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Giancarlo Esposito

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Giancarlo Esposito
Born
Giancarlo Giuseppe Alessandro Esposito
Occupation(s)Actor, director, producer
Years active1966–present
SpouseJoy McManigal (1995-present)

Giancarlo Giuseppe Alessandro Esposito (born April 26, 1958) is an American film and television actor and director.

Early life and personal details

Esposito was born in Copenhagen, Denmark to an Italian father and African-American mother. His mother was an opera and nightclub singer from Alabama, who once appeared on the same bill as Josephine Baker. His father was from Naples, and worked as a stagehand and carpenter.[1][2] Esposito lived in Europe, New York, and Cleveland until the family settled in Manhattan when he was six.

Esposito remembers that he and his brother, young boys living in Germany, ran and hid from an Ivorian deliveryman; he was frightening because he was a dark-skinned Black man. Their mother realized they were unaware their parents had different colors. The family later moved to Elmsford, New York, just north of New York City, where Esposito lived on the border between the town's black and Italian neighborhoods. He currently owns houses in Woodstock, New York and Ridgefield, Connecticut. He is the father of four daughters, and separated from his wife Joy McManigal.

Career

He made his Broadway debut (1966) at age eight playing a slave child opposite Shirley Jones in the short-lived Maggie Flynn. He did not take offense at the play's racial politics then; he was thrilled. "I had a solo and everything."[3][4]

In the 1980s, Esposito appeared in small roles in films such as Maximum Overdrive, King of New York, and Trading Places and TV shows such as Miami Vice and Spenser: For Hire. He played J.C. Pierce, a cadet in the 1981 movie Taps. In 1988, he landed his breakout role as a college student labeled a "wannabe" by his peers in director Spike Lee's film School Daze. Over the next four years, Esposito and Lee collaborated on three other movies: Do the Right Thing, Mo' Better Blues, and Malcolm X.

In the 1990s, he appeared in the acclaimed indie films Night on Earth, Fresh and Smoke, as well as its sequel Blue in the Face. He also appeared in Reckless with Mia Farrow.

Esposito is known for his portrayal of FBI agent Mike Giardello on the TV crime drama Homicide: Life on the Street. That role reflected both his black and Italian heritage. He played this role from 1998–1999 until the series' cancellation. The character's father Al is portrayed as subject to colorism, something Esposito's character practiced in School Daze. Another biracial role was Sergeant Paul Gigante in the television comedy series, Bakersfield P.D. (Fox Broadcasting Company, 1993–1994).

In 1997 he played the role of Darryl in Trouble on the Corner and Charlie Dunt in Nothing to Lose.

Other TV credits include NYPD Blue, Law & Order, The Practice, and Fallen Angels: Fearless.

Esposito has portrayed drug dealers (Fresh), cops (The Usual Suspects), political radicals (Bob Roberts) and even a demonic version of the Greek God of Sleep from another dimension (Monkeybone.) He played Cassius Clay, Sr., in Ali and Nuyorican poet Miguel Piñero's friend and collaborator Miguel Algarín in Piñero, both released in 2001.

In 2006, he starred in "Last Holiday" as Senator Dillings, alongside Queen Latifah and Timothy Hutton.

Mr. Esposito played Robert Fuentes, a Miami businessman with shady connections, on the UPN television series South Beach. He has appeared in New Amsterdam and CSI: Miami. He recorded a public service announcement for Deejay Ra's Hip hop literacy campaign to encourage reading about Muhammad Ali.

Gospel Hill (2008) was his directorial debut; he also produced the film, and starred in it. He is currently producing his next film Diamond District set in New York, with Matt Damon rumored to be starring.

His New York theatre credits include The Me Nobody Knows, Lost in the Stars, Seesaw, and Merrily We Roll Along. In 2008 he appeared on Broadway as Gooper in an African American production of Tennessee Williams' Pulitzer Prize-winning drama Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, directed by Debbie Allen and starring James Earl Jones, Phylicia Rashad, Anika Noni Rose, and Terrence Howard.

Since 2009, he has starred in the AMC drama Breaking Bad, playing the role of Gustavo 'Gus' Fring, the head of a New Mexico based methamphetamine drug ring. He is expected to return to the show in it's fourth season, currently slated to air in July 2011.

He also appears alongside Nicole Kidman and Aaron Eckhart in the 2010 film, Rabbit Hole.

Awards

He won Obie and Theatre World Awards for Zooman and the Sign, 1981; Obie award for Distant Fires, 1993.[3]

References

  1. ^ LeVasseur, Andrea (c:a 2003). "Giancarlo Esposito Pictures, Biography, Filmography, News, Videos". All Movie Guide. Starpulse. Retrieved 2009-04-10. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |year= (help); Cite has empty unknown parameters: |month= and |coauthors= (help)
  2. ^ "Giancarlo Esposito Biography (1958-)". Film Reference. NetIndustries, LLC. Retrieved 2009-04-10. Giancarlo Giuseppi Alessandro Esposito; born April 26, 1958, in Copenhagen, Denmark; raised in New York, NY; father, a stagehand and carpenter;mother, an opera and nightclub singer; married Joy McManigal (a producer), June 1995; children: Shayne Lyra, Kate Lyn. {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameters: |month= and |coauthors= (help)
  3. ^ a b "Giancarlo Esposito." Contemporary Black Biography, Volume 9. Gale Research, 1995. Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Michigan: Gale, 2009. http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/BioRC. Document Number: K1606000445. Updated: 05/18/2006. Fee via Fairfax County Public Library. Retrieved 2009-04-10.
  4. ^ "Giancarlo Esposito - Biography - Actor, Co-Producer, Director". Variety Profiles. Variety. Retrieved 2009-04-10.

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