Joseph Gordon-Levitt is known for his roles in 500 Days of Summer, G.I. Joe: The Rise of the Cobra and The Dark Knight Rises, and now the actor has made a comeback to Hollywood in Disney's latest remake, Pinocchio.
Joseph will star as fan favourite Jiminy Cricket in the live action movie, with Tom Hanks as woodcarver Gepetto, Benjamin Evan Ainsworth as the titular character, Cynthia Erivo as the Blue Fairy and Luke Evans as the evil Coachman.
However, Joseph has had a rocky career over the last few years, including his time out away from the camera and the death of his brother.
But what happened to Joseph Gordon-Levitt's brother and why did he take a break from acting?
What happened to Joseph Gordon-Levitt's brother?
Joseph's career boomed following NBC's 3rd Rock from the Sun which began in 1996.
The actor then became an entrepreneur and filmmaker with his brother Daniel and the pair went on to start HitRecord together in 2004.
HitRecord is an online collaborative media platform that uses a variety of media to produce such projects as short films, books, and DVDs.
Six years after the start of the business, Daniel was found unresponsive in his Hollywood home and taken to a hospital where he was later pronounced dead.
Daniel's cause of death was not made public but rumours began to circulate as media outlets speculated that he passed away from a "possible overdose."
Since his brother's passing, Joseph was featured in a profile article by GQ magazine which he later slammed for "factually incorrect" information that was used as they noted Dan passed away of an alleged drug overdose.
He took to Tumblr to share his views on the article.
He said: "I'm writing this because I have a problem with what their article [says] about my brother, I'll be honest, it really made me feel terrible."
Why did Joseph Gordon-Levitt take a break from acting?
Joseph decided to take a break from acting back in 2018 to focus on his family.
The actor ended up taking two years out of the spotlight to look after his children that he shares with his wife, Tasha McCauley.
The couple share a son, who was born in 2015, and a daughter, who was born in 2017, together but they keep their children out of the spotlight - including their names.
When asked about his break away from filming and coming back to work, Joseph told The Hollywood Reporter : "Having taken some time off, the perspective that I’ve returned with was just really wanting to focus on the art and the craft that I love so much.
"There were, of course, voices in my head expressing concern about momentum, career building and things of that nature. But I knew that if I wanted to be happy, I had to choose my first project back as what would challenge me as an actor and really intrigue and inspire me. And with 7500 , I think I really did find that."
Joseph returned to small screen in 2020 as he starred in the likes of Amazon Prime Video’s thriller 7500, Netflix ’s sci-fi movie Project Power and Aaron Sorkin’s The Trial of the Chicago 7.
He also released Create Together, a six-episode YouTube series on his HitRecord business which showed the process of how he connected creatives from around the world in an effort to collaborate together during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Disney's live action remake of Pinocchio is available now on Disney+.
