Zach Braff

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Zach Braff (2011)

Zachary "Zach" Israel Braff (born April 6, 1975 in South Orange , New Jersey ) is an American actor , director and screenwriter . He became known for the role of JD in the comedy series Scrubs .

Life

Braff comes from a creative Jewish family and is the youngest of the four children of his now divorced parents. His eldest brother Adam writes screenplays for television, his brother Joshua is a writer , and his sister Shoshanna is a fashion designer .

Braff was allowed to accompany his father, a lawyer, to performances by his amateur drama group at an early age , which enabled him to gain his first own stage experience in the play The Music Man of the local community theater at the age of ten .

At fifteen, Braff was given a leading role in the planned television series High , produced by Bruce Paltrow . Also there was the daughter of the producer , Gwyneth Paltrow . After the trial screening of the pilot episode , the series seemed promising, but was taken out of the program by those responsible at the broadcaster CBS shortly before the premiere .

Braff in New Jersey (2007)

Four years later, in 1993, Braff received his first film role; in Manhattan Murder Mystery he played the son of Woody Allen and Diane Keaton .

After the end of high school he decided to take a college -Studies at Northwestern University in the state of Illinois to take to get into the technical aspects of film art to deepen. By his own admission, he was a mediocre student who did not always excel with his script drafts. As part of his studies, he directed several short films , took acting courses and took part in a play.

After successfully completing his bachelor's degree, he moved to New York City in 1997 , where he earned his living as a production assistant for music videos (including Sting and Mariah Carey ) and pursued an acting career. After many unsuccessful efforts, he finally got an engagement at the New York Public Theater for a production of William Shakespeare's Macbeth with Alec Baldwin and Angela Bassett in the leading roles.

This is followed by film roles in low-budget productions , which, however, do not reach a wider audience. He was only able to convince with his portrayal of a homosexual, drug addicted club-goer in The Broken Hearts Club . He moved to Los Angeles in 2000 to shoot this film . Here, too, he topped up his fees with waiters. Braff recalls the time as follows:

“When 'Broken Hearts Club' was out, people would come from the movie to the restaurant for dessert and see me and do a double take. They'd say, 'We just saw your movie. It was great. ' And I'd be like, 'Thank you. Let me tell you about our specials. '”

“When 'Broken Hearts Club' was running in the cinema, it happened several times that people came straight to the restaurant (where I was working at the time) after the film and after a certain delay a light dawned on them when I saw me. They'd say something like, 'We just saw your movie. That was great. ' And then I said: 'Thank you. I'll tell you the daily specials. '"

- Zach Braff

In late 2000, Braff auditioned for the lead role in Scrubs . Although the comedy genre did not correspond to his personal career planning, as there was a risk of character determination by this character, the comedy series appealed to him with its mixture of weird humor and drama.

After quitting his waiter job, he learned that filming would not start until two and a half months later. He used this time to develop his long-cherished film idea: a "non-linear story" about a young man who, alienated from his family and on the occasion of his mother's funeral, returns to his native New Jersey and, contrary to expectations, rediscovers love there . After three months, the rough draft was ready for the script, which - peppered with autobiographical details - formed the basis for his directorial debut Garden State .

Braff has been known to a wide audience since the broadcast of Scrubs in October 2001. The series achieved solid audience ratings and its unconventional style won critical acclaim. Braff also influenced the design of the soundtrack : The singer-songwriters Joshua Radin and Cary Brothers , who were represented several times, are among his closest friends. He also chose the title song Superman . He became aware of the band Lazlo Bane through mutual acquaintances and directed the band's video released in 2002.

Braff is close friends with his Scrubs colleague Donald Faison . During the break from filming after the first season in the spring and summer of 2002, the two shared an apartment in New York City. Braff had again accepted an offer from the public theater and played the role of Sebastian in Was ihr wollt in the context of the open-air production "Shakespeare in Central Park " alongside Julia Stiles .

In the following time he concentrated, besides working for Scrubs , on making his own film. It was his first script; He had already gained his first directing experience by making music videos, commercials from his time in New York and short films from his college days. Danny DeVito's Jersey Films company, which was responsible for Erin Brockovich and Pulp Fiction , gave the go-ahead for production. For the leading roles, Braff was able to win several important stars with Natalie Portman , Peter Sarsgaard and Ian Holm .

Filming began in early 2003. In January 2004, Garden State was presented at Robert Redford's Sundance Film Festival . The film received good reviews and became a commercial success, although the studios initially only opened the film in New York and Los Angeles and later also in selected cities. As with Scrubs , Braff promoted his friend Colin Hay in Garden State by including some of his songs in the concept and even giving him a guest role. Braff was awarded a Grammy in early 2005 for compiling the soundtrack .

In 2005, Braff made two films while Scrubs was off filming for four months . So he played in the Canadian production The Last Kiss and shortly afterwards in Fast Track , later renamed The Ex (Fast Track) (German title: Dein Ex - Mein Albtraum ). In 2006, Braff's contract with Scrubs expired , but was renewed for another year in March 2007. He was paid $ 350,000 per episode for that season . This made Braff one of the highest paid actors on US television.

German dubbing voice

Braff's German voice actor is usually Kim Hasper , who lent him the voice in the television series Scrubs and the films Your Ex - My Nightmare and The Last Kiss, among others .

Filmography

actor

Voice actor

Director

Screenwriter

Awards

Braff has been nominated for many awards and has won nine so far.

Won

Nominations

In addition to his nine awards, he received 26 nominations. Extracts:

  • 2002–2006: A total of 10 nominations for the Teen Choice Award in different categories for Scrubs - The Beginners and Garden State
  • 2004: Nomination for the Grand Jury Prize of the Sundance Film Festival for Garden State
  • 2005: Golden Globe nomination for "Best Actor in a TV Series (Comedy / Musical)" (Scrubs)
  • 2005: Emmy nomination for Best Actor in a Comedy Series (Scrubs)
  • 2005: Empire Award nomination for Best Newcomer (Garden State)
  • 2005: MTV Movie Award nomination in the Best Kiss category for Garden State (together with Natalie Portman )
  • 2005: MTV Movie Award nomination in the Breakthrough Male category for Garden State
  • 2005: People's Choice Award nomination in the Favorite Leading Man category
  • 2005: People's Choice Award nomination for Favorite Male Television Star
  • 2005: Satellite Award nomination for Best Actor in a Series, Comedy or Musical for Scrubs
  • 2006: Golden Globe nomination for "Best Actor in a Television Series (Comedy / Musical)" (Scrubs)
  • 2007: Golden Globe nomination for "Best Actor in a Television Series (Comedy / Musical)" (Scrubs)

Web links

Commons : Zach Braff  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c biography in the Internet Movie Database
  2. ↑ a b c d Zach Braff's blog about the film Garden State
  3. ↑ a b 'Scrubs' star Zach Braff has fun with chaos of sitcom medicine ( Memento from April 9, 2005 in the Internet Archive ) Report by Frazier Moore for "Associated Press" on December 19, 2002
  4. ↑ a b c d e f g The Making of the Resident ( Memento of April 9, 2005 in the Internet Archive ) Article by Michael Joseph Gross in "The Boston Globe" of September 22, 2002
  5. ↑ Rosie's People: TV Spotlight ZACH BRAFF ( Memento of March 27, 2006 in the Internet Archive ) Article by Allison Adato in "Rosie Magazine" from May 2002
  6. ↑ a b c d His Garden Is Growing Column "The Shooting Star" ( Memento from February 16, 2004 in the Internet Archive ) by Jamie Painter Young, February 12, 2004
  7. ↑ Who Wants to Play Doctors? ( Memento of April 9, 2005 in the Internet Archive ) Article by Coeli Carr in the "New York Post" of June 25, 2002
  8. ^ Awards for Zach Braff. IMDB.com, accessed September 19, 2009 .
personal data
SURNAME Braff, Zach
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Braff, Zachary Israel (full name); Braff, Zach Israel (nickname)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American actor and director
DATE OF BIRTH April 6, 1975
PLACE OF BIRTH South Orange , New Jersey , USA