.

Themes, Method, and Collaborators
Stone's cinema is defined by moral urgency and formal restlessness: rapid montage, shifts in film stock and color, and aggressive sound design used to convey memory, trauma, and media saturation. He gravitates toward stories of outsiders and insiders locked in systems of war, finance, politics, and culture. Collaborators across decades have included cinematographer Robert Richardson and, later, artists from varied disciplines; performers such as Michael Douglas, Charlie Sheen, Tom Cruise, Kevin Costner, Val Kilmer, Anthony Hopkins, Woody Harrelson, Jamie Foxx, and Joseph Gordon-Levitt recur as focal points for his arguments about ambition, conscience, and authority. Producers like Arnold Kopelson and A. Kitman Ho were vital at key junctures, as were writers including Stanley Weiser and Zachary Sklar.

Personal Life
Stone has been married to Najwa Sarkis, to Elizabeth Burkit Cox, and, later, to Sun-jung Jung. He is the father of three children, including Sean Stone and Michael Stone, and a daughter, Tara. Family ties and his father's Wall Street background informed the emotional terrain of films like Wall Street. His memoir, Chasing the Light, reflects on formative years and the crucible of his early films.

Recognition and Legacy
Oliver Stone has received three Academy Awards: one for the screenplay of Midnight Express and two for directing Platoon and Born on the Fourth of July. His work is both decorated and debated, often provoking discussion about how cinema interprets history and ideology. From the jungles of Vietnam to the corridors of American power, he has remained a provocation in the culture, sustained by a circle of actors, producers, editors, and mentors whose collaborations helped give his films their force and signature.

Our collection contains 30 quotes who is written by Oliver, under the main topics: Witty One-Liners - Wisdom - Truth - Justice - Leadership.

Other people realated to Oliver: Rodney Dangerfield (Comedian), Salma Hayek (Actress), Quentin Tarantino (Director), Daryl Hannah (Actress), Tommy Lee Jones (Actor), Cameron Diaz (Actress), Gary Oldman (Actor), LL Cool J (Musician), Frank Langella (Actor), Terence Stamp (Actor)