Tag

John Lithgow

Browsing

John Lithgow received his latest Emmy nomination for his role in the HBO television reboot of “Perry Mason,” alongside Matthew Rhys. Lithgow currently stars opposite Jeff Bridges in Jon Watts’ FX drama “The Old Man,” based on the bestselling novel of the same name by Thomas Perry. For his role in the series Lithgow was nominated for a Critics’ Choice Award for Best Supporting Actor in a Drama Series.

Most recently, Lithgow was seen in “Art Happens Here,” a docuseries in which he goes back to school to demonstrate the transformative power of arts education while exploring four arts disciplines: dance, ceramics, silk-screen printing and vocal jazz ensemble. On the feature side he will next be seen in the animated musical Spellbound, with Rachel Zegler and Nicole Kidman, and in the drama Jimpa, with Olivia Colman.

Lithgow’s roots are in the theater. In 1973 he won a Tony Award two weeks after his Broadway debut in David Storey’s “The Changing Room.” Since then, he has appeared on Broadway 25 times, earning five more Tony nominations, a second Tony win (for “Sweet Smell of Success”), four Drama Desk Awards and induction into the Theater Hall of Fame. Lithgow’s Broadway performances have included major roles in “My Fat Friend,” “Trelawney of the ‘Wells,’” “Comedians,” “Anna Christie,” “Bedroom Farce,” “Beyond Therapy,” “M. Butterfly,” “The Front Page,” “The Retreat From Moscow,” “All My Sons,” “The Columnist,” “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels” and “Hillary and Clinton.”

In England, Lithgow has played Malvolio with the Royal Shakespeare Company as well as the title role in Arthur Wing Pinero’s “The Magistrate” with the National Theatre. In 2014 he played another title role, “King Lear,” for the Public Theater at the Delacorte Theater in New York’s Central Park.

In 2008 Lithgow devised the one-man show “John Lithgow: Stories by Heart” for Lincoln Center Theater. Over the next 10 years, he performed it in 35 cities around the country, finally arriving on Broadway in 2018 for a triumphant run at the Roundabout Theatre Company. Most recently, Lithgow directed the Off Broadway play “Everything’s Fine,” written and performed by Douglas McGrath. The show opened on October 13, 2022 at the Daryl Roth Theater.

In the early 1980s John Lithgow began to make a major mark in film. Mid-decade he was nominated for Oscars® in back-to-back years (for The World According to Garp and Terms of Endearment). In the years before and after he has appeared in more than 50 feature films. Notable titles include All That Jazz, Blow Out, Twilight Zone: The Movie, Footloose, 2010, Buckaroo Banzai, Harry and the Hendersons, Memphis Belle, Raising Cain, Ricochet, Cliffhanger, Orange County, Shrek, Kinsey, Rise of the Planet of the Apes, This Is 40, Interstellar, Love Is Strange, Beatriz at Dinner, Pet Sematary, Daddy’s Home 2, Bombshell, Sharper, Killers of the Flower Moon and Cabrini.

Lithgow has been nominated for 13 Emmy Awards for his work on television. He has won six times: once for an episode of “Amazing Stories,” once for Showtime’s “Dexter,” once for the role of Winston Churchill in Netflix’s “The Crown,” and three times for playing High Commander Dick

Solomon on the hit NBC comedy series “3rd Rock from the Sun.” During that show’s six-year run Lithgow also won a Golden Globe, two SAG Awards and the American Comedy Award. Soon thereafter he got a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Since the early days of his career, Lithgow has also entertained young children. He has written several New York Times bestselling children’s picture books, most recently “Never Play Music Right Next to the Zoo.” Lithgow has performed concerts for children with a dozen major American symphony orchestras and released three kids’ albums, including the Grammy-nominated “The Sunny Side of the Street,” just one of his four Grammy nominations. He has been honored with the New Victory Arts Award for his work “bringing kids to the arts and the arts to kids.”

In 2011 HarperCollins published Lithgow’s warmly received memoir Drama: An Actor’s Education, an evocation of his life and career up to the age of 35. Since 2019 he has written and illustrated three books of satirical verse comprising “The Dumpty Trilogy,” achieving the remarkable feat of landing Lithgow on the New York Times nonfiction bestseller list three times in consecutive years.

Lithgow joined Kennedy Center President Deborah Rutter and Poet Laureate Natasha Trethewey as co-chairs of the Commission on the Arts of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Under their leadership the commission has produced authoritative reports on arts in education and America’s creative workforce. The recommendations in these reports took on added urgency in the age of COVID. While the commission has concluded its work, Lithgow continues to passionately advocate on these issues.

Lithgow was born in Rochester, New York. He grew up in a theater family, following the fortunes of his father Arthur Lithgow, a producer of American repertory theater. He attended eight public schools in Ohio and Massachusetts before finally finishing high school in Princeton, New Jersey. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard College and studied at the London Academy of Music & Dramatic Art on a Fulbright Grant. Lithgow has been honored with the Fulbright Lifetime Achievement Medal, induction into The American Academy of Arts and Sciences and an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from Harvard. On this last occasion he became the first actor to deliver Harvard’s Commencement Address.

John Lithgow has three children and three grandchildren. He has been married for 40 years to Mary Yeager, an Emerita Professor of business and economic history at UCLA. The actor currently divides his time between Los Angeles and New York.

Press release from Fosforo Press.

Pin It