Tony Shalhoub Biography

Anthony Marcus "Tony" Shalhoub (born October 9, 1953) is an American actor. His television work includes the roles of Antonio Scarpacci in Wings and sleuth Adrian Monk in the TV series Monk. He has won three Emmy Awards and a Golden Globe for his work in Monk. He has also had a successful career as a character actor, with roles in films like Spy Kids, Men in Black, Men in Black II, Thirteen Ghosts, Galaxy Quest, 1408, Barton Fink, Big Night, The Siege, Cars, Cars 2, and The Man Who Wasn't There.

Early life

Shalhoub was born and raised in Green Bay, Wisconsin. His father, Joe Shalhoub, a Maronite from Lebanon, immigrated to the United States as an orphan at the age of 10. He married Shalhoub's mother, Helen, a second-generation Lebanese-American, and founded a family grocery chain, starting with a store in downtown Green Bay.

Being the second youngest of the couple's 10 children, Shalhoub was introduced to the theater by an older sister, who put his name forward to be an extra in a high school production of The King and I. Despite finding himself standing on the wrong side of the curtain during the final dress rehearsal, he became enamored of the theater. Shalhoub graduated from Green Bay East High School, where his senior peers named him the best dressed and most likely to succeed. In his senior year he suffered a setback, breaking his leg in a fall off the stage into the pit during a rehearsal. Recovering quickly, he was able to perform in the school's final play of the year. He graduated with a bachelor's degree in drama from the University of Southern Maine in Portland, going on to earn a master's from the Yale School of Drama in 1980.

Career

Stage

Shortly thereafter, he moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he spent four seasons with the American Repertory Theater before heading to New York City, where he found work waiting tables while honing his craft and auditioning. He made his Broadway debut in the 1985 Rita Moreno/Sally Struthers production of The Odd Couple and was nominated for a 1992 Tony Award for his featured role in Conversations with My Father. Shalhoub met his wife, actress Brooke Adams, when they co-starred on Broadway in The Heidi Chronicles. His off-Broadway credits include Waiting for Godot, For Dear Life, Rameau's Nephew, Zero Positive, and two productions of Shakespeare in the Park: Henry IV, Part 1 and Richard II.

Shalhoub returned in December 2006 to the Second Stage Theatre in New York, off-Broadway, opposite Patricia Heaton for a run of The Scene by Theresa Rebeck. In 2010, he went to Broadway to act as Saunders in a revival version of Lend Me a Tenor in New York at the Music Box Theatre.

Screen roles

One of his first television roles was in 1991 as the Italian cabdriver Antonio Scarpacci in the sitcom Wings. Shalhoub was pleasantly surprised to land the role after having a recurring role in the second season. Shalhoub affected an Italian accent for the role. In the same time period, Shalhoub played physicist Dr. Chester Ray Banton in The X-Files second-season episode "Soft Light".

Shalhoub's film roles following his Wings breakout included an excitable producer in Barton Fink and a fast-talking lawyer in The Man Who Wasn't There (both directed by the Coen brothers), a linguistically unidentified cabby in Quick Change, a Cuban-American businessman in Primary Colors, sleazy alien pawn shop owner Jack Jeebs in the Men in Black films, a sympathetic attorney in A Civil Action, a widowed father in Thir13en Ghosts, a cameo role in the film Gattaca, and a has-been television star in Galaxy Quest.

He had a co-starring role in the film Big Night, where he plays an Italian-speaking chef complete with accent. In 1995 he had a role in the hit NBC sitcom Frasier in the episode "The Focus Group" as an Arab newsstand owner named Manu Habbib. He did voice acting for the 1997 computer game Fallout.

Shalhoub demonstrated his dramatic range in the 1998 big-budget thriller The Siege, where he co-starred alongside Denzel Washington, Annette Bening, and Bruce Willis. His character, FBI Special Agent Frank Haddad, was of Middle Eastern descent and suffered discrimination after terrorist attacks in New York City. He returned to series television in 1999, this time in a lead role on Stark Raving Mad, opposite Neil Patrick Harris. However, the show didn't attract much of an audience, and NBC canceled the series in July 2000.

Monk

After a two-year absence from the small screen, Shalhoub starred in another TV series, Monk, in which he portrayed Adrian Monk, a brilliant Sherlock Holmes-type detective with many compulsions and phobias, for USA Network. Shalhoub was nominated for an Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series in eight consecutive years from 2003 to 2010, winning in 2003, 2005, and 2006. He also took the Golden Globe award for Best Performance by an Actor in a Television Series " Musical or Comedy, in 2003.

During Monk

In addition to his acting work, Shalhoub, along with the Network of Arab-American Professionals and Zoom-in-Focus productions, established The Arab-American Filmmaker Award Competition in 2005. Arab-American filmmakers submitted screenplays, with the chosen winner flown to Hollywood to have their screenplay produced. Two runners-up were also invited to participate in the production.

He appeared with Alec Baldwin in the 2004 Hollywood satire The Last Shot as a gruff small-time mobster with a love for movies, and as the voice of Luigi in the 2006 Disney/Pixar film Cars. The same year he appeared in Danny Leiner's drama "The Great New Wonderful" as a psychologist in post-9/11 New York City. The following year, 2007, he appeared in the horror film 1408 as well as on stage off-Broadway as Charlie in The Scene.

He received a 2008 Grammy nomination in the category "Best Spoken Word Album for Children" for his narration of The Cricket in Times Square.

Personal life

Shalhoub married actress Brooke Adams in 1992. The two have worked together in several films, one episode of Wings, and Adams has appeared credited as a "Special Guest Star" in five episodes of Monk, portraying several different side characters, including a flight attendant driven to drinking by Monk's eccentricities (in "Mr. Monk and the Airplane" and in "Mr. Monk's 100th Case"), the mother of a kidnapped violinist ("Mr. Monk and the Kid"), a county sheriff who shows interest in Monk ("Mr. Monk Visits a Farm"), and a crazy cat lady ("Mr. Monk and the Badge"). Shalhoub and Adams appeared on Broadway together in the 2010 revival of Lend Me a Tenor. At the time of their wedding, Adams had an adopted daughter, Josie Lynn (born 1989), whom Shalhoub adopted. In 1994, they adopted another daughter, Sophie (born 1993). The family resides in Los Angeles and Green Bay, Wisconsin.

In 2006, Shalhoub's brother Dan appeared on the reality show American Inventor, pitching the Sha-Poopie, a catch-in-action pooper scooper. Judges rejected it. It later appeared in the 2009 Monk episode "Mr. Monk and the Dog". Shalhoub is the cousin of Chicago radio personality Jonathon Brandmeier. He is also the brother-in-law of former Guiding Light actress Lynne Adams. His other brother Michael Shalhoub is also an actor and has also made three guest appearances on Monk, as a member of a disbanded radical group ("Mr. Monk and the Missing Granny"), a Wyoming beekeeper ("Mr. Monk Bumps His Head"), and the wedding minister at Captain Stottlemeyer's wedding ("Mr. Monk is the Best Man").

Filmography

Film

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1986	Heartburn	Airplane Passenger
	Longtime Companion	Paul's Doctor
1990	Quick Change	Taxicab Driver
1991	Barton Fink	Ben Geisler
1992	Honeymoon in Vegas	Buddy Walker
1993	Addams Family Values	Jorge
	Searching for Bobby Fischer	Chess Club Member
1994	I.Q.	Bob Rosetti
1996	Big Night	Primo	Won "? National Society of Film Critics Award for Best Supporting Actor Nominated "? Chlotrudis Award for Best Actor Independent Spirit Award for Best Male Lead New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Supporting Actor (3rd place)
1997	A Life Less Ordinary	Al
	Gattaca	German
	Men in Black	Jack Jeebs
1998	A Civil Action	Kevin Conway
	The Siege	Agent Frank Haddad
	The Impostors	Voltri, First Mate
	Paulie	Misha Vilyenkov
	Primary Colors	Eddie Reyes
1999	Galaxy Quest	Fred Kwan
	The Tic Code	Phil
2001	Thir13en Ghosts	Arthur Kriticos
	The Man Who Wasn't There	Freddy Riedenschneider	Nominated "? AFI Film Award for AFI Featured Actor of the Year " Male " Movies Chicago Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting Actor Online Film Critics Society Award for Best Supporting Actor
	Spy Kids	Alexander Minion
2002	Life or Something Like It	Prophet Jack
	Made-Up	Max Hires
	Impostor	Nelson Gittes
	Men in Black II	Jack Jeebs
	Spy Kids 2: The Island of Lost Dreams	Alexander Minion
2003	Party Animals	Celebrity Father
	Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over	Alexander Minion
	T for Terrorist	Man in White Suit
	Something More	Mr. Avery
2004	The Last Shot	Tommy Sanz
	Against the Ropes	Sam LaRocca
2005	The Great New Wonderful	Dr. Trabulous
2006	Cars	Luigi	Voice
2007	Careless	Mr. Roth
	AmericanEast	Sam
	1408	Sam Farrell
2008	L.A. Actors	Bum
2009	Feed the Fish	Sheriff Anderson
2010	How Do You Know	Psychiatrist
2011	Cars 2	Luigi	Voice
2012	Hemingway & Gellhorn	Koltsov
2013	Movie 43	Father of abducted girl	Deleted sketch: "Find Our Daughter"
	Pain & Gain	Victor Kershaw

Television

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1986	The Equalizer	Terrorist	Season 1 episode: "Breakpoint"
1987	Spenser: For Hire	Dr. Hambrecht	Season 2 episode: "The Road Back"
1988	Alone in the Neon Jungle	Nahid	Movie
1989	Money, Power, Murder	Seth Parker	Movie
	Day One	Enrico Fermi	Movie
1991	Monsters	Mancini	Season 3 episode: "Leavings"
1991"97	Wings	Antonio Scarpacci	136 Episodes
1992	Dinosaurs	Jerry (voice)	Season 2 episode: "Fran Live"
1993	Gypsy	Uncle Jocko	Movie
1995	Gargoyles	The Emir (voice)	Season 2 episode: "Grief"
	The X-Files	Dr. Chester Ray Banton	Season 2 episode: "Soft Light"
1996	Radiant City	Narrator	Movie
	Frasier	Manu Habib	Season 3 episode: "The Focus Group"
	Almost Perfect	Alex Thorpe	Season 1 episode: "Auto Neurotic"
1999	That Championship Season	George Sitkowski	Movie
	Ally McBeal	Albert Shepley	Season 2 episode: "Those Lips, That Hand"
1999"2000	Stark Raving Mad	Ian Stark	22 Episodes
2000	MADtv	Taxi Cab Driver, Himself	Season 5, episodes 18 & 24
2001	The Heart Department	Dr. Joseph Nassar	Movie
2002"09	Monk	Adrian Monk	Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series (won 2003, 2005"06, nominated 2004, 2007"10) Family Television Award for Best Actor (2006) Golden Globe Award for Best Actor " Television Series Musical or Comedy (won 2003, nominated 2004"05, 2007, 2009) Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Comedy Series (Won 2004"05, nominated 2003, 2007"10) Nominated "? Prism Award for Best Performance in a Comedy Series (2007) Satellite Award for Best Actor " Television Series Musical or Comedy (2004"05) Television Critics Association Award for Individual Achievement in Comedy (2003)
2011	Too Big To Fail	John Mack
	Five	Mitch Taylor
2013"present	We Are Men	Frank Russo

Video games

Year	Video Game	Role
1997	Fallout: A Post-Nuclear Role-Playing Game	Aradesh
2006	Cars	Luigi
2007	Cars Mater-National Championship	Luigi
2009	Cars Race-O-Rama	Luigi
2011	Cars 2 (video game)	Luigi

Produced

Year	Title
2003"09	Monk
2005	Mush
2009	Feed the Fish
2009	Pet Peeves

Directed

Year	Title	Notes
2002	Made-Up	Best of the Fest Award at the Northampton Film Festival Audience Award for Narrative First Film Nominated "? Taos Land Grant Award for Best Film