BRAD PITT'S path from Missouri-bred choirboy to delectable hunk was cemented with a strong Baptist faith and at least a trillion situps. His father, a trucking company manager, raised Brad and his younger brother and sister to be respectable, churchgoing folk.

　　After graduating from Kickapoo High, Pitt headed off to the University of Missouri, where he majored in advertising, graphic design, and frat-boy shenanigans. Just two weeks and two credits shy of graduating, Pitt crammed all of his earthly belongings in the rattletrap Datsun he called "Runaround Sue," and headed out to Hollywood to become, well, a movie star.

choirboy：唱诗班少年；布拉德·皮特从一个清纯的乡间少年成长为人见人爱的性感偶像。
delectable：使人愉快的。
situp：仰卧起坐；布拉德·皮特的一身肌肉可不是轻轻松松练出来的。
churchgoing：经常上教堂的；布拉德的父亲是一位卡车公司经理，他把小布拉德和弟弟妹妹培养成有教养的好孩子。
shenanigan：恶作剧，诡计；布拉德在密苏里大学主修广告，美术设计，并且兼顾同学会的工作。
belongings：财产，所有物；皮特在毕业前两周收拾所有家当去了好莱坞，希望实现做一个电影明星的梦想。

He told his parents and friends that he was off to attend the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, because he was afraid to tell them that, in fact, he planned to relegate himself to the status of a table-waiting, limo-driving, chicken-suit-wearing, L.A. cliché — all in the hope that someday he would be famous.

　　Luckily, Pitt's days spent donning a chicken costume for El Pollo Loco and driving strippers to bachelor parties were numbered. With a few acting classes under his belt, he soon landed a recurring role as the hormone-propelled boyfriend of Priscilla Presley's daughter on Dallas.

relegate：降低身份；布拉德·皮特到好莱坞去发展是从饭店服务员，汽车司机这些低级工作做起的，他都没有敢告诉父母和朋友。
cliché：陈腐的，颓废的（人或物）。

A role in 1991's Thelma and Louise, as the horny hitchhiker responsible for Thelma's Geena Davis first orgasm, finally catapulted Pitt into the spotlight. And rightly so: it was the first occasion that Pitt's abdominals had been properly lighted, and Hollywood sat up and took notice along with a fair-sized chunk of slavering moviegoers.

　　Pitt scored his first critical acclaim, not to mention his first Oscar nomination, in the role of a mental patient in Terry Gilliam's 12 Monkeys, in which he attempted — with little success — to disguise his comeliness with cross-eyed brown contacts and a psychotic grin.

catapult：弹射，发射；布拉德的机会出现在1991年，他在影片“末路狂花”中演了一个性感角色，第一次充分展示了他的腹肌，终于引起好莱坞和观众的注意。
chunk：大块头。
acclaim：喝彩，欢呼；皮特在影片“12猴子”里扮演一个精神病患者，这部影片大获成功，皮特也获得了奥斯卡奖的提名。
comeliness：漂亮，美貌；在“12猴子”中，皮特有意用滑稽的表情掩饰自己的美貌，显示出精湛的演技。
psychotic：精神病的。

He affected a fair Irish brogue as a charismatic I.R.A. terrorist in 1997's The Devil's Own, and a passable Germanic accent as Austrian journeyer Heinrich Harrar in Seven Years in Tibet, a performance many have credited as the best of his career.

　　Pitt, who commands in the neighborhood of $10 million per film nowadays, signed to play Death in Meet Joe Black, director Martin Brest's lavish, if ill-conceived, 1998 remake of Death Takes a Holiday.

brogue：爱尔兰人；1997年，皮特在影片“魔鬼同行”中出演一名爱尔兰共和军战士，在影片“西藏七年”中演达赖喇嘛的教师，这两部影片都广获好评。
charismatic：超凡魅力的。
credit：声望，荣誉；许多人认为皮特在“西藏七年”中的表演是他最精彩的一次。

Pitt reteamed with Seven director David Fincher for the 1999 release Fight Club, the anarchic story of doomed male Gen-Xers who react to the soul-numbing effects of rampant '90s consumerism by forming underground clubs for the purpose of beating the tar out of each other.

　　Based on the Chuck Palahniuk novel of the same title, the controversial Club may have left critics and audience members divided on the subject of its ultimate efficacy and import, but no one could disagree that Pitt's six-pack abs have only gotten better with time.

reteam：重新合作；皮特在1999年和“七宗罪”的导演再度携手，合作了充满争议的影片“格斗俱乐部”。
anarchic：无政府主义的。
consumerism：用户至上主义。