- Born
- Birth nameWilliam James Pullman
- Height6′ 1¼″ (1.86 m)
- William James Pullman was born in Hornell, New York, one of seven children of Johanna (Blaas), a nurse, and James Pullman, a doctor. He is of Dutch (mother) and English, Northern Irish, and Scottish (father) descent. After high school, Bill went into a building construction program at SUNY Delhi in New York. He transferred to State University of New York College at Oneonta where he received his BA in Theater. He received both his MFA in Theater/Directing and an honorary PHD from University of Massachusetts at Amherst. While teaching Directing at Montana State University in Bozeman, Montana, one of Bill's students was the soon-to-be film director John Dahl, who later cast Mr. Pullman in "The Last Seduction".
Moving to New York City, he worked with Kathy Bates in the acclaimed stage production of "Curse of the Starving Class". However, it was his first work in three strikingly diverse films that brought him to the attention of his audience: "Ruthless People" with Danny DeVito and Bette Milder, the Mel Brooks hit "Spaceballs" and the Oscar-nominated (and winner for Best Supporting Actress Geena Davis) "The Accidental Tourist". Still attracted to the art and study of building construction, Bill has designed and/or restored three "barns": In Montana, he converted a 1933 barn at his ranch into his family home. In Los Angeles, he built a Truss barn in the style of LA's 1910 fruit storage barns. In western New York State, he restored a '3-bay' barn that sometimes serves as a community center near his hometown of Hornell, New York. Focused more on neighborhoods than show business-based charities and societies, Pullman has defined himself by his work with his local communities. He works to bridge communities of Los Angeles through his board work with Cornerstone Theater. Pullman continues to work with his neighbors who formed "Concerned Citizens Montana" to secure a place at the table regarding the national need for a smart grid for energy transmission. He also works with the local university (Alfred University, New York) as well as supports local health services ("The Pullman Women's Health and Birthing Center" at St James Hospital, Hornell, NY).
Pullman is also an MS Society Ambassador. Based in Los Angeles, New York City and Western Montana, Pullman is married to dancer Tamara Hurwitz Pullman, and they have three children, daughter singer/songwriter Maesa Rae and multi-talented sons Jack and Lewis Pullman, who is now also an actor.- IMDb Mini Biography By: CyJay@aol.com and Kathleen McInnis
- SpouseTamara Pullman(January 3, 1987 - present) (3 children)
- Children
- ParentsJohanna Pullman (Blaas)James Pullman
- RelativesSibling(Sibling)Sibling(Sibling)Jay Pullman(Sibling)Joe Pullman(Sibling)Sibling(Sibling)Sibling(Sibling)
- Gravelly voice
- Lost his sense of smell after a head injury and two-day coma.
- While teaching at Montana State University one of his students was director John Dahl. Later Dahl gave him a role in his film The Last Seduction (1994).
- With his wife Tamara they started the charity Hollywood Orchard that grows and gathers fruit to donate to families in need.
- Is the sixth of seven children. His father was a doctor and his mother a nurse.
- Currently co-owns a ranch in Montana with his brother.
- [on watching Independence Day (1996) with President Bill Clinton] Oh, great. This is going to be like shooting baskets with Magic Johnson watching.
- [1996, on Lost Highway (1997)] I was brought up in a very small town in upstate New York. We lived on Main Street, and my dad was a doctor. And this idyllic setting held some very dark corners. Working with David Lynch, getting to know his psyche, and getting inside the character in Lost Highway felt so connected up to my past. Benign on the exterior, seething on the interior. My dad was also the town coroner, so we saw all these dead bodies...When I was a teenager my father would bring us along. I remember that when my mother had colon cancer, my father took us down to the basement of the hospital and pulled out a tumor in a jar to show us. And he's holding it up, he's kinda laughing, like a scientist. He said, 'See, it's kinda like congealed hamburger.' I mean, that's like David Lynch, that combination of strange, funny, macabre, all in one. So working with Lynch felt very much like going home.
- Liebestraum (1991) was a great experience, a great time, and I have such fond memories about it...It was wild working with Mike Figgis, because he's very much in possession of himself. Some would say a narcissist, but I think there's a power in that. I have to admit that I was just dazzled by his absorption with his own instincts and his own ability to pursue things...
- It's very curious when you're an actor and suddenly you're in the right role, with the right match. Truthfully, I almost avoided While You Were Sleeping (1995), because I find those romantic comedies kind of precious, and they're full of lines that leave you feeling a little bewildered when you say them. It's all about first looks and little giggles, and part of me is always thinking, 'Isn't there anything else we could be doing with our time right now? Something a little more important?' But when I was doing it, I really enjoyed it. It was like the air was charged between me and Sandy. From the minute I met her, we just clicked. We were totally in tune with each other. Lots of the movie was about us just talking and talking, and I'll tell you the truth, most actors don't listen very well, they don't give it 100 percent. But Sandy and I, we just lived in that rarefied air of the movie, and it worked really, really well.
- [1996] When I was in Japan to promote While You Were Sleeping (1995), I went to this screening where they had a thousand Japanese women who'd won tickets in a radio contest. I've been around a lot of very successful actors, sex symbols - Brad Pitt, Richard Gere, Alec Baldwin, some others - and I always had a quiet little profile through all that. I've seen women go berserk over some of these guys. But I'll tell you, I never experienced anything like what happened in that Japanese theater. I felt like I was Elvis. They were screaming, the classic thing that you see on documentaries of The Beatles. And I'm standing there and my body feels so strange and I am so embarrassed. And a girl asks a question and the translator talks to her and then the translator turns to me and says, 'She thinks you're a very sexy man.' It's not even a question! And everyone just starts roaring with laughter. It was not a comfortable situation. I'll tell you that.
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