Josh James Brolin was born on Feb. 12, 1968 in Santa Monica, CA. Despite being born to successful film actor James Brolin, Josh's upbringing in rural Templeton, CA kept him estranged from the Hollywood world. By the time he was a teenager, however, Brolin had begun his own acting career, making his screen debut with a starring role in the Richard Donner-directed and Steven Spielberg-produced adventure comedy "The Goonies" (1985). Notice from the role earned Brolin work in films like "Thrashin'" (1986) and television shows like "The Young Riders" (ABC 1989-1992). Following the cancelation of said series, in which Brolin starred as Wild Bill Hickok, he returned to film acting, accruing roles in "The Road Killers" (1994), David O. Russell's "Flirting with Disaster" (1996), Guillermo del Toro's "Mimic" (1997), and "My Brother's War" (1997), directed by his father James. The decade to follow paired Brolin with a number of big name directors: he appeared in Woody Allen's "Melinda and Melinda" (2004), Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino's "Grindhouse" (2007), Joel and Ethan Coen's "No Country for Old Men" (2007), Gus Van Sant's "Milk" (2008), and Oliver Stone's "W." (2008), in which Brolin played President George W. Bush. He reteamed with Stone for "Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps" (2010) and with the Coens for "True Grit" (2010), and then went on to work with Spike Lee on "Oldboy" (2013) and Paul Thomas Anderson on "Inherent Vice" (2014). That same year marked Brolin's first appearance as Thanos in the Marvel Cinematic Universe by way of "Guardians of the Galaxy" (2014); he reprised the character in "Avengers: Age of Ultron" (2015), "Avengers: Infinity War" (2018), and "Avengers: Endgame" (2019).