John Joseph “Jack” Nicholson was born in Neptune City, New Jersey on April 22, 1937.¹⁾

He is the son of June Frances Nicholson (November 5, 1918 – July 31, 1963), a showgirl (stage name June Nilson).²⁾

Nicholson's mother hailed from Ireland, England, and Germany.³⁾

In 1936, she married Italian-American showman Donald Furcillo (stage name Donald Rose) without knowing he was already married.⁴⁾

In his book Jack's Life, biographer Patrick McGilligan speculated that June's manager, Eddie King (formerly Edgar A. Kirschfeld), was Nicholson's real father rather than Furcillo.⁵⁾

When Nicholson was born, June was only 18 years old, unmarried, and unsure of his father's identity. Her parents decided to raise Nicholson as their own kid without exposing his actual paternity, and June would pose as his sister.⁶⁾

Time magazine researchers discovered and notified Nicholson in 1974 that his “sister”, June, was actually his mother, and his other “sister”, Lorraine, was actually his aunt.⁷⁾

His mother and grandmother had both deceased at this point (in 1963 and 1970).⁸⁾

Nicholson grew raised in the New Jersey town of Neptune City.⁹⁾

He was brought up in his mother's Roman Catholic faith.¹⁰⁾

His family relocated to an apartment in Spring Lake, New Jersey, before he started high school.¹¹⁾

“Nick,” as he was known to his high school pals, went to nearby Manasquan High School, where the Class of 1954 elected him “class clown”.¹²⁾

Nicholson attended his 50th high school reunion in 2004, escorted by his aunt Lorraine.¹³⁾

He served in the Air National Guard for a while.¹⁴⁾

Nicholson is well-known for a diverse spectrum of starring and supporting parts, including sarcastic humor, romance, and grim depictions of antiheroes and psychopathic characters.¹⁵⁾

He has played the “eternal outsider, the sarcastic wanderer”, someone who struggles against the social system, in several of his works.¹⁶⁾

Nicholson is the most nominated male actor in Academy Award history, with 12 nominations.¹⁷⁾

Nicholson has won the Academy Award for Best Actor twice, once for the drama One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975) and once for the romantic comedy As Good as It Gets (1997).¹⁸⁾

He also received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor for his work in the comedy-drama Terms of Endearment (1983). Nicholson is one of just three male performers who have received three Academy Awards.¹⁹⁾

Nicholson is one of just two actors to have received an Academy Award nomination for acting in each decade from the 1960s through the 2000s; the other being Michael Caine.²⁰⁾

He has received six Golden Globe Awards and the Kennedy Center Honor in 2001. He was one of the youngest performers to receive the American Film Institute's Life Achievement Award in 1994.²¹⁾

He has also appeared in the road movie Easy Rider (1969), the drama Five Easy Pieces (1970), the comedy-drama film The Last Detail (1973), the neo-noir mystery thriller Chinatown (1974), the drama The Passenger (1975), and the epic feature Reds (1981).²²⁾

He starred as Jack Torrance in Stanley Kubrick's horror film The Shining (1980), as the Joker in Tim Burton's superhero picture Batman (1989), and as Frank Costello in Martin Scorsese's neo-noir criminal thriller The Departed (2006).²³⁾

Nicholson hasn't been in a film since 2010; in 2017, it was believed that he had retired.²⁴⁾

His first work in show business was as an assistant to animators William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, who were then widely known for the Tom & Jerry cartoons. The animators gave him a position in the art department after noticing his drawing abilities.²⁵⁾

From June 17, 1962 through August 8, 1968, Nicholson was married to Sandra Knight. Prior to the divorce, they had been apart for two years.²⁶⁾

Nicholson had an on-again, off-again relationship with actress Anjelica Huston that included periods of overlap with other women, notably Danish model Winnie Hollman, with whom he fathered a daughter, Honey Hollman, between April 1973 and January 1990. (born 1981).²⁷⁾

Nicholson was in a relationship with actress Rebecca Broussard from 1989 till 1994. They have two children together, Lorraine (born on April 16, 1990) and Raymond (born February 20, 1992).²⁸⁾

Nicholson dated actress Lara Flynn Boyle for about a year, from 1999 to 2000.²⁹⁾

Nicholson identified as a “lifelong Irish Democrat.” He is pro-choice despite his personal opposition to abortion.³⁰⁾