Bruce Davison was born on June 28, 1946, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to Clair, an architect and musician, and Marian (Holman) Davison, a secretary. His parents divorced when he was just three years old. He developed an interest in acting while majoring in art at Penn State and after accompanying a friend to a college theater audition.
Davison made his professional stage debut in 1966 as Jonathan in "Oh Dad, Poor Dad, Mama's Hung You in the Closet and I'm Feelin' So Bad" at the Pennsylvania Festival Theatre. He then made it to Broadway within just a couple of years, starring in the role of Troilus in "Tiger at the Gates" at the Vivian Beaumont Theatre.
Success in the movies came immediately for the perennially youthful-looking actor after he and a trio of up-and-coming talents starred together in the poignant but disturbing coming-of-age film Last Summer (1969). From this, he was awarded a starring role opposite Kim Darby in The Strawberry Statement (1970),an offbeat social commentary about 60s college radicalism.
Davison's film load did not increase significantly as expected and the ones he did appear in were no great shakes. With the exception of his co-starring role alongside Burt Lancaster in the well-made cavalry item Ulzana's Raid (1972) and the powerful low-budget Short Eyes (1977),his film roles were underwhelming.
As such, Davison wisely looked elsewhere for rewarding work and found it on the stage and on the smaller screen. Earning strong theatrical roles in "The Skin of Our Teeth," "The Little Foxes" and "A Life in the Theatre," he won the Los Angeles Drama Critics Award for his work in "Streamers" in 1977. On TV, he scored in mini-movie productions of Mourning Becomes Electra (1978),Deadman's Curve (1978) and, most of all, Summer of My German Soldier (1978) co-starring Kristy McNichol.
The 1980s was also dominated by strong theater performances. Davison took over the role of the severely deformed John Merrick as "The ElephantMan" on Broadway; portrayed Clarence in "Richard III" at the New York Shakespeare Festival; was directed by Henry Fonda in "The Caine Mutiny Court Martial"; played a moving Tom Wingfield opposite Jessica Tandy's Amanda in "The Glass Menagerie"; received a second Los Angeles Drama Critics Award for his work in the AIDS play "The Normal Heart"; and finished off the decade gathering up fine reviews in the amusing A.R. Gurney period piece "The Cocktail Hour".
It was not until he was cast in the ground-breaking gay drama Longtime Companion (1989) that his film career revitalized. Giving a quiet, finely nuanced, painfully tender performance as the middle-aged lover and caretaker of a life partner ravaged by AIDS, Davison managed to stand out amid the strong ensemble cast and earn himself an Oscar nomination for "Best Supporting Actor".
Since his success in Longtime Companion (1989),Davison has been all over the screen. Predominantly seen as mature, morally responsible dads and politicians, his genial good looks and likability have on occasion belied a weak or corrupt heart. He married actress Lisa Pelikan in 1986 and they have one son, Ethan, born in 1996.
