Charles Martinet

Early life

Charles Andre Martinet^[3] was born on September 17, 1955,^[4] in San Jose or Cupertino, California^[1]: 337 to father Jacques René Pierre Martinet. The younger of two children, he has an older brother, John, though he was taller than him despite being the younger sibling, and while his brother was extroverted, Charles was shy and more anxiety-driven than him in his youth. ^{[5]: 20:16–20:18 [6]} His mother's family had been in the country since the Mayflower voyages,^{[5]: 20:26–20:36} while his father grew up in Paris, France,^[6] and Martinet's paternal grandfather served in World War I under General Pershing in order to get eligibility for American citizenship; they then came to the US when Martinet was a child. This makes him French-American.^{[5]: 20:37–20:51}


His family moved to Barcelona, Spain when he was 12 years old, where he attended an American middle school.^[6][7] In 1969, after 3 years in Spain, they moved to Paris, France.^[6][7] As a result, he became fluent in Spanish and French; he can also speak a little bit of Italian.^[1]: 337 He attended the American School of Paris and graduated in 1974.^[1]: 338


As a young adult, Martinet became interested in international law.^{[1]: 338 [6][8][9]} He attended the University of California, Berkeley, where he majored in history or politics.^[6][8] In his senior year, he decided to discontinue his studies after a tutor told him to "regurgitate information he'd written in his book, chapter-by-chapter".^[8] When he was about 20 years old, a friend persuaded him to take acting classes^[1]: 338 to combat his fear of public speaking.^[6][9] His first role was a monologue from the Spoon River Anthology.^[9] Charles Martinet formed his acting philosophy in his first acting class, as in that class, there was a man who suffered from a terrible stutter, and he found out from him what happened: on his 21st birthday, he went to Las Vegas to see the live performance of a comedian with his friends, but that evening, the comedian made insulting jokes at his expense, something that scarred him for life, as he woke up with a stutter the next day after spending the night in an hotel. This story affected Martinet so much that he swore that he would never do offensive jokes.


Martinet auditioned for and won an apprenticeship at the Berkeley Repertory Theatre.^[1]: 338 After training with the Berkeley Rep for several years, Martinet went to London to attend the Drama Studio London,^{[1]: 338 [9]} where among other skills, he discovered his talent for accents and dialects.^[7] Upon returning to California he joined the Berkeley Repertory Theatre. He went on to become a founding member of the San Jose Repertory Theatre for four years.^[9]