Matt Dillon

In a 1991 article, movie critic Roger Ebert referred to him as the best actor within his age group, along with Sean Penn. In 2002, he made his directorial debut with City of Ghosts and has since continued to act in films such as Factotum (2005), You, Me and Dupree (2006), The House That Jack Built (2018), and Asteroid City (2023). For Crash (2004), he won an Independent Spirit Award and was nominated for a Golden Globe Award and the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. He had earlier been nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album for narrating Jack Kerouac's On the Road. On television, he starred in the first season of the FOX television series Wayward Pines (2015), for which he was nominated for a Saturn Award.

Matt Dillon studied at Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute, Compton College and Mamaroneck High School. The recorded working language is English. Distinctions recorded are Donostia Award, MTV Movie Award for Best Villain and Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture.

• Name — Matt Dillon • Birth Name — Matthew Raymond Dillon • Born — 18 February 1964 • Birthplace — New Rochelle, New York, USA • Occupation — Actor • Relatives — Kevin Dillon (brother) Jim Raymond (great uncle) Alex Raymond (great uncle) • Years Active — 1979–present • Awards — Full list Matthew Raymond Dillon (born February 18, 1964) is an American actor. He made his feature film debut in Over the Edge (1979) and established himself as a teen idol by starring in the films My Bodyguard (1980), Little Darlings (1980), Liar's Moon (1982), The Flamingo Kid (1984) and three of the four S. E. Hinton book adaptations: Tex (1982), Rumble Fish (1983) and The Outsiders (1983). From the late 1980s onward, Dillon achieved further success, starring in Drugstore Cowboy (1989), Singles (1992), The Saint of Fort Washington (1993), To Die For (1995), Beautiful Girls (1996), In & Out (1997), There's Something About Mary (1998), and Wild Things (1998). In a 1991 article, movie critic Roger Ebert referred to him as the best actor within his age group, along with Sean Penn. In 2002, he made his directorial debut with City of Ghosts and has since continued to act in films such as Factotum (2005), You, Me and Dupree (2006), The House That Jack Built (2018), and Asteroid City (2023). For Crash (2004), he won an Independent Spirit Award and was nominated for a Golden Globe Award and the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. He had earlier been nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album for narrating Jack Kerouac's On the Road. On television, he starred in the first season of the FOX television series Wayward Pines (2015), for which he was nominated for a Saturn Award.

Dillon was raised in a close-knit Irish Catholic family in Mamaroneck, New York by homemaker Mary Ellen and Paul Dillon, a portrait painter and sales manager for packing material manufacturer Union Camp. He was named for the main character from the radio and TV Western drama series Gunsmoke. Paul Dillon also was the long-time golf coach at Fordham University, having been enshrined in the school's Hall of Fame in 2019. Dillon is the second of six children with one sister and four brothers, one of whom is actor Kevin Dillon. His paternal grandmother was the sister of comic strip artist Alex Raymond, the creator of Flash Gordon.

• Illustration — Dillon at the 2005 Cannes Film Festival In 1978, Jane Bernstein and a friend were helping director Jonathan Kaplan cast the teen drama Over the Edge when they found Dillon cutting class at Hommocks Middle School in Larchmont. Dillon auditioned for a role and made his debut in the film. The film received a regional, limited theatrical release in May 1979, and grossed only slightly over $200,000. Dillon's performance was well-received, which led to his casting in two films released the following year: the teenage sex comedy Little Darlings, in which Kristy McNichol's character loses her virginity to a boy from the camp across the lake, played by Dillon, and the more serious teen dramedy My Bodyguard, where he played a high-school bully opposite Chris Makepeace. The films, released in March and July 1980, respectively, were box office successes and raised Dillon's profile among teen audiences. Another of Dillon's early roles was in the Jean Shepherd PBS special The Great American Fourth of July and Other Disasters. The only available copies of this film are stored at UCLA, where a legal dispute makes it unavailable to the public. One of his next roles was in Liar's Moon, where he played Jack Duncan, a poor Texas boy madly in love with a rich banker's daughter. He won the role of Dallas "Dally" Winston in Francis Ford Coppola's 1983 cinematic adaptation of S. E. Hinton's novel, The Outsiders, and shared the screen with an ensemble cast that included Tom Cruise, Emilio Estevez, Leif Garrett, C. Thomas Howell, Diane Lane, Rob Lowe, Ralph Macchio, and Patrick Swayze. He had previously appeared in another adaptation of one of Hinton's novels with Emilio Estevez, Tex (1982), and he and Diane Lane appeared in Coppola's second adaptation of a Hinton novel, Rumble Fish (1983). All three films were shot in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Hinton's hometown. He followed those up with The Flamingo Kid in 1984. He made his Broadway debut with the play The Boys of Winter in 1985. Dillon did voiceover work in the 1987 documentary film Dear America: Letters Home from Vietnam. In 1985, Dillon was namechecked in the lyrics of the Roger Daltrey song 'After The Fire' (written by Pete Townshend). In 1989, Dillon won critical acclaim for his performance as a drug addict in Gus Van Sant's Drugstore Cowboy. Dillon continued to work in the early 1990s with roles in films like Singles (1992). He had a resurgence when he played Nicole Kidman's husband in To Die For (1995), as well as starring roles in Beautiful Girls (1996), In & Out (1997), Wild Things (1998) and There's Something About Mary (1998), for which he received an MTV Movie Award for Best Villain. • Illustration — Dillon at the 2010 FICG In 2002, he wrote and directed the film City of Ghosts, starring himself, James Caan and Gérard Depardieu. In 2005, he starred in Factotum, a film adaptation of an autobiographical work by Charles Bukowski. The same year he received critical praise and earned Best Supporting Actor Golden Globe and Academy Award nominations for his role in Crash, a film co-written and directed by Paul Haggis. In 2005, Dillon co-starred in Disney's Herbie: Fully Loaded and on March 11, 2006, hosted Saturday Night Live, in which he impersonated Greg Anderson and Rod Serling in sketches. Dillon starred in the comedy You, Me and Dupree, opposite Kate Hudson and Owen Wilson. The film opened on July 14, 2006. On September 29, 2006, Dillon was honored with the Premio Donostia prize in the San Sebastián International Film Festival. Dillon contributed his voice as the narrator, Sal Paradise, in an audiobook version of Jack Kerouac's novel On the Road. In 2006, he narrated Once in a Lifetime: The Extraordinary Story of the New York Cosmos. Dillon appeared in several music videos during his career. He made a cameo appearance as a detective in Madonna's Bad Girl music video which also stars Christopher Walken. Dillon appeared in 1987 in the music video for "Fairytale of New York" by the Irish folk-punk band The Pogues, playing a cop who escorts lead singer Shane MacGowan into the "drunk tank". In 2007, the band Dinosaur Jr. hired Dillon to direct the video for their single "Been There All The Time" from the album Beyond. That year, he guest-starred on The Simpsons episode "Midnight Towboy". Early in 2015, he played the role of a Secret Service agent in the FOX 10-episode series Wayward Pines. In 2018, Dillon played the lead role in the Lars von Trier thriller The House That Jack Built. In 2023, he was part of the ensemble cast in Wes Anderson's comedy Asteroid City. He portrayed Marlon Brando in the biopic about Maria Schneider Being Maria, which premiered at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival.

Dillon was in a relationship with Cameron Diaz from 1995 to 1998. From 2014 to 2023, he was in a relationship with Italian actress, dancer and choreographer Roberta Mastromichele. Dillon is an aficionado and collector of Latin music, with a large collection of vinyl, including a notable library of Cuban 78s.

• Illustration — Dillon at the 2009 Tribeca Film Festival

• Year — Film — Role — Notes • 1982 — | The Great American Fourth of July and Other Disasters — Ralph Parker — Television film • 1991 — | Fishing with John — Himself — Miniseries Episode 3 • Women & Men 2 — Eddie Megeffin — Television film Segment: "Return to Kansas City" • 1999 — Oz — Director Episode: "Napoleon's Boney Parts" • 2006 — Saturday Night Live — Himself — Host Episode: "Matt Dillon/Arctic Monkeys" • 2007 — The Simpsons — Louie — Voice Episode: "Midnight Towboy" • 2011 — Modern Family — Robbie Sullivan — Episode: "Princess Party" • 2015 — Wayward Pines — Ethan Burke — Main role (season 1) • 2023 — High Desert — Denny — Main role • TBA — The Magnificent Seven — Chris Adams — Lead role

• Year — Title — Artist — Notes • 1987 — "Fairytale of New York" — The Pogues • 1989 — "Shirlee" — Unity 2 — Director • 1993 — "Bad Girl" — Madonna • 2007 — "Been There All the Time" — Dinosaur Jr. — Director