Lou Taylor Pucci

Lou Taylor Pucci is an American actor born on July 27, 1985, in Seaside Heights, New Jersey. He grew up in Keansburg, New Jersey, having relocated there at age two, and later graduated from Christian Brothers Academy in Lincroft, New Jersey. His father, Louis Pucci, played guitar in the bands The Watch and Leap of Faith, and his mother, Linda Farver, is a former model and beauty queen who held the title of Miss Union County. He has two brothers and a sister named Penelope.

Pucci began performing at age ten in a hometown production of Oliver! and went on to appear on Broadway in 1998, serving as an understudy for the role of Friedrich in The Sound of Music. His screen career began with a role in Rebecca Miller's Personal Velocity: Three Portraits in 2002.

His breakthrough came with the lead role in Mike Mills' Thumbsucker in 2005, a performance that earned him the Special Jury Prize for Acting at the Sundance Film Festival and the Silver Bear for Best Actor at the Berlin International Film Festival. That same year he appeared in Arie Posin's The Chumscrubber. Subsequent film credits included Fast Food Nation in 2006, The Go-Getter in 2007, Explicit Ills in 2008, and Carriers in 2009. Pucci also appeared in Green Day's music video for "Jesus of Suburbia," playing the character St. Jimmy alongside Thumbsucker co-star Kelli Garner.

In 2009, three of Pucci's films screened at the Sundance Film Festival: Brief Interviews with Hideous Men, directed by John Krasinski; The Informers, based on Bret Easton Ellis's short story collection and featuring Billy Bob Thornton, Winona Ryder, Kim Basinger, and Mickey Rourke; and The Answer Man, with Jeff Daniels and Lauren Graham. Pucci also served as a juror for the festival's short film competition that year.

He took on a leading role in The Story of Luke in 2013, playing an autistic man alongside Seth Green, and appeared in the same year's Evil Dead remake, which was based on Sam Raimi's 1981 original. He also starred in the thriller Spring in 2014. In November 2014, Pucci played Teddy Courtney in a crossover episode between Law & Order: Special Victims Unit and Chicago P.D. Additional credits include the horror film Ava's Possessions and Poor Boy, a western thriller starring Michael Shannon that premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in April 2016.

On television, Pucci guest-starred as Benji in the first three episodes of the Lifetime series You in 2018 and appeared as Nock Nock in the FX comedy series You're the Worst in 2019. He subsequently took on a recurring role in American Horror Story: 1984.