Charles Bronson was born Charles Dennis Buchinsky, in a Roman Catholic family of Lithuanian descent as the 11th of 15 children.

He learned to speak English when he was a teenager; before that, he spoke Lithuanian and Russian.

Charles Bronson worked at many odd jobs until joining a theatrical group in Philadelphia.

He made several appearances on television in the 1950’s and 1960’s.

In 1968, he starred as Harmonica in Once Upon a Time in the West. Harmonica died at age 81 on August 30, 2003.

Former prostitute Jill McBain (Claudia Cardinale) moves from New Orleans to frontier Utah, on the very edge of the American West. She arrives to find her new husband and family slaughtered.

The prime suspect, coffee-lover Cheyenne, befriends her and offers to go after the real killer, assassin gang leader Frank, in her honor.

He is accompanied by Harmonica, a man already on a quest to get even. Harmonica says he will reveal who he is only at the point of dying.