Bill was born on May 17, 1955 in Fort Worth, Texas. He discovered his acting aspirations at the age of 8. He and his friends would create movies using hand-held cameras and Super 8 film. His parents supported him--and he moved to LA at 18 to work on an educational film for a few weeks.

A few weeks turned into a few years. Bill worked as a set dresser for Roger Corman's New World Pictures. His first film debut was Crazy Mama (1975) as John. Bill became convinced he would fare better with a few acting lessons. So he moved to New York and studied at New York University under famed drama coach Stella Adler.

When he returned to the West Coast, Paxton's career began to take shape, with eleven appearances on the silver screen between 1981 and 1986. Following a string of bit parts in critically lauded films (The Lords of Discipline, Streets of Fire, The Terminator), he landed major supporting roles in back-to-back movies playing soldier-types: in Weird Science, he appeared as the sadistic, paramilitary brother of the nerdy protagonist; in Aliens, he portrayed a rowdy, gun-toting space marine. You'd think he would have had plenty to do making movies, but during this same period, Paxton wrote, directed, and produced two award-winning short films, and cut an album as half of the rock group Martini Ranch. All that, and he still found time to woo and marry Louise Newbury, whom he met in London in 1982.

quick filmography

Mexicali (2001)
Vertical Limit, The (2000)
U-571 (2000) .... Lt. Commander Mike Dahlgren
Mighty Joe Young (1998) .... Gregg O'Hara
... aka Mighty Joe (1999) (UK)
Simple Plan, A (1998) .... Hank Mitchell
... aka Einfacher Plan, Ein (1999) (Germany)
... aka Un plan simple (1999) (France)
Twister: Ride it Out (1998) .... Bill Harding
Titanic (1997) .... Brock Lovett
Traveller (1997) .... Bokky
Twister (1996) .... Bill Harding
Evening Star, The (1996) .... Jerry Bruckner
Apollo 13 (1995) .... Fred Haise
Last Supper, The (1995) .... Zack
True Lies (1994) .... Simon
Frank and Jesse (1994) .... Frank James
Boxing Helena (1993) .... Ray O'Malley
Indian Summer (1993) .... Jack Belston
Future Shock (1993/I) .... Vince
Monolith (1993) .... Tucker
Tombstone (1993) .... Morgan Earp
Trespass (1992) .... Vince
... aka Looters (1992)
Vagrant, The (1992) .... Graham Krakowski
Dark Backward, The (1991) .... Gus
One False Move (1991) .... Dale (Hurricane) Dixon
Back to Back (1990) .... Bo Brand
Brain Dead (1990) .... Jim Reston
... aka Paranoia (1990) (USA)
Last of the Finest, The (1990) .... Howard 'Hojo' Jones
... aka Blue Heat (1990)
... aka Street Legal (1990)
Navy SEALS (1990) .... Dane
Predator 2 (1990) .... Jerry Lambert
Next of Kin (1989) .... Gerald Gates
Slipstream (1989) .... Matt Owens
Pass the Ammo (1988) .... Jesse Wilkes
Near Dark (1987) .... Severen
Aliens (1986) .... Private W. Hudson
Commando (1985) .... Intercept Officer
Weird Science (1985) .... Chet Donnelly
Streets of Fire (1984) .... Clyde
Impulse (1984) .... Eddie
Mortuary (1984) .... Paul Andrews
Terminator, The (1984) .... Punk Leader
Lords of Discipline, The (1983) .... Gilbreath
Deadly Lessons (1983) (TV) .... Eddie Fox
Taking Tiger Mountain (1983)
Night Warning (1981)
... aka Butcher, Baker, Nightmare Maker (1981)
... aka Momma's Boy (1981)
... aka Nightmare Maker (1981)
Stripes (1981) .... Soldier
Crazy Mama (1975) .... John

_{derived from imdb.com's mini-biography of Bill Paxton and a few other underrated-actor type web-sites}