Biography

A hulking character actor who brings new meaning to the concept of versatility, Oliver Platt has appeared in a dizzying array of films that make him instantly recognizable but not instantly placeable to the average filmgoer. Since making his screen debut as an oily Wall Street drone in Mike Nichols' Working Girl (1988), Platt has lent his talents to almost every conceivable genre, including period dramas, political comedies, children's films, and campy horror movies.

The son of a U.S. Ambassador, Platt was born in Washington, D.C., on January 12, 1960. Thanks to his father's job, he had an exceptionally itinerant childhood. By the time he was 18, he had attended 12 different schools in places as diverse as Tokyo, the Middle East, and Colorado. Long interested in acting, Platt received a BA in drama from Boston's Tufts University; following graduation, he remained in Boston for three years to pursue his stage career. In 1986 he moved to New York, where he performed in a number of off-Broadway productions and had the lead in the 1989 Lincoln Center production of Ubu.

Following his screen debut in Working Girl, Platt began finding steady work in such films as Married to the Mob (1988), Postcards from the Edge (1990), Beethoven (1992) -- which featured him and future collaborator Stanley Tucci as puppy thieves -- and Benny and Joon (1993). He also proved himself adept at cheesy period drama in The Three Musketeers (1993), which cast him as Porthos, and at all-out comedy, as demonstrated by his turn as a struggling comic in Funny Bones (1995). Rarely cast as a leading man, Platt has always been visible in substantial supporting roles, equally comfortable at portraying nice guys, bad guys, and just flat out weird guys alike. As Ashley Judd's suitor in Simon Birch (1998), he was the straight man, while in The Impostors (1998), his second collaboration with Tucci (two years earlier he served as associate producer for the latter's Big Night), he again displayed his capacity for broad physical comedy as a struggling actor who finds himself a stowaway on an ocean liner. In Dangerous Beauty (1998), Platt was able to exercise his nasty side as a bitter nobleman-turned-religious zealot in 16th-century Venice; that same year, his capacity for exasperated quirkiness was displayed in Bulworth, which cast him as Warren Beatty's put-upon, coke-snorting campaign manager.

1999 proved to be a somewhat disappointing year for Platt, as two of his films, Three to Tango (which featured him as a gay architect) and the schlock-horror Lake Placid, which cast him as an idiosyncratic mythology expert, were both critical and commercial flops. A third film that year, Bicentennial Man -- in which Platt played the scientist who turns the titular robot (Robin Williams) into a man -- fared somewhat better. The following year, Platt's comic abilities were again on display in Gun Shy, in which he hammed it up as a bottom-rung mafioso with an overblown ego. ~ Rebecca Flint, All Movie Guide

Filmography

"Queens Supreme" (2003) TV Series .... Judge Jack Moran
Pieces of April (2003) .... Jim Burns
Queens Supreme (2003) (TV) .... Judge Jack Moran
Hope Springs (2002) .... Doug Reed
Ash Wednesday (2002) .... Moran
Zigzag (2002) .... Toad
Liberty Stands Still (2002) .... Victor Wallace
"West Wing, The" (1999) TV Series .... Oliver Babish (2001)
SSX Tricky (2001) (VG) (voice) .... Luther-Dwayne Grady
Don't Say a Word (2001) .... Dr. Louis Sachs
"Deadline" (2000) TV Series .... Wallace Benton
2000 MTV Movie Awards (2000) (TV) .... Himself
Ready to Rumble (2000/I) .... Jimmy King
Gun Shy (2000) .... Fulvio Nesstra
... aka Gunshy (2000) (Australia: video title)
Cinderelmo (1999) (TV) .... Fairy Godperson
Bicentennial Man (1999) .... Rupert Burns
... aka 200 Jahre Mann, Der (2000) (Germany)
Three to Tango (1999) .... Peter Steinberg
Lake Placid (1999) .... Hector Cyr
Impostors, The (1998) .... Maurice
Simon Birch (1998) .... Ben Goodrich
... aka Angels and Armadillos (1998)
Doctor Dolittle (1998) .... Dr. Mark Weller
Bulworth (1998) .... Dennis Murphy
Dangerous Beauty (1998) .... Maffio Venier
... aka Honest Courtesan, The (1998) (UK) (USA: working title)
... aka Destiny of Her Own, A (1999) (Australia)
Time to Kill, A (1996) .... Harry Rex Vonner
Executive Decision (1996) .... Dennis Cahill
... aka Critical Decision (1996)
Infiltrator, The (1995) (TV) .... Yaron
Funny Bones (1995) .... Tommy Fawkes
Tall Tale (1995) .... Paul Bunyan
... aka Tall Tale: The Unbelievable Adventures of Pecos Bill (1995)
Three Musketeers, The (1993) .... Porthos
Benny & Joon (1993) .... Eric
Indecent Proposal (1993) .... Jeremy
Temp, The (1993) .... Jack Hartsell
Diggstown (1992) .... Fitz
... aka Midnight Sting (1992)
Beethoven (1992) .... Harvey
Postcards from the Edge (1990) .... Neil Bleene, Assoc. Producer
Flatliners (1990) .... Randal Steckle
Crusoe (1988) .... Mr. Newby
Working Girl (1988) .... Dave Lutz
Married to the Mob (1988) .... Ed Benitez