Hollywood star: Between drama and success: John Travolta turns 68

Two very successful dance films made him world famous, Quentin Tarantino’s “Pulp Fiction” (1994) a cult star – unforgotten to this day. Now John Travolta turns 68.

He got off to a flying start in the 1970s with the musical “Grease” and enchanted the audience with his five-hour performances. In 1978, the equally successful film adaptation of the play followed.

John Travolta was born in New Jersey in 1954, the youngest of six children. It quickly became clear that he was not interested in a normal education and dropped out of school at the age of 16 to move to New York. There he attended acting classes and got his first roles, soon cementing his place on the city’s stages. He made his name from soap operas, commercials and shows. His move to Los Angeles in 1975 and the series “Welcome Back, Kotter” made him known nationwide. Travolta became a teen idol.

Dance, dance, dance

But he didn’t just want to commit himself to acting, he also wanted to prove his musical talent. He got his first role of this kind in “Saturday Night Fever”, where he was able to prove his dancing talent. The soundtrack, which he interpreted himself, sold 25 million copies. For the role, he was nominated for an Oscar for the first time.

The 1980s initially brought Travolta some film flops. With “Look Who’s Talking” he managed to return to success in 1989. That same year, he met his future wife, Kelly Preston, while filming The Experts. The couple, who married two years later, had three children. Son Jett died aged 16 in 2009. Kelly Preston died of breast cancer in 2020.

Travolta’s father died in 1995. Despite the huge success of “Pulp Fiction”, whose film received an Oscar for best screenplay and gave Travolta another nomination for the trophy, her career collapsed again due to the stroke of fate. Again, it took several years for him to recover from his pain.