Matt Damon

An affable player who has cultivated friendships in tandem with his showbiz career, Damon began acting professionally while attending Harvard University. His first notable role was as an anti-Semitic student in the 1992 teen drama School Ties, costarring his childhood buddy and future collaborator Ben Affleck. After a handful of supporting parts, Damon and Affleck cowrote and costarred in the hit 1997 indie drama Good Will Hunting. Not only did Damon earn an Oscar nod for his winning portrayal of a quiet genius, the duo picked up an Oscar for best screenplay. As both actors' stars continued to rise, they made cameos in each other's projects and also produced the popular filmmaking reality series Project Greenlight. Damon went on to deliver top-notch performances in diverse roles, such as a murderous impostor in The Talented Mr. Ripley, a suave thief in Ocean's Eleven and an amnesia-stricken spy in The Bourne Identity. Once again proving his willingness to physically transform himself for a role (he lost 40 pounds for 1996's Courage Under Fire), Damon packed on the pounds for 2009's The Informant!, in which he played a doughy corporate executive. Despite the steady stream of work, Damon still found time for some fun, capitalizing on a long-running joke with Jimmy Kimmel by appearing in a humorous and sexually suggestive music video with Kimmel's on-again-off-again girlfriend Sarah Silverman. Off screen, Damon married interior designer Luciana Barroso. He is also active in a number of charities and is a founding member of the production company LivePlanet. ~ Rovi