Eric Bogosian Biography

Date of Birth: April 24, 1953

Actor/writer Eric Bogosian was born in Woburn, Massachusetts. He began acting when he was in high school and started writing when he arrived in New York.

Of his education he says, "I had pretty typical theatre training until I came to New York in '75. I graduated from Oberlin in the Theatre Department, and I'd say at that point the Oberlin idea of cutting edge theatre was Pinter and Beckett and Albee...literary playwrights."

Bogosian is the author of the plays Talk Radio, subUrbia and Griller, as well as three Obie Award-winning solos: Drinking In America, Sex, Drugs, Rock & Roll and Pounding Nails in the Floor with My Forehead. He wrote the screen adaptations of his first two plays, receiving the Berlin Film Festival's "Silver Bear" for his work on Talk Radio. He is the recipient of a Drama Desk Award and two National Endowment for the Arts fellowships.

"I live by a very, very simple idea in the theatre which I learned from Richard Foreman. I make the theatre that I want to see."

His collaborations include a 1986 album recorded with the late Frank Zappa and the 1997 television series High Incident created with director Steven Spielberg. His one-act Bitter Sauce was commissioned as part of Love's Fire, an evening of works based on Shakespearean sonnets.

As an actor, Bogosian has appeared in over a dozen feature films. He is best known for starring as the misanthropic "shock-jock" Barry Champlain in Oliver Stone's film version of his own Talk Radio, Robert Altman's Caine Mutiny Court Martial and Steven Segal's Under Siege 2. In the past few years, he was featured in Dolores Claiborne, Woody Allen's Deconstructing Harry and the HBO movie A Bright Shining Lie. He then went on to star in the campus drama, Gossip (2000) and romantic comedy In the Weeds (2000). In 2002, he starred in Ararat and played a role in Wonderland the following year.

His most recent role is in the J.D. Salinger biopic Rebel in the Rye (2017) starring Nicholas Hoult.

He has also worked on television, appearing in shows such as Law & Order, The Larry Sanders Show and Showtime's Beggars and Choosers.

Bogosian lives in New York City with his wife Joe Anne, whom he married in 1984, and two sons.

Filmography:

Rebel in the Rye (2017)
Wonderland (2003)
Ararat (2002)
In the Weeds (2000)
Gossip (2000)
Deconstructing Harry (1997)
Office Killer (1997) (uncredited)
Beavis and Butt-head Do America (1996) (voice)
The Substance of Fire (1996)
Arabian Knight (1995) (voice)
Under Siege 2: Dark Territory (1995)
Dolores Claiborne (1995)
Naked in New York (1994)
Sex, Drugs, Rock & Roll (1991)
Suffering Bastards (1989)
Arena Brains (1988)
Talk Radio (1988)
New Wave Comedy (1986)
Special Effects (1984)