Langella, Frank (b. 1940), actor. The dark, youthful‐looking leading man, whose versatility has allowed him to shine in both classic and contemporary plays, has been a durable and favorite actor on the New York stage for forty years. He was born in Bayonne, New Jersey, and studied theatre at Syracuse University before appearing in stock productions. Langella made his New York debut in 1963 and started to get noticed as a member of the Lincoln Center Theatre Company, particularly as the young Will Shakespeare in A Cry of Players (1968). Among his many memorable performances were the personified lizard Leslie in Seascape (1975), the honorable title hero in The Prince of Homburg (1976), a young and sensuous Dracula (1977), the guilt‐ridden lawyer Quentin in After the Fall (1984), an egotistical Sherlock Holmes in Sherlock's Last Case (1987), the tormented Captain in The Father (1996), and the Russian fop Tropatchov in Fortune's Fool (2002). Langella frequently returned to regional theatre, in particular the Williamstown Theatre Festival.
Frank Langella
| American Theater Guide: Frank Langella |
| Actor: Frank Langella |
- Born: Jan 01, 1940 in Bayonne, New Jersey
- Occupation: Actor
- Active: '70s-2000s
- Major Genres: Drama, History
- Career Highlights: Dracula, Junior, Dave
- First Major Screen Credit: Diary of a Mad Housewife (1970)
Biography
An imposing and highly memorable presence on the Broadway stage, actor Frank Langella has won only a fraction of the acclaim he's received in the theater for his film career; still, his brooding good looks and his ability to play both villains and comic foils with a touch of menace has made him a welcome (and increasingly familiar) fare to film buffs. Frank Langella was born in Bayonne, NJ, on New Year's Day, 1940. Langella caught the acting bug when he was 11, after playing an elderly man in a school play on the life of Abraham Lincoln, and he went on to earn a degree in Theater from Syracuse University. After studying acting with Elia Kazan, Langella began working with regional theater companies in the East Coast and the Midwest, and in 1963, made his New York stage debut when he landed the leading role in an off-Broadway revival of The Immoralist. Between 1964 and 1966, Langella would win three Obie awards for his work in off-Broadway theater, and in 1969, he received a Drama Desk award for his work in the drama A Cry of Players. In 1974, he made his Broadway debut in Edward Albee's Seascape, and, the following year, won another Drama Desk award as well as a Tony for his performance.Langella made his film debut in 1970 with a supporting role in Diary of a Mad Housewife, and later that same year, scored a larger part in The Twelve Chairs, written and directed by Mel Brooks. While Langella landed occasional television and film roles through much of the 1970s, he was still busiest as a stage actor. In 1977, Langella was cast in the leading role of a Broadway revival of Dracula, and his con brio performance as the bloodthirsty count earned rave reviews, turning the production into an unexpected hit. Langella was tapped to reprise his performance for a film version of Dracula released in 1979, but he was forced to tone down his unique take on the role for the screen, and what would have seemingly been the perfect screen vehicle for his talents became a critical and box-office disappointment. However, Langella maintained a busy schedule of stage work, and in the 1990s, finally scored a breakthrough screen role in the comedy Dave as the deceitful political puppet master Bob Alexander. A busy schedule of character roles in such films as Junior, Lolita, and The Ninth Gate followed, though Langella still remained a frequent and distinguished presence in the New York theatrical community. He worked steadily at the beginning of the twenty-first century in films as diverse as the romantic drama Sweet November, and David Duchovny's directorial debut House of D. He scored an artistic and critical success in 2005 playing William Paley in George Clooney's historical docudrama about Edward R. Murrow Good Night, and Good Luck. He was then tapped by Bryan Singer to embody Daily Planet editor Perry White in the 2006 summer blockbuster Superman Returns.
In 2007, Langella earned strong reviews and some awards buzz for his starring role in Starting Out in the Evening, but it was actually the next year, 2008 when he captured a Best Actor Academy Award nomination, a well as a SAG nomination, for his portrayal of disgraced former president Richard Nixon in Ron Howard's big-screen adaptation of Frost/Nixon. ~ All Movie Guide
| Filmography: Frank Langella |
| Wikipedia: Frank Langella |
| Frank Langella | |
|---|---|
 Langella at the 2007 Toronto International Film Festival |
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| Born | Frank A. Langella, Jr. January 1, 1938 Bayonne, New Jersey, U.S. |
| Occupation | Actor |
| Years active | 1965–present |
| Spouse(s) | Ruth Weil (1977-1996) |
Frank A. Langella, Jr. (born January 1, 1938)[1][2] is an American stage and film actor. His Tonys include two for Best Featured Actor in a Play for Edward Albee's Seascape (1975), and Ivan Turgenev's Fortune's Fool (2002), and for Best Leading Actor in a Play for his performance as Richard Nixon in Peter Morgan's Frost/Nixon (2008). Langella was nominated for two other Best Leading Actor in a Play Tonys; first in 1978 for the Edward Gorey-designed revival of Bram Stoker's Dracula and again in 2004 for Stephen Belber's Match.
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Personal life
Langella, an Italian American,[3] was born in Bayonne, New Jersey,[4] the son of Frank A. Langella Sr., a business executive.[5] Langella attended Washington Elementary School and Bayonne High School in Bayonne.[6] He graduated from Columbia High School, in the South Orange and Maplewood School District, in 1955, and graduated from Syracuse University in 1959 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in drama. He remains a brother of the Alpha Chi Rho fraternity.
Langella was married to Ruth Weil from June 14, 1977 to their divorce in 1996. They have two children. He lived with actress/comedian Whoopi Goldberg, whom he met on the set of Eddie in 1996, until they separated in March 2001.
Career
Langella made his first foray on stage in New York in William Gibson's A Cry of Players, playing a young, highly fictionalized William Shakespeare, opposite Anne Bancroft at Lincoln Center's Vivian Beaumont Theatre in 1968, and won film fame in two 1970 films: Mel Brooks' The Twelve Chairs and Frank Perry's Diary of a Mad Housewife, being nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Most Promising Newcomer for the latter. Langella won his first Tony Award for his performance in Edward Albee's Seascape and 1975 and was nominated for another for what may have been the performance for which he was best known for in the early part of his career: the title role of the 1977 Broadway production of Dracula. Despite his initial misgivings about continuing to play the role, he was persuaded to star opposite Laurence Olivier in the subsequent film version directed by John Badham.
He eschewed the career of a traditional film star by always making the stage the focal point of his career, appearing on Broadway in such plays as Sherlock's Last Case, Strindberg's The Father (winning a Drama Desk Award), Match (Tony Award nomination), and Fortune's Fool, for which he won a second Tony Award.
But Langella would continue to juggle film and television with his stage work, playing Sherlock Holmes in an HBO adaptation (1981) of William Gillette's famous stage play. He repeated the role on Broadway in 1987 in Charles Marowitz's play Sherlock's Last Case. That same year, Langella would also portray the villain Skeletor in Masters of the Universe. In 1988, Langella co-starred in the movie And God Created Woman. In 1993 he made a memorable three-episode appearance on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine as the devious Jaro Essa. He also appeared as Al Baker in "Dominance", a 2003 episode of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit and had a recurring role as Pino in the 2005 short-lived sitcom Kitchen Confidential. On film, he played Claire Quilty in Adrian Lyne's adaptation of Lolita and appeared as a villainous pirate in the summer 1995 release Cutthroat Island. His film work also includes roles in George Clooney's Good Night, and Good Luck (2005) as former CBS chief executive William S. Paley and Bryan Singer's Superman Returns (2006) as Daily Planet editor Perry White. Langella received critical acclaim as well as the Boston Society of Film Critics Award in 2007 for his sensitive portrayal of an elderly novelist in Starting Out in the Evening.
He was cast as Richard M. Nixon in Peter Morgan's Frost/Nixon, which received enthusiastic reviews during a run at the Donmar Warehouse and Gielgud Theatre in London before moving to New York's Bernard B. Jacobs Theater in April 2007, culminating in Langella's third Tony Award. He reprised the role of Nixon in the 2008 film Frost/Nixon, directed by Ron Howard. He received Golden Globe, Screen Actors Guild, and BAFTA nominations for Best Actor for his performance. He was also nominated for an Academy Award in the Best Actor category for the role, losing to Sean Penn's performance in Milk.
In 2000 he played the role of Ebenezer Scrooge in a musical version of A Christmas Carol at Madison Square Garden.[7] He has also appeared in notable off-Broadway productions, including in the title role of Robert Kalfin's Chelsea Theater Center production of The Prince of Homburg, which was filmed by PBS for the Theatre in America series.[8] He recently starred as Sir Thomas More in the 2008 Broadway revival of A Man for All Seasons, which finished its limited run in December.[9]
In late 2009, he starred alongside Cameron Diaz and re-united with Superman Returns co-star James Marsden in the Richard Kelly film The Box.[10]
Langella stars 2010 in the drama-thriller Unknown White Male, which is directed by Jaume-Collet-Serra.[11]
Filmography
See also
References
- ^ http://www.mirror.co.uk/celebs/news/2009/01/21/oscar-nominations-frank-langhella-top-10-facts-you-need-to-know-about-the-academy-award-nominated-frost-nixon-actor-115875-21059440/
- ^ http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/04/movies/awardsseason/04mcgr.html?n=Top/Reference/Times%20Topics/People/H/Howard,%20Ron
- ^ Roberts, Sheila (2007-11-22). "Frank Langella Interview, Starting out in the Evening". MoviesOnline. http://www.moviesonline.ca/movienews_13501.html. Retrieved 2007-12-04.
- ^ Peter Marks (1996-02-11). "Frank Langella Stamps 'The Father' as His Own". The New York Times. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D05E3DB1539F932A25751C0A960958260. Retrieved 2008-04-10.
- ^ "Frank Langella Biography". filmreference. 2008. http://www.filmreference.com/film/98/Frank-Langella.html. Retrieved 2008-04-10.
- ^ Coutros, Evonne E. "PLAYING A WICKED STREAK FOR ALL IT'S WORTH", The Record (Bergen County). January 23, 1994.
- ^ http://www.filmreference.com/film/98/Frank-Langella.html
- ^ Napoleon, Davi (1991). Chelsea on the Edge: The Adventures of an American Theater. Iowa State University Press. ISBN 0813817137.
- ^ Cox, Gordon. Frank Langella to be 'Man' on B'way, Variety, 21 May 2008.
- ^ Video Interviews: The Box
- ^ Frank Langella Scores Starring Role in 'Unknown White Male'
External links
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Frank Langella |
- Frank Langella at the Internet Broadway Database
- Frank Langella at the Internet Movie Database
- Frank Langella at the Internet Off-Broadway Database
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Mentioned in
- Unscripted (2005 Comedy Film)
- How You Look to Me (2006 Drama Film)
- AMC StoryMakers (2009 Film)
- Dracula (1979 Horror Film)
- The Mark of Zorro (1974 Adventure Film)
- Elaine Welton Hill (Actor, Mystery/Romance)
- La Maison Sous Les Arbres (1971 Thriller Film)
- Stella Adler: Awake and Dream! (1992 Film, TV & Radio Film)
- Doomsday Gun (1994 Drama Film)
- The Seagull (1975 Drama Film)
- All Good Things (2009 Mystery Film)
- Deep Space Nine 22: The Circle: Star Trek (TV Episode) (1993 Science Fiction TV Episode)
- Deep Space Nine 23: The Siege: Star Trek (TV Episode) (1993 Science Fiction TV Episode)
- Seascape (American Theater)
