Joe Grifasi

Joe Grifasi, born Joseph G. Grifasi on June 14, 1944, in Buffalo, New York, is an American character actor whose career spans film, television, and stage. He is the son of Patricia, née Gaglione, and Joseph J. Grifasi, a skilled laborer. Grifasi attended Bishop Fallon High School, a Roman Catholic institution in Buffalo that has since closed, and it was during that period that he determined he wanted to pursue character acting specifically.

Grifasi's Broadway career extended from 1976 to 2002 and included appearances in a range of plays and musicals. His stage credits include 27 Wagons Full of Cotton, Dinner at Eight, The Mystery of Edwin Drood, and The Play's the Thing, in which he starred. His work on Broadway earned him two Drama Desk Award nominations: Outstanding Featured Actor in a Musical in 1986 and Outstanding Featured Actor in a Play in 1988.

Beyond the stage, Grifasi has accumulated more than 130 film and television credits. Among his film roles, he portrayed a Pier 32 dock foreman in The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!, appearing in a scene opposite the character Frank Drebin. He also took on the roles of two Baseball Hall of Fame inductees from the New York Yankees: Phil Rizzuto in the 2001 film 61*, which is set in 1961, and Yogi Berra in The Bronx Is Burning, set in 1977. On television, Grifasi has portrayed Defense Attorney Hashi Horowitz on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, a recurring role he has held from 2005 to 2021 in which the character eventually becomes a Superior Court Judge.