Biography: Christopher Lloyd

Christopher Allen Lloyd (born October 22, 1938) is a three-time Emmy Award-winning American actor. He is well known for his roles as Emmett "Doc" Brown in the Back to the Future trilogy, Judge Doom in Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Uncle Fester in The Addams Family and Addams Family Values, as well as Reverend Jim Ignatowski on television's Taxi. He also starred in the short-lived television series Deadly Games, where he played Jackal, a videogame villain brought to life. His unique voice has also made him popular with animation, frequently voicing villains. He currently voices the character Hacker on the animated PBS series Cyberchase.

Personal life

Lloyd was born in Stamford, Connecticut, the son of Ruth (née Lapham), a singer who was the sister of San Francisco mayor Roger Lapham, and Samuel R. Lloyd, a lawyer. ^{He attended the Fessenden School, a preparatory school in Newton, Massachusetts. Lloyd was raised in New Canaan, Connecticut and Westport, Connecticut where he graduated from Staples High School in 1958. His mother, Ruth, donated Waveny Park to the town of New Canaan.}

Lloyd seldom appears in public or gives interviews (he gave a rare interview on Channel 4's 100 Greatest Family Films in 2005). Some of his best friends, co-stars and fans who've met him describe Lloyd as a very shy and quiet man. His nephew, Sam Lloyd, is best known for playing Ted Buckland, the lawyer on Scrubs. Christopher Lloyd was married from February 1992 to December 2005 to writer/producer Jane Walker Wood; this was his third marriage. His namesake, Chris Lloyd is not related but is actually the son of sitcom writer David Lloyd. He is a fan of fly fishing. Lloyd's home was unfortunately completely destroyed by the California Wildfires of November 2008 in Montecito [[1]].

Career

He began acting by age 14 and started apprenticing in summer stock. He took acting classes in New York City at age 19, some at the Neighborhood Playhouse with Sanford Meisner. He appeared in several Broadway productions, including Happy End, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Red, White and Maddox, Kaspar, The Harlot and the Hunted, The Seagull, Total Eclipse, MacBeth, In the Boom Boom Room, Cracks, Professional Resident Company, What Every Woman Knows, As They Put Handcuffs on the Flowers, The Father, King Lear, and Power Failure.

His first major motion picture role was as a psychiatric patient in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. However, he may be most remembered for his roles as Reverend Jim Ignatowski, the ex-hippie cabbie on the TV sitcom Taxi, and the eccentric inventor Emmett "Doc" Brown in the Back to the Future trilogy of sci-fi films, a role he has played numerous times in various spin-offs and incarnations. He also played notable roles as Klingon Commander Kruge in Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, Professor Dimple in an episode of Road to Avonlea, the title role in The Pagemaster, the villain Judge Doom in Who Framed Roger Rabbit, a wacky sound effects man named Zoltan in Radioland Murders, and Uncle Fester in the big screen adaptations of The Addams Family. In Nov. 2007, Lloyd was reunited onscreen with his former Taxi co-star, Judd Hirsch in the (season 4, episode 9) Graphic ^{of the show Numb3rs.}

Filmography

• One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975)
• Goin' South (1978)
• Taxi (1978)
• Three Warriors (1978)
• The Onion Field (1979)
• The Lady in Red (1979)
• The Legend of the Lone Ranger (1981)
• Mr. Mom (1983)
• To Be or Not to Be (1983)
• Star Trek III: The Search for Spock (1984)
• The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension (1984)
• Back to the Future (1985)
• Clue (1985)
• Miracles (1986)
• Walk Like a Man (1987)
• Track 29 (1988)
• Eight Men Out (1988)
• Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988)
• The Dream Team (1989)
• Back to the Future Part II (1989)
• Back to the Future Part III (1990)
• DuckTales the Movie: Treasure of the Lost Lamp (1990)
• Back to the Future: The Ride (1991)
• Suburban Commando (1991)
• The Addams Family (1991)
• Amazing Stories: Book Two (1992)
• T bone 'N' Weasel (1992)
• Dennis the Menace (1993)
• Addams Family Values (1993)
• Twenty Bucks (1993)
• Angels in the Outfield (1994)
• Camp Nowhere (1994)
• The Pagemaster (1994)
• In Search of Dr. Seuss (1994)
• Radioland Murders (1994)
• Rent-a-Kid (1995)
• Deadly Games (1995)
• Things to Do in Denver When You're Dead (1995)
• Cadillac Ranch (1996)
• Toonstruck (1996)
• Quicksilver Highway (1997)
• Anastasia (1997)
• Angels in the Endzone (1997)
• The Real Blonde (1997)
• My Favorite Martian (1999)
• Alice in Wonderland (1999)
• Baby Geniuses (1999)
• Man on the Moon (1999)
• It Came From the Sky (1999)
• Cyberchase as The Hacker (2002-present)
• Wit (2001)
• When Good Ghouls Go Bad (2001)
• Kids World (2001)
• Interstate 60 (2002)
• Wish You Were Dead (2002)
• Hey Arnold!: The Movie (2002)
• Haunted Lighthouse (2003)
• Tremors (2003)
• I Dream (2004)
• Admissions (2004)
• Stacked (TV) (2005)
• Here Comes Peter Cottontail: The Movie (2005)
• Bad Girls From Valley High (2005)
• A Perfect Day (2005)
• Valerie on the Stairs (2007)
• Numb3rs (2007)
• The Tale of Despereaux (2008)
• Foodfight! (2008)
• Call of the Wild (2008)
• The Simpsons Ride (2008)
• Law & Order: Criminal Intent (2008)
• Fly Me to the Moon (2008)

Further reading

• Chelsea on the Edge: The Adventures of an American Theater, Davi Napoleon. Includes discussion of Lloyd's early work off-Broadway, including the production of Happy End at the Chelsea Theater Center and on Broadway, Kaspar, and Total Eclipse . Iowa State University Press. ISBN-0-8138-1713-7, 1991.

References

1. Sam Lloyd, Sr. Biography (1925-)
2. Lloyd genealogy
3. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1139210/