Walter Bruce Willis (born March 19, 1955), better known as Bruce Willis, is an American actor and film producer. His career began in television in the 1980s and has continued both in television and film since. One of his more popular roles was that of John McClane in the Die Hard series which were critical and financial successes. Willis has released several albums and has appeared in several television shows. He has also appeared in over sixty films, including Pulp Fiction, Sin City, 12 Monkeys, Armageddon, and The Sixth Sense.

Motion pictures featuring Willis have grossed US$2.55 to US$3.05 billion at North American box offices, making him the seventh highest-grossing actor in a leading role, and ninth highest including supporting roles. Willis was married to actress Demi Moore and they had three daughters before their divorce in 2000 after thirteen years of marriage. He is a two-time Emmy Award-winning, Golden Globe Award-winning, and four-time Saturn Award-nominated actor and has publicly shown his support for the United States armed forces.

Early life

Willis was born in Idar-Oberstein, West Germany, the son of a Kassel-born German mother, Marlene, who worked in a bank, and David Willis, an American soldier. Willis was the eldest of four children (his siblings are Florence, David, and Robert). After being discharged from the military in 1957, Willis' father took his family back to Penns Grove, New Jersey, where he worked as a welder and factory worker. His parents separated in 1972 while Willis was in his teens. Willis attended Penns Grove High School in his hometown, where he encountered issues with a stutter. Finding it easy to express himself on stage and losing his stutter in the process, Willis began performing on stage and his high school activities were marked by such things as the drama club and student council president.

After high school, Willis took a job as a security guard and he also transported work crews at the DuPont Chambers Works factory in Deepwater, New Jersey. He quit after a colleague was killed on the job, and became a regular at several bars. Willis learned to play the harmonica and joined an R&B band called Loose Goose. After a stint as a private investigator (a role he would play in the television series Moonlighting as well as in the 1991 film, The Last Boy Scout), Willis returned to acting. He enrolled in the drama program at Montclair State University, where he was cast in the class production of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. Willis left school in his junior year and moved to New York City.