Interviewee: Harrison Ford
Interviewer: Diane Sawyer
Date: May 25 2008

The man who would be a well-known celebrity once belied his own roles; as a boy, Harrison Ford was singularly introverted. Harrison Ford came to LA in 1964, playing minor roles and teaching himself carpentry to get by.

Woodworking for Sergio Mendes and a casting director led him to George Lucas, who gave Ford a role in American Graffiti in 1973. Four years later, Harrison became Han Solo in Lucas’ big investment, Star Wars, which became the highest-grossing film in its time. He sustained box office streak playing the lead in Steven Spielberg and George Lucas’ Indiana Jones trilogy, which began with Raiders of the Lost Ark in 1981.

Some of the most successful films in history are Harrison Ford movies, which gave the actor a $20 million paycheck per film. At 55, Harrison Ford was still a crowd-drawer in 1997’s Air Force One.

To an extent, Harrison Ford’s acting is versatile, from comedy in 1988’s Working Girl to horror in 2000’s What Lies Beneath. He even made a cult following with Ridley Scott’s post-apocalyptic opus Blade Runner.

Ford is one lucrative talent. For his role as Amish-like detective in Peter Weir’s 1985 classic, Witness, he was nominated for Best Actor at the Academy Awards. He also secured a Golden Globe nomination for 1993’s The Fugitive, one in a series of film adaptations of Tom Clancy’s novels, including Clear and Present Danger. The series, which invested $50 million on Ford, had considerable box office returns.

In 2008, Harrison Ford starred in the fourth installment of the Indiana Jones movies.