ROBERT PATRICK Biography - Other artists & entretainers

 
 

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ROBERT PATRICK
       

Robert Patrick was born November 5, 1958 in Marietta, Georgia to Robert, a banker, and Nadine, a homemaker. The oldest of 5 children, Robert got his first taste of acting and his first experience with creative input when he starred in a third grade production of Peter Pan and refused to wear green tights. His family moved around a lot and he lived, for a time, in the areas of Dayton, Cleveland, Detroit and Boston.  Robert played American Legion baseball in high school and attended Bowling Green University where he made the varsity football team as a freshman linebacker. By his own admission, he was a rowdy guy in college and left before he earned a degree.

       

When he was 26 years old, a near-fatal drowning accident on Lake Erie caused him to reassess his life, quit his house painting job in Cleveland and move to Los Angeles to
pursue acting.  He lived out of his car for awhile, then got a part in a play.  After six months, he was cast in the first of a number of Roger Corman movies.

       

Robert attributes his early ability to get parts in B movies to his tough attitude, his athleticism and the fact that he could ride a motorcycle.  But as quick as the parts came, his pay was so little that he had to supplement his acting income by tending bar. 

       

His big break came when he was cast in James Cameron’s Terminator 2: Judgment Day as the T-1000 villain opposite Arnold Schwarzenegger. To prepare for the role, he took martial arts, strength, endurance and weapons training and observed the movements of cats, eagles and praying mantises to develop some of the memorable and distinctive moves of his character. Robert married his longtime girlfriend, Barbara Hooper, during the T2 shoot.