John Lithgow

John Arthur Lithgow (/ˈlɪθɡoʊ/ LITH-goh; born October 19, 1945) is an American actor. He studied at Harvard University and the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art before becoming known for his diverse work on stage and screen. He has received numerous accolades including four Actor Awards, seven Emmy Awards, two Golden Globes, a Laurence Olivier Award, and three Tony Awards, as well as nominations for two Academy Awards, a British Academy Film Award and four Grammy Awards.

A three-time Tony Award winner, Lithgow has won in the categories Best Featured Actor in a Play for his Broadway debut portraying a rugby player in The Changing Room (1972), Best Actor in a Musical for playing a fearful columnist in Sweet Smell of Success (2002), and Best Actor in a Play for his portrayal of Roald Dahl in Giant (2026).

He was Tony-nominated for Requiem for a Heavyweight (1985), M. Butterfly (1988), Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (2005), and The Columnist (2012). He has also acted in A Delicate Balance (2014) and Hillary and Clinton (2019).

On television, Lithgow starred as Dick Solomon in the NBC sitcom 3rd Rock from the Sun (1996–2001), winning three Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series. He received further Emmy Awards for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series playing Arthur Mitchell in the drama Dexter (2009) and for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series for his portrayal of Winston Churchill in the Netflix drama The Crown (2016–2019).

He also starred in the HBO drama series Perry Mason (2020) and the FX thriller series The Old Man (2022–2024).

In film, Lithgow has received two nominations for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his roles as a transgender ex-football player in The World According to Garp (1982) and as a lonely banker in Terms of Endearment (1983). He also acted in All That Jazz (1979), Blow Out (1981), Footloose (1984), Harry and the Hendersons (1987), A Civil Action (1998), Shrek (2001), Kinsey (2004), Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011), Love Is Strange (2014), Interstellar (2014), Late Night (2019), Bombshell (2019), Killers of the Flower Moon (2023), and Conclave (2024).

Early life and education

Lithgow was born on October 19, 1945, in Rochester, New York. His mother, Sarah Jane (née Price), was a retired actress. His father, Arthur Lithgow, was a theatrical producer and director who ran McCarter Theatre in Princeton, New Jersey. His father was born in Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic, to a European-American family; his great-grandfather was a vice consul and vice commercial agent in the country.

He is the third of four children and his siblings are an older brother David Lithgow, an older sister Robin Lithgow, and a younger sister Sarah Jane Bokaer.

Lithgow is of mostly English and Welsh descent. His maternal grandfather, Orlo Price, as well as other family members, left their native Wales, and settled in a town called Welsh Hills, Ohio, and started fruit farming in the 19th century. On the show Finding Your Roots, Lithgow also discovered that he is a descendant of eight Mayflower passengers, including colonial governor William Bradford.

He is also related to that show's host, the historian and literary critic, Henry Louis Gates Jr., in addition to being distant cousins with painter Frederic Edwin Church, chef Julia Child, author Thomas Pynchon, and actors Alec Baldwin, Clint Eastwood, and Sally Field.

Because of his father's job, the family moved frequently during Lithgow's childhood. He spent his childhood years in Yellow Springs, Ohio, where activist Coretta Scott King was his babysitter. He spent his teenage years in Akron (living at Stan Hywet Hall) and Lakewood, Ohio, followed by Princeton, New Jersey.

Lithgow is a 1963 graduate of Princeton High School. He then studied history and English literature at Harvard College. Lithgow lived in Adams House as an undergraduate and later served on the Harvard Board of Overseers. He credits a performance at Harvard of Gilbert and Sullivan's Utopia Limited with helping him decide to become an actor.

He was a pupil of dramatist Robert Chapman who was the director of Harvard's Loeb Drama Center. Lithgow was graduated from Harvard in 1967 with an A.B. magna cum laude and was elected to Phi Beta Kappa.

Upon graduation from Harvard, Lithgow won a Fulbright Scholarship to study at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art. After graduation from the LAMDA, he served as the director of the Arts and Literature Department at WBAI, the Pacifica radio station in New York City.

Career

1972–1995: Broadway debut and breakthrough

In 1972, Lithgow made his film debut in Dealing: Or the Berkeley-to-Boston Forty-Brick Lost-Bag Blues. In 1976, he starred in a pivotal role in Brian De Palma's Obsession with Cliff Robertson and Genevieve Bujold as Robertson's long time business partner, Robert Lasalle. In 1973, Lithgow debuted on Broadway in David Storey's The Changing Room at the Morosco Theatre, playing English rugby player Kenny Kendal.

He won a Drama Desk Award and the Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Play. The production ran from March 2 to August 18, totaling 3 previews and 192 performances. The following year, he starred again on Broadway in the comedy play My Fat Friend, opposite Lynn Redgrave at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre. He starred in several plays, such as 27 Wagons Full of Cotton, A Memory of Two Mondays, and Secret Service, with Meryl Streep at The Public Theater and with Tom Hulce at the Playhouse Theatre.

Lithgow acted in Bob Fosse's semi-autobiographical movie All That Jazz (1979), playing a character loosely based on real-life Broadway director and choreographer Michael Bennett. Between 1978 and 1980, Lithgow appeared in ten episodes of the radio drama revival series CBS Radio Mystery Theater. Lithgow voiced the character of Yoda in the National Public Radio adaptations of The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi.

Lithgow was approached about playing Dr. Frasier Crane on Cheers, but turned it down. In 1982, Lithgow was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performances as transsexual ex-football player Roberta Muldoon in The World According to Garp. In 1983, he played lonely small-town banker Sam Burns in Terms of Endearment, receiving his second consecutive Oscar nomination.

Both films were screen adaptations of popular novels. In 1983, Lithgow appeared in a remake of the classic Twilight Zone episode "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" in Twilight Zone: The Movie as the paranoid passenger made famous on the television show by William Shatner. In an interview with Bill Moyers, Lithgow revealed this role as his favorite of his film career.

Also in 1983, Lithgow appeared in a minor role as University of Kansas science professor Joe Huxley in the nuclear apocalypse television film The Day After, receiving a nomination for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie. In 1984, he starred in the film The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension as Dr.

Emilio Lizardo / Lord John Whorfin. Also in 1984, he starred in 2010: The Year We Make Contact and played a pastor who condemns dancing and rock music in Footloose.

In 1985, he starred opposite Jodie Foster in Mesmerized. Also in 1985, he starred in Santa Claus: The Movie alongside Dudley Moore. Also in 1985, at the Martin Beck Theatre on Broadway, he starred in Requiem for a Heavyweight, written by Rod Serling. Playing washed-up boxer Harlan "Mountain" McClintock, he won the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actor in a Play and was nominated for the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play.

The production ran only 11 performances. In 1986, he was nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Miniseries or a Special for Resting Place, portraying Major Kendall Laird, a charismatic but morally compromised Southern lawman entangled in a long-buried murder. In 1986, he starred in The Manhattan Project, directed by Marshall Brickman.

Also in 1986, Lithgow won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series for his appearance in the episode "The Doll" of the Amazing Stories anthology series. In 1987, Lithgow starred in the Bigfoot-themed family comedy Harry and the Hendersons.

In 1988, he returned to Broadway and starred in David Henry Hwang's M. Butterfly alongside BD Wong, at the Eugene O'Neill Theatre. Playing French diplomat René Gallimard, he won the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actor in a Play and was nominated for the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play. The production ran from March 13 to January 27, 1990, totaling 9 previews and 777 performances.

In 1991, he starred in the movie Ricochet opposite Denzel Washington as Earl Talbot Blake, a criminal seeking revenge against the policeman who sent him to prison. Also in 1991, he played missionary Leslie Huben in the film adaptation of Peter Matthiessen's novel At Play in the Fields of the Lord. In 1992, he starred as a man with multiple personality disorder in Brian De Palma's film Raising Cain.

In 1992, he became the narrator in the Dr. Seuss video Yertle the Turtle and Other Stories. In 1993, he starred in Renny Harlin's film Cliffhanger opposite Sylvester Stallone as terrorist leader Eric Qualen, and he reunited with Washington in Alan J. Pakula's film The Pelican Brief. In 1994, Lithgow played Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the NBC miniseries World War II: When Lions Roared (also known as Then There Were Giants) directed by Joseph Sargent, and starring alongside Michael Caine and Bob Hoskins.

In an interview with The Los Angeles Times, Lithgow said that his parents loved Roosevelt and that his mother "burst into tears" when he told her he was playing him. Lithgow wore leg braces to mirror Roosevelt's paralysis after FDR contracted polio and expressed the difficulty of playing a revered historical figure: "People know him and revere him so much, no matter how close you get, you're not only far from the real thing, you are far from people's fantasies of him.

But what also makes it's hard, is what makes it fascinating." Variety praised the performances of Lithgow, Caine, and Hoskins, and Paul Mavis admitted Lithgow "does quite well with the character" despite his initial reservations on whether the actor could faithfully portray FDR. In 1995, he was nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie for My Brother's Keeper, portraying Tom Bradley, an HIV-positive teacher, and Bob Bradley, his twin brother. He provided narration for the IMAX film Special Effects: Anything Can Happen (1996).

1996–2015: Sitcom and theater work

In television, Lithgow is widely known for his starring role as Dick Solomon in the 1996–2001 NBC sitcom 3rd Rock from the Sun. He received six consecutive nominations for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series and won the award three times (1996, 1997, 1999). His son, Ian, regularly appeared alongside him as Leon, one of his physics students.

In 1998, he appeared in the film, A Civil Action, as Judge Walter J. Skinner. Emanuel Levy of Variety wrote that Lithgow was among the film's "standout character performances", and Lithgow and costars James Gandolfini and Sydney Pollack were cited by Janet Maslin of The New York Times as giving "shrewd, first-rate performances".

He lent his voice to the character Jean Claude in the 2000 Nickelodeon Movies animated film, Rugrats in Paris: The Movie.

In 2001, Lithgow gained recognition for voicing Lord Farquaad in the Academy Award-winning DreamWorks Animation film Shrek, alongside Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy, and Cameron Diaz. Upon joining the film, Lithgow read his dialogue and was shown a maquette of his character and storyboards. As Shrek experienced delays, Lithgow would return "once every eight months or so to record some new material." He admitted to not thinking the film would be as successful as it ended up being: "I thought it was like a Saturday morning cartoon or something.

Not a big deal." Abigail Stevens praised Lithgow and Vincent Cassel as giving "deliciously evil performances", and Elvis Mitchell opined that Lithgow's involvement made the film funnier. Peter Bradshaw compared Lithgow's vocal characterization to being "somewhere between Kelsey Grammer and Alan Rickman."

In 2002, he narrated Life's Greatest Miracle, a documentary about human embryonic development. That same year, Lithgow returned to Broadway portraying powerful NYC gossip columnist J. J. Hunsecker in the adaptation of the 1957 film Sweet Smell of Success, acting alongside Brian d'Arcy James. Lithgow won the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical for his performance.

In 2005, he starred on Broadway in the musical-comedy Dirty Rotten Scoundrels alongside Norbert Leo Butz at the Imperial Theatre. While both were nominated for the Tony Award for Best Leading Actor in a Musical, Butz won over Lithgow. That same year, Lithgow was elected into the American Theater Hall of Fame for his work on Broadway, as well as for his performances in operas by Verdi and Wagner.

In 2004, he portrayed the moralistic, rigid father of Alfred Kinsey in that year's biopic Kinsey, in which Liam Neeson also starred. In 2003, Lithgow wrote the narrations for the Christopher Wheeldon ballet Carnival of the Animals and appeared as the elephant character—nurse Mabel Buntz—with the New York City Ballet.

He returned for a 2005 revival, the Houston Ballet production of the same show in 2007, and the Pennsylvania Ballet production of it in 2008.

In 2005, Lithgow became the first ever actor to deliver a commencement speech at Harvard University, his alma mater, and they awarded him an honorary Doctor of Arts. In 2006, Lithgow had a small role in the Academy Award-winning film, Dreamgirls, as Jerry Harris, a film producer offering Deena Jones (Beyoncé Knowles) a film role. Since 2006, he has starred in Progresso commercials, advertising their soup brand.^{[citation needed]}