Emmy Award winner JOHN LEGUIZAMO was raised in New York and studied acting with Lee Strasberg and Wynn Handman at New York University. His most recent film credits are the directorial debut of actor Frank Whaley, Joe the King (co-produced by Leguizamo’s Lower East Side Films), Seth Zvl Rosenfeld’s King of the Jungle, and Spike Lee’s Summer of Sam, in which Leguizamo’s “raging, startlingly visceral performance” was singled out by Janet Maslin of The New York Times.
Other big screen credits include ‘Tybalt’ in Baz Luhrmann’s William Shakespeare’s Romeo+ Juliet, the villainous clown in the box-office hit Spawn, Beeban Kidron’s To Wong Foo, Thanks For Everything, Julie Newmar (for which Leguizamo garnered a Golden Globe Best Supporting Actor Nomination), Brian De Palma’s Carlito’s Way, Casualties of War and Tony Scott’s The Fan. Leguizamo also lent his vocal talents to the character of The Rat in Twentieth Century Fox’s smash hit comedy Dr. Dolittle.
His one-man show “Freak,” which he also wrote, ended a successful run on Broadway in 1998, and along with Tony nominations for Best Play and Best Performance, won the Drama Desk Award for Oustanding Solo/One Person Show and the Outer Critic’s Circle Award for Outstanding Solo Performance. A special presentation of “Freak,” directed by Spike Lee, which aired on HBO, earned Leguizamo the Emmy Award for Outstanding Performance in a Variety or Music Program. In 1995, Leguizamo created and starred in the first Latin comedy/variety show, the Emmy Award-winning “House of Buggin” for Fox.
His latest acting project is Baz Luhrmann’s Moulin Rouge, in which he plays Toulouse-Latrec. The film will be released by Twentieth Century Fox later this year.