Patrick Swayze - Dancer and Actor

Patrick was born August 18, 1952, in Houston, Texas, to a Chemical Plant Engineer, Jesse Swayze (died 1982) and a dancer, choreographer, Patsy Swayze. He has two brothers, Don Swayze (aka Donny Swayze, actor) and Sean, and two sisters, Vicky Swayze (committed suicide 1994) and Bambi.

His dancing and talent came from his mother, Patsy, who is a successful dance and movie choreographer with such films as Urban Cowboy, Liar's Moon, Thelma and Louise and Letters from a Killer to her resume.

Educated in Houston, Texas, Patrick attended San Jacinto College and several dance companies: Houston Jazz Ballet Company, Harkness Ballet Theater School, New York, Joffrey Ballet Company, and the Eliot Feld Ballet Company.

Even before his movie career began he was married June 12, 1975 to actress / dancer, Lisa Niemi (Lisa Haapaniemi) a dance student of his mother's and who played opposite Swayze in the adventure sci-fi Steel Dawn (1987). They first met as students when she was 15 and he was 23.

One of his first movies was Skatetown USA (1979) in which he plays the role of a young skater at the local roller-disco rink and is challenged by a street-gang leader in a championship contest. In 1982 he played in another street-gang related movie as an undercover investigator to stop illegal weapons in The Renegades.

Another action movie followed, Uncommon Valor (1983), Patrick carries out a dangerous mission to find a man's son who is listed as "Missing In Action" in Vietnam. Patrick was cast in The Outsiders (1983), Frances Ford Coppola's movie, which uses a Brat-Pack cast of Rob Lowe, Emilio Estevez, and Tom Cruise to tell the story of rival teen cliques back in the '60s.

Red Dawn (1984) was a movie before Patrick really hit it big. The movie was based on a Russian invasion of a small American town and is foiled by local teens that sabotage the enemy. Some critics didn't like the movie. Grandview, U.S.A. (1984), Patrick demolishes cars at a local racetrack and falls in love with the track's beautiful owner, Jamie Lee Curtis. Trouble ensues when she falls for a younger man.

In 1985, North and South, John Jakes Civil War saga that chronicles the interlocking fortunes of two close-knit families striving to hold their friendships in a war torn nation was released. This is a nine-hour drama that is truly worth seeing. Patrick portrays the brutal sport of ice hockey in Youngblood (1986), then came Steel Dawn (1987) a futuristic sci-fi film (co-staring his wife)

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