Biography: Christopher Lloyd

Christopher Allen Lloyd (born October 22, 1938) is an American actor. He is widely known for his iconic portrayals of characters such 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, and 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, and also was a regular in the short-lived TV series Stacked, in the mid-2000's, and for his voice of Hacker in Cyberchase.

His voice has also made him popular with animation, frequently voicing villains. He currently voices the character Hacker on the animated PBS series Cyberchase. He has won three Primetime Emmy Awards, an Independent Spirit Award, nominated for two Saturn Awards, and a Daytime Emmy Award.

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.^[1][2] 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, an heiress to the Lapham-Texaco oil fortune, donated her family's ancestral home, Waveny Park, to the town of New Canaan.

Lloyd seldom appears in public or gives interviews. Some of his best friends, co-stars and fans who have 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 fourth marriage. He is a fan of fly fishing. Lloyd's home was destroyed in the Tea Fire of November 2008 in Montecito, California.

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, And 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, for which he was nominated for a Saturn Award. He portrayed the villain Maj. Bartholomew 'Butch' Cavendish in The Legend of the Lone Ranger 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 Disney/Amblin's 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 1999 Lloyd was reunited onscreen with Michael J. Fox in an episode of Spin City entitled "Back to the Future IV — Judgment Day" where Lloyd plays Owen Kingston, Mike Flaherty's (Fox's character) former mentor who stops by City Hall to see him, only to proclaim himself as God. That same year, he starred in the movie remake of the 1960s series My Favorite Martian. Also in November 2007, Lloyd was reunited onscreen with his former Taxi co-star Judd Hirsch in the (Season 4 episode) "Graphic"^[3] of the TV series Numb3rs.

He recently played Ebenezer Scrooge in a 2008 production of A Christmas Carol at the Kodak Theatre with John Goodman and Jane Leeves. He also recently appeared in a trailer for a fake horror film, entitled Gobstopper, where he played Willy Wonka as a horror movie villain.^[4]

Filmography

Awards

Primetime Emmy Awards

• (1982) Won - Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series / Taxi
• (1983) Won — Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series / Taxi
• (1992) Won - Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series / Road to Avonlea

Saturn Awards

• (1986) Nominated - Best Supporting Actor / Back to the Future
• (1990) Nominated — Best Supporting Actor / Who Framed Roger Rabbit

Independent Spirit Awards

• (1994) Won - Best Supporting Male / Twenty Bucks

DVD Exclusive Awards

• (2001) Nominated — Best Actor / When Good Ghouls Go Bad

Daytime Emmy Awards

• (2008) Nominated — Outstanding Performer in an Animated Program / Cyberchase

Drama Desk Award

• (1973) Won - Drama Desk Award for Best Performance/ Kaspar

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-)". Filmreference.com. http://www.filmreference.com/film/81/Sam-Lloyd-Sr.html. Retrieved 2009-10-17. 
2. ^ "Lloyd genealogy". Freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com. http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~battle/celeb/lloyd.htm. Retrieved 2009-10-17. 
3. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1139210/
4. ^ "Gobstopper The Movie". Gobstopper The Movie. http://gobstoppermovie.com/. Retrieved 2009-10-17. 

External links

• Christopher Lloyd at the Internet Movie Database
• Christopher Lloyd at the Internet Broadway Database
• Christopher Lloyd at the Internet Off-Broadway Database
• Christopher Lloyd at Allmovie
• Christopher Lloyd at Memory Alpha (a Star Trek wiki)
• Ciaran Meets The Stars

Christopher Lloyd main page.