Raphael Sbarge

Raphael Sbarge is an American actor, filmmaker, and director born on February 12, 1964, in New York City. He grew up in a theater-oriented household: his mother, Jeanne Button (1930–2017), worked as a professional costume designer, and his father, Stephen Sbarge, was an artist, writer, and stage director who named his son after the Renaissance painter Raphael. His parents later divorced, and in 1981 his mother married MacDonald Eaton, a production designer and painter. Sbarge began performing at age five, appearing on Sesame Street.

His stage career began in 1973 with a production of Edward Bond's Lear. In 1981, he appeared in Joseph Papp's Shakespeare in the Park production of Henry IV, Part 1. The following year, he made his Broadway debut opposite Faye Dunaway in The Curse of an Aching Heart. His Broadway work continued over the following decades and included Ah, Wilderness!, The Twilight of the Golds, A Voice in the Dark, and The Shadow. Additional New York stage credits include Hamlet (1982), Ghosts (1988), and The Shadow Box.

On screen, Sbarge built a wide-ranging career in film and television beginning in the early 1980s. His film appearances include Risky Business (1983), Vision Quest (1985), My Science Project (1985), Independence Day (1996), BASEketball (1998), Message in a Bottle (1999), Pearl Harbor (2001), and The Exorcist: Believer (2023). His television work spans several decades and includes A Streetcar Named Desire with Ann-Margret (1984), Billionaire Boys Club (1990), Murder 101 with Pierce Brosnan (1991), Quicksilver Highway with Christopher Lloyd (1997), Introducing Dorothy Dandridge with Halle Berry (1999), and a recurring role in five episodes of Star Trek: Voyager (1996). He also appeared in the first four episodes of the sixth season of 24, and had a recurring role as Howard Aucker on The Young and the Restless.

From 2001 to 2004, Sbarge was a series regular on The Guardian, starring Simon Baker, playing Jake Straka. Beginning in 2011, he joined the cast of Once Upon a Time, portraying both Archie Hopper, a therapist, and his fairy tale counterpart Jiminy Cricket from Pinocchio, a dual role he continued through 2018. From 2014 to 2016, he played Inspector David Molk, a philosophizing SFPD homicide inspector, on TNT's Murder in the First. In 2016, he made a cameo appearance as Saul Goodman's father on Better Call Saul.

Sbarge has also established a substantial career as a voice actor in video games. He voiced Carth Onasi in Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (2003) and its sequel, RC-1262 "Scorch" in Star Wars: Republic Commando (2005), and Kaidan Alenko across the Mass Effect trilogy (2007–2012). Additional voice credits include Grim Fandango and chief scientist Jude Monserrate in The Outer Worlds 2.

As a filmmaker, Sbarge has directed and produced documentary and narrative work. His 2017 short film The Bird Who Could Fly premiered at the Asians on Film Festival and won Best Director, Best Ensemble, and Audience Awards at several Asian film festivals across the United States. He also filmed Broadway actor Marty Moran in his Obie Award-winning play The Tricky Part, which won Best Director at the Awareness Festival. His 2019 documentary LA Foodways, a one-hour feature and six-part series that debuted on KCET-PBS and was co-produced with his production company Wishing Well Entertainment, received an Emmy nomination in the Education/Information category. His 2022 documentary Only in Theaters, which follows the Laemmle Theaters, a fourth-generation family-owned art house cinema chain, opened theatrically in Los Angeles and subsequently in New York and San Francisco before moving to on-demand distribution. His documentary 10 Days in Watts earned a Culture/History Emmy at the 76th LA Area Emmys on July 27, 2024.

Sbarge has also been active in environmental advocacy. He co-founded Green Wish, a nonprofit organization, alongside actor Ed Begley Jr. and Rachelle Carson Begley, with the aim of directing donations to local environmental organizations through retail partnerships. He served as executive producer of On Begley Street, a web series documenting the construction of what was described as North America's greenest and most sustainable home. Sbarge is married to Jenna DeAngeles.