Profile photo of John Lithgow

John Lithgow

John Arthur Lithgow (born October 19, 1945) is an American actor. He studied at Harvard University and the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art before becoming known for his diverse work on stage and screen. He has received numerous accolades, including six Primetime Emmy Awards, two Golden Globe Awards, and two Tony Awards, as well as nominations for two Academy Awards, a British Academy Film Award, four Grammy Awards, four Screen Actors Guild Awards, and a Laurence Olivier Award. Lithgow won two Tony Awards, his first for Best Featured Actor in a Play for his Broadway debut in The Changing Room (1972) and his second for Best Actor in a Musical for the musical Sweet Smell of Success (2002). He was Tony-nominated for Requiem for a Heavyweight (1985), M. Butterfly (1988), and Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (2005). He has acted in the plays The Columnist (2012), A Delicate Balance (2014), and Hillary and Clinton (2019). He portrayed Roald Dahl in the play Giant on the West End, for which he was nominated for the Olivier Award for Best Actor.  He starred as Dick Solomon in the television sitcom 3rd Rock from the Sun (1996–2001), winning three Primetime Emmy Awards for Best Actor in a Comedy Series. He received further Primetime Emmy Awards for his performances as Arthur Mitchell in the drama Dexter (2009) and as Winston Churchill in the Netflix drama The Crown (2016–2019). He also starred in HBO's Perry Mason (2020) and FX's The Old Man (2022). On film, he has received two Academy Awards for Best Supporting Actor nominations for his roles as a transsexual ex-football player in The World According to Garp (1982) and a lonely banker in Terms of Endearment (1983). He also acted in All That Jazz (1979), Blow Out (1981), Footloose (1984), Harry and the Hendersons (1987), A Civil Action (1998), Shrek (2001), Kinsey (2004), Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011), Love Is Strange (2014), Interstellar (2014), Late Night (2019), Bombshell (2019), Killers of the Flower Moon (2023), and Conclave (2024).

Filmography

2026
Jimpa

as Jimpa

Movie
2024
Conclave

as Tremblay

Movie
2024
Cabrini

as Mayor Gould

Movie
2023
Killers of the Flower Moon

as Prosecutor Peter Leaward

Movie
2021
Live in Front of a Studio Audience: The Facts of Life and Diff'rent Strokes

as Philip Drummond

Movie
2017
Pitch Perfect 3

as Fergus

Movie
2017
Daddy's Home 2

as Don

Movie
2016
The Accountant

as Lamar Blackburn

Movie
2014
Interstellar

as Donald

Movie
2011
Rise of the Planet of the Apes

as Charles Rodman

Movie
2001
Shrek

as Lord Farquaad (voice)

Movie
1993
The Pelican Brief

as Smith Keen

Movie
1993
Cliffhanger

as Eric Qualen

Movie
1985
Santa Claus: The Movie

as B.Z.

Movie
1984
2010

as Dr. Walter Curnow

Movie
1984
Footloose

as Rev. Shaw Moore

Movie
1981
Blow Out

as Burke

Movie
2016
The Crown

as Winston Churchill

TV Show
2006
Dexter

as Arthur Mitchell

TV Show