James Cromwell
Birth name	James Oliver Cromwell
Born	January 27, 1940 (1940-01-27) (age 67) Los Angeles, California
Spouse(s)	Julie Cobb (1986-2006) Anne Ulvestad (1976 - 1986)
Awards Academy Awards Nominated: Best Supporting Actor 1995 Babe Emmy Awards Nominated: Outstanding Supporting Actor - Miniseries/Movie 2000 RKO 281 Nominated: Outstanding Guest Actor - Drama Series 2001 ER 2003 Six Feet Under Screen Actors Guild Awards Nominated: Best Cast - Motion Picture 1997 L.A. Confidential 1999 The Green Mile Nominated: Best Ensemble - Drama Series 2005, 2006 Six Feet Under

James Oliver Cromwell (born January 27, 1940), sometimes credited as Jamie Cromwell, is an Academy Award-nominated American television and film actor.

Biography

Early life

Cromwell was born in Los Angeles, California and was raised in Manhattan, New York and is the son of actor, director and producer John Cromwell and actress Kay Johnson.[1] His father was blacklisted during the McCarthy era.[2] Cromwell was educated at The Hill School, Middlebury College and the Carnegie Institute of Technology. He studied engineering at Carnegie Mellon University. He went into the theater (like both his parents) doing everything from Shakespeare to experimental plays.

Early career

He began work in television in the mid-1970s (notably Stretch Cunningham on All in the Family and a lead character in Hot L Baltimore), made his film debut in 1976 in Neil Simon's classic detective spoof Murder by Death, and goes back to the stage periodically. In his recurring role as Mr. Skolnick, father of Lewis Skolnick, he is one of only four actors to appear in all four Revenge of the Nerds movies from 1984 through 1994 (the others being Robert Carradine, Curtis Armstrong and Larry B. Scott). Cromwell also played a similar role in the film Explorers, where he was a German scientist who was the father of River Phoenix's character, also very much into science as was Lewis Skolnick. In 1983 film The Man With Two Brains, he had a brief role as a German real-estate agent whom Steve Martin bumps in the head with a cat carrier.

Career: 1990s

His notable film roles in the 1990s include his Academy Award nominated performance as Farmer Arthur Hoggett in Babe (1995) and Captain Dudley Liam Smith in L.A. Confidential (1997). This was a breakout role for the actor, which made him bankable in Hollywood. He also played Dr. Zefram Cochrane in Star Trek: First Contact (1996) and the Star Trek: Enterprise pilot "Broken Bow" (the Star Trek: Enterprise episode "In a Mirror, Darkly" later reused some of the First Contact footage).[3] He has appeared on Star Trek: The Next Generation and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, though not as Cochrane (his appearances on these shows predated his role in First Contact). These episodes were "The Hunted", "Birthright, Part I and II" and "Starship Down". He completed the decade by appearing as the general in The General's Daughter (1999) starring John Travolta.

Career: 2000s

He co-starred in the last two seasons of the HBO series Six Feet Under, in which he portrayed George Sibley, Ruth Fisher's geologist husband. He also and notably starred alongside Helen Mirren who plays HM Queen Elizabeth II in the Oscar-winning The Queen where he portrays Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. He appeared in the sixth season of 24 in the role of Phillip Bauer, father to main character Jack Bauer played by Kiefer Sutherland, Captain George Stacy in Spider-Man 3 and Jane Austen's father in Becoming Jane, a biopic of the English writer with Anne Hathaway in the lead role. Other roles where he co-stars or appears include Bishop Lionel Stewart in several episodes of ER (2001), U.S. President Robert "Bob" Fowler in The Sum of All Fears (2002), former President D. Wire Newman in an episode of The West Wing (2004), Dr. Alfred Lanning, creator of modern robots and inventor of the Three Laws of Robotics in I, Robot and as the warden in the remake of The Longest Yard. He will star in the Druid Theatre Company's production of Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey Into Night. He will play James Tyrone in the production, which will play in Galway and Dublin, Ireland, in September and October 2007.[4]

Personal life

Cromwell is known for his unusually tall stature; he stands at 6 ft 7 in (approx. 201 cm). His height, however, has not prevented Cromwell from becoming a prolific character actor, appearing in a wide variety of roles.

Cromwell has long been an advocate of progressive and liberal causes. In the late 1960s he was a member of "The Committee to Defend The Panthers", a group organized to defend 13 members of the Black Panther Party who had been imprisoned in New York and were eventually released. In a 2004 interview with CNN.com, Cromwell praised the Panthers.[5] Cromwell became a vegetarian in 1974 after seeing a stockyard in Texas and experiencing the "smell, terror and anxiety." He became an ethical vegan after playing the character of Farmer Hoggett while filming the movie Babe in 1995. Cromwell frequently speaks out on issues regarding animal cruelty for PETA, namely the treatment of pigs.

Filmography

• Hot L Baltimore (1975) (TV series)
• Murder by Death (1976)
• The Cheap Detective (1978)
• The Man with Two Brains (1983)
• Revenge of the Nerds (1984)
• Revenge of the Nerds II: Nerds in Paradise (1987)
• The Rescue (film) 1988
• Miracle Landing (1990) (TV)
• The Babe (1992)
• Revenge of the Nerds III: The Next Generation (1992) (TV)
• Revenge of the Nerds IV: Nerds in Love (1994) (TV)
• Babe (1995)
• Star Trek: First Contact (1996)
• The People vs. Larry Flynt (1996)
• Eraser (1996)
• L.A. Confidential (1997)
• The Education of Little Tree (1997)
• Babe: Pig in the City (1998)
• Deep Impact (1998)
• Species II (1998)
• The General's Daughter (1999)
• The Green Mile (1999)
• Snow Falling on Cedars (1999)
• RKO 281 (1999)
• The Bachelor (1999)
• Space Cowboys (2000)
• The Sum of All Fears (2002)
• Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron (2002) (voice)
• The Magnificent Ambersons (2002) (TV)
• RFK (2002) (TV)
• Snow Walker (2003)
• Angels in America (2003)
• Blackball (2003)
• Six Feet Under (2001) (TV series) (2004 â€" 2005)
• I, Robot (2004)
• Salem's Lot (2004) (TV)
• Pope John Paul II (TV) (2005)
• The Longest Yard (2005)
• The Queen (2006)
• Becoming Jane (2007)
• Spider-Man 3 (2007)
• 24 (2007)
• Dante's Inferno (2007)

References

External links

• James Cromwell at the Internet Movie Database
• James Cromwell article at Memory Alpha, a Star Trek wiki