Adrien Brody is an American actor and producer. He received widespread recognition and acclaim after starring in Roman Polanski’s “The Pianist”, for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor at age 29, making him the youngest actor to win in that category. Take a look below for 26 more fun and interesting facts about Adrien Brody.

1. Brody is the only male American actor to receive the Cesar Award for Best Actor.

2. Other successful films that Brody has starred in are “The Thin Red Line,” “The Village”, “King Kong”, and “Predator.”

3. He is a frequent collaborator of Wes Anderson’s, having starred in three of Anderson’s films, “The Darjeeling Limited,” “Fantastic Mr. Fox,” and “The Grand Budapest Hotel.”

4. In 2017, he appeared in the fourth series of the BBC historical drama “Peaky Blinders.”

5. Brody was born in Woodhaven, Queens, New York City, New York, the son of Sylvia Plachy, a photographer, and Elliot Brody, a retired history professor and painter.

6. Brody’s father is of Polish Jewish descent; Brody’s mother, who was raised as a Catholic, was born in Budapest, Hungary, and is the daughter of a Catholic Hungarian aristocrat father and a Czech Jewish mother.

7. Brody was raised, “without a strong connection” to Judaism or Catholicism.

8. As a child, Brody performed magic shows at children’s birthday parties as “The Amazing Adrien.”

9. He attended I.S. 227 Louis Armstrong Middle School and New York’s Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts.

10. His parents enrolled him in acting classes to distance him from the dangerous children with whom he associated.

11. He attended summer camp at Long Lake Camp for the Arts in the Adirondacks in upstate New York.

12. Brody attended Stony Brook University before transferring to Queens College for a semester.

13. Taking acting classes as a child, by the age of 13, he appeared in an Off-Broadway play and a PBS television film.

14. After appearing in “Bullet” in 1996 with Tupac Shakur and Mickey Rourke, Brody hovered on the brink of stardom, receiving an Independent Spirit Award nomination for his role in the 1998 film “Restaurant,” and later praise for his roles in Spike Lee’s “Summer of Sam” and Terrence Malick’s “The Thin Red Line.”

15. He received widespread recognition when he was cast as the lead in Roman Polanski’s “The Pianist.”

16. To prepare for the role, Brody withdrew for months, gave up his apartment and his car, broke up with his then-girlfriend, learned how to play Chopin on the piano, and lost 29 pounds.

17. The role won him an Academy Award for Best Actor, making him the youngest actor ever to win the award, and to date the only winner under the age of 30.

18. Brody appeared on “Saturday Night Live” on May 10, 2003, his first television work, during which, he controversially gave an improvised introduction, while wearing fake dreadlocks and a Jamaican accent for Jamaican reggae musical guest Sean Paul, causing him to be banned.

19. On August 4, 2017, he received the Leopard Club Award at the Locarno Festival.

20. The Leopard Club Award pays homage to a major film personality whose work has made a lasting impact on the collective imagination.

21. In 1992, Brody was seriously hurt in a motorcycle accident in which he flew over a car and crashed head first into a crosswalk. He spent months recuperating.

22. He has broken his nose three times doing stunts; the most recent was during the filming of “Summer of Sam.”

23. He dated Michelle Dupont, a music industry personal assistant, from 2003 to 2006. She was his date to the 2003 Oscars.

24. Brody began dating Spanish actress Elsa Pataky in 2006.

25. For Pataky’s 31st birthday in July 2007, Brody purchased her a 19th century farm in Central New York that was remodeled to look like a castle.

26. Brody and Pataky were featured at their New York home in a 35 page spread for HELLO! magazine in October 2008. The pair broke up in 2009.