Kurt Russell sketch with a no. 2 pencil on smooth bristol paper. Kurt Vogel Russell (born March 17, 1951) is an American actor. He began acting on television in the western series The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters (1963–64). In the late 1960s, he signed a ten-year contract with The Walt Disney Company where, according to Robert Osborne, he became the studio's top star of the 1970s.