Dan Lauria
Lauria at the ATX TV Festival 2014 for Sullivan & Son
Born (1947-04-12) April 12, 1947 (age 76)
Brooklyn, New York, U.S.
OccupationActor
Years active1962–present
Spouse
Eileen Cregg
​
​
(m. 1991; div. 2001)​
Military career
Service/branchUnited States Marine Corps
Years of service1970–1973
RankCaptain (O-3)
Battles/warsVietnam War

Dan Lauria (born April 12, 1947) is an American actor, who played the role of Jack Arnold in The Wonder Years (1988–1993), Jack Sullivan on Sullivan and Son (2012–2014), and Al Luongo on Pitch (2016–2017).

Early life

Lauria, an Italian-American, was born in Brooklyn, New York, the son of Carmela (née Luongo) and Joseph J. Lauria.[1] He also lived in Lindenhurst, New York. He graduated from Lindenhurst Senior High School in 1965 as a varsity football player, and he briefly taught physical education at Lindenhurst High School. A Vietnam War veteran, Lauria served as an officer in the United States Marine Corps;[2] he served at the same point in his life that Jack Arnold, his character in The Wonder Years, did during the Korean War. In Vietnam, he served as a platoon commander at An Loc near the Cambodian border. He got his start in acting while attending Southern Connecticut State University in New Haven, Connecticut, on a football scholarship.

Career

Lauria is best known for his portrayal of Jack Arnold, the stern, but loving, money-conscious father on the TV series The Wonder Years, that ran from 1988 to 1993. He also played NASA Administrator James Webb in the 1998 TV miniseries From the Earth to the Moon and Commanding Officer, USA in 1996's Independence Day. More recently he has appeared as Police Commissioner Eustace Dolan in The Spirit. He appeared as Coach Hamstrung in The Three Stooges N.Y.U.K. on AMC in 2000. Lauria appeared on stage in New York in the summer of 2006 in an off-Broadway production of A Stone Carver by William Mastrosimone with Jim Iorio and Elizabeth Rossa. Lauria also had a small role in a season two episode of Army Wives, as well as a season one episode of The Mentalist. In 2009, Lauria has appeared as General Lee Whitworth, M.D. in Criminal Minds season 4. He has also appeared in an episode of Boy Meets World, starring Ben Savage, the younger brother of Fred Savage. In late 2009, Lauria returned to the off-Broadway stage, appearing as Jimmy Hoffa in Brian Lee Franklin's Good Bobby, a fictionalized account of Robert F. Kennedy's rise.

In 2010, Lauria appeared as Vince Lombardi in the Broadway play Lombardi.[3] The play received positive reviews, with sportswriter Jim Hague commenting, "Lauria truly becomes Vince Lombardi. You almost forget you're watching an actor. He's Lombardi through and through, down to the wire-framed glasses and intimidating scowl." North Bergen football coach Vince Ascolese, who met Lombardi, commented "I really felt like he was Lombardi. It was uncanny."[4] Lauria's portrayal of Lombardi was used during the NFL on FOX introduction to Super Bowl XLV, where one of the two participating teams was the Green Bay Packers; the team Lombardi coached to victories in the first two Super Bowls in 1967 and 1968. The Packers went on to defeat the Pittsburgh Steelers in that game.

In 2012, Lauria played the part of Jean Shepherd in the Broadway production of A Christmas Story: The Musical, a role which he reprised off-Broadway at Madison Square Garden in 2013. From 2012 through 2014, he played Jack Sullivan on the Steve Byrne sitcom Sullivan & Son.

Lauria served one year as a Department of Veterans Affairs celebrity hospital visitor, during which he toured many VA hospitals, meeting patients.

Filmography

Lauria at the 41st Emmy Awards on September 17, 1989

Film

  • 1981 C.O.D. as Secret Service Man #2
  • 1983 Without a Trace as Baker
  • 1985 South Bronx Heroes as FBI Agent
  • 1987 Stakeout as Detective Phil Coldshank
  • 1993 Another Stakeout as Captain Phil Coldshank
  • 1995 Excessive Force II: Force on Force as Orlando Franco
  • 1996 Faithful
  • 1996 No One Could Protect Her as Detective Greg Coming
  • 1996 Independence Day as Commanding Officer
  • 1998 True Friends as Pauley
  • 1998 Wide Awake as Father Peters
  • 1999 Stranger in My House as Dennis
  • 1999 A Wake in Providence as Rudy
  • 2001 Full Disclosure as Clive Carter
  • 2001 Ricochet River as Coach Garth
  • 2002 Contagion as General Ryker
  • 2002 Outside the Law as Detective Froman
  • 2002 High Times Potluck as Carmine
  • 2002 The Empath
  • 2003 Dead Canaries as Vito Scaldafieri
  • 2005 The Signs of the Cross as Mr. Coyne
  • 2005 Jesus, Mary and Joey as Father Gino
  • 2006 Big Momma's House 2 as Crawford
  • 2008 Dear Me as Mr. Hunt
  • 2008 The Spirit as Commissioner Eustace Dolan
  • 2009 Alien Trespass as Chief Dawson
  • 2009 Donna On Demand as Detective Lewis
  • 2009 Dead Air as Fred
  • 2009 InSearchOf as Reverend Blackwell
  • 2010 The Waiter as Father Parks
  • 2011 Here's the Kicker as Dave Berry
  • 2011 Life of Lemon as Arthur
  • 2013 Make Your Move as Parole Officer Foster
  • 2014 Sister as Jeffrey Presser
  • 2017 The Concessionaires Must Die! as Jack Fisk
  • 2017 An American Dog Story as Paw Poochini
  • 2017 Locating Silver Lake as Speaker
  • 2020 The Eagle and the Albatross as Dr. Al Wiserman
  • 2020 The Way Back as Gerry Norris
  • 2020 Holidate as Wally
  • 2021 Potato Dreams of America
  • TBA Reagan as Tip O'Neill

Television

References

  1. ^ Dan Lauria Biography at Film Reference. Retrieved October 23, 2010.
  2. ^ Dean, Paul (April 27, 1995). "To Hell . . . and Back : Not everyone who fought in Vietnam came home shattered. Millions returned intact in mind and body, and used the worst of combat to find the best of life". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved April 2, 2015.
    Cutler, Jacqueline (September 10, 2006). "'The Path to 9/11". Chicago Tribune. Retrieved April 2, 2015.
  3. ^ Healy, Patrick (April 15, 2010). "Turf for a Different Kind of N.F.L. Play: Broadway". The New York Times.
  4. ^ Hague, Jim. "'Lombardi' on Broadway is a smash hit" "Tasty Tidbits" The Union City Reporter; October 24, 2010; Pages 12 & 13

External links