Peter MacNicol

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Peter MacNicol
Born Peter C. MacNicol
April 10, 1954 (1954-04-10) (age 55)
Dallas, Texas, U.S.
Occupation Actor
Years active 1981–present
Spouse(s) Marsue MacNicol (1986–present)

Peter C. MacNicol (born April 10, 1954) is an American actor. He is best known for the roles of the eccentric and abnormal John Cage in the FOX comedy-drama Ally Mcbeal, as Tom Lennox in the sixth season of the Fox show 24, and as Alan Birch in Chicago Hope. He is currently starring in the CBS crime drama NUMB3RS as physicist Dr. Larry Fleinhardt.

Contents

[edit] Biography

[edit] Early life

MacNicol was born and raised in Dallas, Texas, the youngest of five children of Barbara and John Johnson, who was an Episcopal priest.[1] MacNicol began his career studying at the University of Dallas and continued at the University of Minnesota. While in Minnesota, he performed in two seasons at the Guthrie Theater. A New York talent agent spotted him and told him to make a move to Manhattan.

[edit] Career

MacNicol was cast in the off-Broadway play, Crimes of the Heart. The production eventually moved to Broadway, and MacNicol won the Theatre World Award. It was also during this production that a casting agent noticed him and called him in to read for his eventual role in Sophie's Choice. In 1987, he starred in the Trinity Repertory Company's original production of the stage adaptation of "All the King's Men," which first appeared at the Dallas Theater Center. This adaptation was developed with the consultation of the author himself.

Among his other stage credits is the Broadway production of Black Comedy/White Lies, MacNicol also has further extensive classical repertory theater background, including the New York Shakespeare Festival in which he played title roles in Richard II and Romeo and Juliet, and appeared in Twelfth Night, Rum and Coke and Found a Peanut.

MacNicol's past work demonstrates the broad dramatic and comedic spectrum of his talent. On film, he has appeared as the naive Southern writer who fell in love with Meryl Streep in Sophie's Choice; the strange museum curator Janosh Poha in Ghostbusters II and the summer camp director Gary Granger in Addams Family Values. Other film credits include HouseSitter and American Blue Note.

MacNicol is best known among television viewers for his Ally McBeal performance as eccentric attorney John Cage, for which he won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series in 2001. He currently stars in the drama NUMB3RS as physicist Dr. Larry Fleinhardt, and had a popular role as Tom Lennox in the sixth season of the hit Fox show 24. MacNicol reprised his role as Lennox in the film 24: Redemption. MacNicol has begun to record as Doctor Octopus for the first season of The Spectacular Spider-Man, which premiered on The CW in March 2008. In addition, this year, MacNicol has written a script entitled Salvation on Sand Mountain and is attached to the project as an executive producer and director. He has recently signed on to play the dub voice of Gishin, Damos's minion who hypnotizes his master in the twelfth Pokemon movie, Arceus and the Overcoming of Time-Space.

[edit] Personal life

He currently resides in Los Angeles with his wife of 22 years who runs The Corie Williams Scholarship Fund, a non-profit foundation that provides scholarships for inner-city children in Los Angeles.

MacNicol joined the picket line at FOX Studios in support of the Writers Guild of America strike and participated in the November 9 rally.

[edit] Filmography

[edit] References

[edit] External links

Awards and achievements
Preceded by
Jason Alexander; Julia Louis-Dreyfus; Michael Richards; Jerry Seinfeld
for Seinfeld
Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series
1998
for Ally McBeal
Succeeded by
Dan Butler; Peri Gilpin; Kelsey Grammer; Jane Leeves; John Mahoney; David Hyde Pierce
for Frasier
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