John Joseph Travolta (born February 18, 1954) is an Academy Award-nominated and Golden Globe Award-winning American actor, dancer, and singer, best known for his leading roles in films such as Saturday Night Fever, Grease, Pulp Fiction, Hairspray, and Battlefield Earth. Travolta, the youngest of six children,[1] was born in Englewood, New Jersey. His father, Salvatore Travolta, was a semi-professional football player turned tire salesman and partner in a tire company.[2] His mother, Helen Cecilia (née Burke), who was 42 when Travolta was born, was an actress and singer who had appeared in The Sunshine Sisters, a radio vocal group, and acted and directed before becoming a high school drama and English teacher. Travolta's father was a second-generation Italian American and his mother was Irish American;[3][4] Travolta grew up in an Irish-American neighborhood[5] and has said that his household was predominantly Irish in culture. His family was Catholic.[6]