joaquin phoenix...

i saw the village in the theater - and then there was a preview for ladder 49 (which i want to see) and then i ended up watching signs last weekend... AND... joaquin phoenix has been on talk shows... i keep seeing his face - everywhere i look - and it's forced me to find out more... so i've done a bit of searching (not obsessively - just on one site - my favorite one, i might add) and here are some things i've found out about joaquin...

... he's 5'8" - surprising to me, but it's all good...
... his birthday is october 28 - born in 1974... in san juan, puerto rico...
... his birth name is Joaquin Raphael Phoenix... for a while (from when he was 4 until the early '90's), he changed his name to "Leaf" to match the earthier names of his older siblings, river and rain... and his younger siblings are liberty and summer (coincidently the names of the two girls who lived across the street from me growing up were summer and liberty... weird...)
... his parents were Church of God missionaries...
... they were all strict vegans and the kids were not allowed to be in commercials for meat, junk food, or milk...
... joaquin (as leaf)'s screen debut was on the film space camp (one of my FAVORITE movies growing up) in 1986 as max... and i bought it today on dvd for $7.50 at walmart... YEA!!!
... he dropped out of the public eye for a while and went to mexico with his dad (his parents were in the midst of separation)
... in 1993, he "returned to the public eye under tragic circumstances"... he was at the viper room when river collapsed from an overdose and joaquin actually made the call to 911...
... he met liv tyler on the set of inventing the abbotts and they dated for almost 3 years...
... his sister summer is married to casey affleck (ben's brother) and they have one child named Indiana August Affleck...
... because of his vegan-ness, he won't wear costumes made from animal skin and he once wouldn't wear shoes in a prada photo shoot because they were made of leather...

so there are a few fun facts about joaquin phoenix... i know... random... but haven't you come to expect it from me??? don't worry - joaquin isn't taking the place of john cusack for my favorite actor... but he may be getting up there on the list!!!