Schwarzenegger Born: Bodybuilder, Star, Governor in One Life

Arnold Schwarzenegger won seven Mr. Olympia titles, starred in some of the highest-grossing action films of the 1980s and 1990s, and then won the governorship of California. No other figure in modern history has dominated three such completely unrelated fields in a single lifetime. Born in Thal, Styria, Austria on July 30, 1947, he grew up in a postwar household with a strict, sometimes abusive father. He began weight training at fifteen, won the Junior Mr. Europe contest at eighteen, and moved to the United States at twenty-one, barely speaking English. He won his first Mr. Olympia title in 1970 at twenty-three, the youngest person ever to hold it. He won it six more times. His transition to film began with Conan the Barbarian in 1982, but The Terminator in 1984 made him a global star. The role required almost no dialogue and relied on physical presence and mechanical timing, perfectly suited to an Austrian bodybuilder whose English still carried a heavy accent. The franchise became one of the most profitable in Hollywood history. He followed it with Predator, Total Recall, Kindergarten Cop, and True Lies, earning as much as $25 million per film. He married Maria Shriver, a member of the Kennedy family and a journalist, in 1986. The marriage ended after he acknowledged fathering a child with the family's housekeeper, a revelation that became public in 2011. He ran for governor during California's 2003 recall election against Gray Davis, winning with 48.6 percent of the vote in a field of 135 candidates. He served two terms as governor of the world's fifth-largest economy, pushing environmental legislation, including California's landmark greenhouse gas reduction law, AB 32, while clashing with the state legislature over budget deficits. After leaving office in 2011, he returned to acting and became an outspoken political commentator, notable for his willingness to criticize his own Republican Party. His career defies conventional narrative: an immigrant bodybuilder who became a movie star, a Kennedy in-law, and a governor.