Frank Langella

Frank Alexander Langella Jr. was born on January 1, 1938, in Bayonne, New Jersey, to Angelina Barbato and Frank Alexander Langella Sr., a business executive who served as president of The Bayonne Barrel and Drum Company. He grew up alongside a brother, Andrew, and a sister, RoseMarie. Langella attended Washington Elementary School and Bayonne High School before his family relocated to South Orange, New Jersey, where he graduated from Columbia High School in 1955. He subsequently earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in drama from Syracuse University in 1959.

Before reaching Broadway, Langella built his stage experience off-Broadway, appearing in The Immoralist at the Bouwerie Lane Theatre in 1963 and in Robert Lowell's The Old Glory in 1965, among other productions. His Broadway debut came on December 8, 1966, at the Vivian Beaumont Theater, Lincoln Center, in Federico García Lorca's Yerma. He followed that with William Gibson's A Cry of Players in 1968, portraying a fictionalized young William Shakespeare opposite Anne Bancroft.

Bancroft recommended Langella to her husband Mel Brooks, who cast him in a leading role in The Twelve Chairs in 1970. That same year, Langella appeared in Frank Perry's Diary of a Mad Housewife, earning a Golden Globe nomination for Most Promising Newcomer. His Broadway career gained significant momentum in 1975 when he won his first Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Play for his performance in Edward Albee's Seascape, in which he played an intellectual lizard. He received a Tony nomination for the title role in the 1977 Broadway production of Dracula, and despite initial reservations, went on to star in the 1979 film adaptation directed by John Badham, opposite Laurence Olivier.

Throughout the 1980s, Langella continued to move between stage and screen. He played Antonio Salieri in the 1982 Broadway production of Amadeus, replacing Ian McKellen. His other Broadway work during this period included Passion in 1983, Noël Coward's Design for Living in 1984, Arthur Miller's After the Fall in 1984, David Rabe's Hurlyburly in 1985, and a revival of Shakespeare's The Tempest, in which he portrayed Prospero. He also played Sherlock Holmes in a 1981 stage adaptation of William Gillette's play and reprised the role on Broadway in 1987 in Charles Marowitz's Sherlock's Last Case. That same year, he portrayed the villain Skeletor in Masters of the Universe, a role he has cited as among his favorites.

The 1990s brought continued stage and screen work. In 1993, Langella made a three-episode appearance on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine as Bajoran Minister Jaro Essa and appeared in the political comedy Dave alongside Kevin Kline and Sigourney Weaver. In 1994, he narrated an American Masters documentary on Tennessee Williams. Langella starred in the 1996 Broadway revival of August Strindberg's The Father and that same year appeared in the comedy film Eddie with Whoopi Goldberg. He played Clare Quilty in the 1997 film adaptation of Lolita and starred opposite Johnny Depp in Roman Polanski's The Ninth Gate in 1999. In 2000, he played Ebenezer Scrooge in a musical production of A Christmas Carol at Madison Square Garden.

Langella's Broadway work in the 2000s brought him two additional Tony Awards. In the 2002 revival of Ivan Turgenev's Fortune's Fool, he portrayed Flegont Alexandrovitch Tropatcho opposite Alan Bates, winning his second Tony for Best Featured Actor in a Play along with a Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Featured Actor in a Play. In 2004, he appeared in the original Broadway production of Match by Stephen Belber, playing an aging dance choreographer alongside Jane Adams and Ray Liotta, earning his fourth Tony nomination. He starred as Sir Thomas More in the 2008 Broadway revival of A Man for All Seasons.

The pinnacle of Langella's Broadway career to that point came with Peter Morgan's Frost/Nixon, in which he was cast as Richard Nixon opposite Michael Sheen. The production ran at the Donmar Warehouse and Gielgud Theatre in London before transferring to Broadway at the Bernard B. Jacobs Theater in April 2007. Langella won his third Tony Award, for Best Actor in a Play, for the role. He reprised Nixon in Ron Howard's 2008 film adaptation, for which he received nominations for the Academy Award for Best Actor, a BAFTA Award, a Golden Globe, and an Actor Award. He appeared in George Clooney's Good Night, and Good Luck in 2005 as former CBS chief executive William S. Paley and in Bryan Singer's Superman Returns in 2006 as Daily Planet editor Perry White.

On television, Langella portrayed Supreme Court Justice Warren Burger in the HBO film Muhammad Ali's Greatest Fight in 2013 and Senator Richard Russell Jr. in the HBO film All the Way in 2016. He had a recurring role as Gabriel, a KGB handler, in the FX series The Americans from 2013 to 2017, and appeared as Sebastian Piccirillo in the Showtime series Kidding from 2018 to 2020.

Langella's Broadway career extended into the 2010s with Man and Boy in 2012, for which he received a Tony nomination. His final Tony win came in 2016, when he received the award for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Play for Florian Zeller's The Father, in which he portrayed an elderly man suffering from Alzheimer's disease. His Broadway career, which spanned from 1966 to 2016, resulted in four Tony Awards in total.