Robert Redford is easily one of the best actors in
the history of show business.
It is literally undisputed. The man has done serious roles,
funny roles, and even was a super villain in a
Marvel movie.
Is there nothing that this man can't do when he's
in front of the camera?
Probably not. But not unlike many actors and actresses,
life behind the camera hasn't always been easy for Redford.
His life has had a lot of hardships,
even going as far back as when he was a
kid.
So allow us to show you the tragic details about
Robert Redford.
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#8 Polio.
In 2011, the famously private Robert Redford surprised everyone when
he agreed to cooperate with author Michael Feeney Callen on
a book about his eventful life.
And one of the many intriguing revelations which emerged was
the actors about of polio as a child.
Polio is, of course, a disease that is no longer
in the world today,
thanks to the efforts of the World Health Organization and
the vaccine that was made to cure it.
Back when Redford was a child,
it was still very much still around.
Thankfully, it wasn't a severe case,
and Even so, the future Hollywood star was still forced
to spend several weeks in bed after overexerting himself during
an ocean swim in 2018.
He told NPR that the mid 40s was a scary
time to fall victim of the condition
before the South vaccine was discovered.
What hungover your childhood was always the fear of polio
because all you saw were people in iron lungs.
Redford would later pay tribute to Jonas Salk,
the scientist who found a vaccine for the disease in
a 2014 short film.
So though it was a very long time ago for
him,
it's still something that he remembers very well.
And it's not hard to see why.
Walk in the Woods, the Bill Bryson book which you're
going to be now making into a film.
Originally the idea was that you and Paul Newman would
do that.
That was the idea. That was the,
the, the,
the hope. And when I took it to Paul,
I think the age difference between us was beginning to
show up.
And he felt that and he was concerned about
physically being able to do it.
I still wanted to do it with him.
I thought it was a perfect thing for he and
I to do after the other two we've done.
It became clear over time that that wasn't going to
be possible.
And then, then Paul passed away
#7 the dare. It's hard to think of Robert Redford
as a child or even a teenager,
but that he once was.
And he spent much of his high school years causing
trouble with the street gang and his hometown of Van
Nuys.
And boys being boys, dangerous dares were all part of
their daily routine.
Unfortunately for Redford, one nearly cost him his life.
What happened that almost caused this?
He was challenged to jump off a relatively high building
by the gang in order to prove that he wasn't
a complete and utter what?
As Redford revealed in 2011 book Robert Redford,
the biography Facing Down Fears hit home early.
You had two choices, it seemed to me.
You can be led by your fears or you can
overcome them.
Having apparently proved his manliness once and for all,
and only just without breaking every bone in his body,
a young Redford was allowed to continue wreaking havoc with
the rest of the gang.
Petty theft was their main source of entertainment,
alcohol from a nearby store a particular favorite activity.
But the star's life of crime appeared to end at
16 when he was arrested for possession of stolen jewelry.
Thankfully for us all, because of it,
he did continue to do that.
He wouldn't have had the acting life that he did.
Number six, the loss of his mother.
The loss of a parent is always hard,
but for Robert Redford, he lost his mother when he
was just 18.
Martha Redford sadly passed away in
1955 from a hemorrhage at the age of just 40.
Her death was linked to a blood disorder she had
contracted during the stillbirth of her twin daughters eight years
previously.
The Hollywood star admitted that he hadn't made things easy
for his mother as a teen,
but that she always stood by him.
She believed that, all things considered,
she just had faith that I had something in me
that was going to turn out OK.
She was right, of course,
and five years after her death,
Robert got his first role in film.
And he didn't stop for a very long time in
proving his mother right.
Robert went on to sing his mom's praises,
further complimenting her smile, adventurous spirit and positive attitude.
He also told a star-studded audience,
which included his longtime friend,
actress Jane Fonda, that he wishes he'd appreciated her more
when she was around.
I took her for granted because that's the way kids
were at that age.
My regret is that she passed away before I could
thank her.
Me. No, no, never, never had,
but it's on my list.
What list is that? Things I want to do but
haven't done yet.
Well, you better hurry up
#5 fathers and uncles.
The overall parenting situation with Redford wasn't the best.
He lost his mother before he was an adult and
his father was a very hard working man who had
very long hours as a milkman and that might have
contributed to Redford going into gangs as he didn't have
a present father to straighten him out.
However, Robert would go on to form a close bond
with someone else.
A young Robert developed a close bond with his Uncle
David,
an all American all around her who is not only
quite the football player but could also speak no fewer
than four different languages.
The pair would reportedly often spend time on the football
field practicing their throwing techniques.
Once again, Robert was left without a strong fraternal presence
when his uncle was drafted and in the Second World
War by General Patton's Third Army.
He never made it home,
sadly, which upset Redford greatly
#4 college issues. Despite his reputation at home,
Robert Redford did go and try to do college,
but things didn't go as smoothly as many,
including he, would have liked.
In his 2011 book Robert Redford,
the biography Michael Callanfini wrote,
Redford had become beloved in the drinking circles but was
regarded as a loose cannon.
The author doesn't mention exactly what went down in the
Kappa Sigma fraternity that a young Redford belonged to,
but considering he was kicked out of college after just
18 months,
you can draw your own pictures to what went down.
At the very least, he broke a lot of rules
to get that judgment.
But that wasn't the end of Redford's education.
After losing his scholarship, he spent time learning how to
paint in both Florence and Paris,
and later studied at New York's American Academy of Dramatic
Arts Thankfully,
the University of Colorado did not issue a blanket ban
on any other Redford's attending.
Two of the Stars kids,
Shawna and Jamie, were later accepted into the institution
#3 his first child.
If you'd think after Robert Redford had straightened out his
life in terms of focusing on his career and getting
married that things would be better for him.
He even had a son named Scott that he was
very happy about.
Tragically, in November in 1959,
the 10 week old Scott passed away from a condition
that would later be termed Sudden Infant Death Syndrome.
Understandably, the incident devastated Redford,
who believed he was responsible for not checking in on
the baby earlier,
and it would take him more than half a century
to open up to the public about the grief he
experienced.
In an unusually candid 2011 interview quoted by Mir,
the Out of Africa star said It was really hard
When we were very young.
I had my first theater job,
which didn't pay much. We didn't know anything about sudden
infant death syndrome.
So as a parent you blame yourself.
It creates a scar that never completely heals
#2 James.
Just three years after his first born son Scott's tragic
death,
Robert Redford was forced to face the very real prospect
of losing his second.
Not only that, but his wife Lola's life hung in
the balance at the same time too.
In 1962, David James Redford was prematurely born with the
same condition that had robbed John F Kennedy of his
second son,
Patrick. The baby was only given a 40%
chance of survival after being diagnosed with highline membrane disease,
but luckily the tot and his mother both managed to
pull through.
It was a colossal relief for us.
Robert explained. People think it's been easy for me.
It's hard to live with.
It's so untrue. The hardest thing in the world is
when your children have problems.
There have been so many hits on our family that
no one knows about and I don't want them to
for my family sake
#1 the divorce. Back in the mid
1980s, Robert Redford and Lola Van Wagonen appeared to have
one of the most stable marriages in Hollywood,
paired tied the knot in
1958 and overcame the tragic death of their first born,
Scott, to have three other children,
Shawna, James and Amy. So it was a bit of
a bombshell when the pair announced,
albeit a decade after it actually happened,
that they were going their separate ways.
Redford spoke out on this and noted it was mutual
and it was right to move on.
We still have great love,
great affection and great friendship.
It is wonderful and I think we probably deserve credit
for it because the kids are great.
They came through it okay.
I never wanted to be one of those divorced show
business casualties so predictable.
I wanted to prove that a marriage could laugh and
prove the business wrong,
but I couldn't. So what do you think?
What do you think about the back story of the
tragedies that Robert Redford has had to endure throughout his
life?
Were you surprised by some of the things that he
has gone through?
Were you surprised that you've never heard about these things
in the past?
Does this give you an even greater respect for Redford
and all the roles that he has played over the
years?
Let us know in the comments below.
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