Frank Langella - Biography

A tall, magnetic actor whose expressive, deep-set brown eyes have projected both intense romanticism and extreme villainy, Frank Langella studied drama at Syracuse University and, after performing in regional repertory and summer stock, joined the Lincoln Center Repertory company (as one of the original repertory company members), making his New York debut in "The Immoralist" in 1963. He spent much of the next decade onstage, building his reputation with OBIE-winning turns in "The Old Glory" (1964), "Good Day" and "The White Devil" (both 1965) while also working frequently at the Berkshire Theatre Festival (where he first created the role of Will Shakespeare in "A Cry of Players" 1968) and the Williamstown Theatre Festival, among others. Langella was excellent in his feature debut as a self-centered amoralist afraid to become entrapped by serious relationships in Frank Perry's "Diary of a Mad Housewife" and also came up aces as a Russian con man in Mel Brooks' "The Twelve Chairs" (both 1970), winning the Best Supporting Actor Award from the National Board of Review for the two performances.

Regardless of film and TV success, Langella has always returned to the stage, where he has tasted his sweetest triumphs. He earned a Tony for his Broadway debut as a slithering lizard in Edward Albee's Pulitzer-winner "Seascape" (1975) and smoldered his way to a Tony nomination as a sexy "Dracula" (1977), sharing the spotlight with Edward Gorey's sets. Tapings of Langella's stage performances at the Williamstown Theatre Festival in Chekhov's "The Seagull" and Tennessee Williams' "Eccentricities of a Nightingale" (both opposite Blythe Danner) aired on PBS as part of "Theater in America" in 1975 and 1976 respectively. He made his Broadway directorial debut at the helm of Albert Innaurato's "Passione" in 1980 and later produced and starred in both a 1984 Off-Broadway revival of "After the Fall" and a Broadway production of "Sherlock's Last Case" (1987). Other notable performances during the 80s came in Sir Peter Hall's production of "Amadeus" (1982, as one of Ian McKellen's successors in the juicy role of Salieri), George C. Scott's production of Noel Coward's "Design for Living" (1984, co-starring Jill Clayburgh) and Mike Nichols' 1985 staging of "Hurlyburly".

After his role as the deranged counter-revolutionary son of Rita Hayworth in Hayworth's swan song, "The Wrath of God" (1972), Langella did not appear on the large screen until reprising his immensely seductive "Dracula" (1979). Though some thought the trendy horror gimmicks employed by director John Badham upstaged Langella's acclaimed Broadway characterization, the film still did fine with blood-thirsty fans at the box office. He was quite good as a down-on-his-luck actor in Michael Pressman's sleeper "Those Lips, Those Eyes" (1980), but for the most part, worthy film roles in solid pictures continued to elude him as he landed in questionable movies like "The Men's Club" (1986), the tedious, imitative fantasy "Masters of the Universe" (1987, as the hideously made-up Skeletor), Roger Vadim's ill-advised remake of "And God Created Woman" (1988) and "1492: The Conquest of Paradise (1992). He fared much better during this time on the small screen, portraying the title characters in the ABC movie "The Mark of Zorro" (1974) and in HBO's "Sherlock Holmes" (1991), as well as taking on historical figures like Da Vinci in "I, Leonardo: A Journey of the Mind" (PBS, 1983) and famed sculptor Frederic Auguste Bartholdi in "Liberty" (NBC, 1986).

The now white-haired Langella enjoyed arguably his best decade in the 90s, scoring successes in all facets of his career. He was tremendous as the evil White House chief of staff in "Dave" (1993) and equally villainous as the brilliant, cynical arms designer of HBO's "Doomsday Gun" and as a department administrator in support of Arnold Schwarzennegger in Ivan Reitman's "Junior" (both 1994). Rebounding from the ill-fated pirate feature "Cutthroat Island" (1995), Langella starred opposite Whoopi Goldberg in the sports comedy "Eddie" (1996) and then played Quilty in Adrian Lyne's remake of the scandalous "Lolita" (1997), baring it all for the picture banned from feature release in the USA (but aired on Showtime in 1998). Returning to the small screen, Langella had little to do as the Pharaoh to Ben Kingsley's "Moses" (TNT, 1996) and later appeared in the NBC miniseries "Jason and the Argonauts" (2000) before essaying the role of a cable network owner for ABC's "The Beast" (2001), a short-lived series about the 24-hour World News Service (WNS) network. Film roles in a string of minor films followed before Langella resurfaced in a major way with his magnetic portrayal of the demanding, compelling and sometimes hypocritical acting teacher Goddard Fulton in the George Clooney-Steven Soderberg-produced improvised series "Unscripted" (HBO, 2005 - ). He then landed another coup when he was cast in the role of Perry White, the editor of the Daily Planet newspaper where Clark Kent works in director Bryan Singer's "Superman Returns" (lensed 2005).

Langella has shown brightest on the boards and will probably always be remembered as a stage actor first and foremost. After playing family patriarch Junius Brutus Booth in a New York production of Austin Pendleton's "Booth" (1994), he garnered acclaim for what Variety called a "hair-raising" performance as August Strindberg's "The Father", as well as for his delicious turn as the perpetually preening matinee idol Garry Essendine in Noel Coward's "Present Laughter" (both 1996). Then, dusting off a character he had played in 1971 and 1980 productions in Williamstown, Langella directed and starred as "Cyrano de Bergerac" (1997) in a scaled-down adaptation for an intimate setting which he also scripted. Played Garry Esendine in Norl Coward's "Present Laughter" on Broadway in the 1996-97 season. In 1998 the actor played The Captain in August Strindberg's "The Father" at the Geffen Playhouse in Los Angeles, and a Tony Award-winning turn as Best Performance by a Featured Actor in a Play for his work as Flegont Alexandrovitch Tropatchov in Ivan Turgenev's "Fortune's Fool" in 2002 at the Stamford Center for the Arts in Stamford, Connecticut.