Several decades before he snapped his fingers and made half of Earth’s population disappear, the son of actor James Brolin got his own start playing Brandon Walsh (yes, Brandon Walsh), the cool and exasperated but also protective and big-hearted big brother of Mikey, whose determination to find One-Eyed Willie’s lost treasure set the action in motion.
Brolin went on to do a few (dozen) movies, including Flirting With Disaster, Mimic, No Country for Old Men (which won the Best Picture Oscar and reinvigorated his career), American Gangster, W., Milk (he was nominated for a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his performance as Harvey Milk’s killer, Dan White), Jonah Hex, True Grit, Sicario and, of course, Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame, cloaked in CGI as mega-villain Thanos. Plus, he starred in the Dune remake and fronted Amazon Prime Video’s sci-fi western Outer Range.
He has two children from his first marriage to Alice Adair, after which he was married to Diane Lane from 2004 until 2013. Brolin and wife Kathryn Boyd, who he married in 2016, have two daughters, Westlyn Reign and Chapel Grace.
Talking about The Goonies, his first-ever job, on Conan in 2012, Brolin said, “It’s just one of those things that every generation—I’ve got 7-year-olds now who are like, ‘oh my god‘, Sloth’ and I’m like, ‘I’m not Sloth! I was the older brother, I understand, I’m gnarly now, the beard and all that.'”
Hardly, but a dose of self-deprecatory humor is always in fashion too.
