Terry O'Quinn

Terry O'Quinn

O'Quinn in 2008
Born Terrance Quinn
July 15, 1952 (1952-07-15) (age 58)
Sault Sainte Marie, Michigan, U.S.
Occupation Actor
Years active 1980–present
Spouse Lori O'Quinn (1979-present) two children

Terry O'Quinn (born July 15, 1952) is an American actor, most famous for playing John Locke on the TV series Lost. He made his debut in a 1980 television movie called F.D.R.: The Last Year. Since then, O'Quinn has had minor supporting roles in films and TV movies such as Young Guns, All the Right Moves, Silver Bullet, Places in the Heart, Between Two Women, and The Rocketeer, in which he portrayed Howard Hughes. O'Quinn has had guest roles on tv shows such as Miami Vice, The Twilight Zone, Tales of the Unexpected, The West Wing, JAG, and Remington Steele.

O'Quinn became known for playing the title role in The Stepfather and Stepfather II, and in 1996 O'Quinn was cast as Peter Watts in Millennium, which ran for three seasons (1996–1999). In 2004, O'Quinn finally broke into mainstream popularity after landing the role of John Locke on the ABC TV series Lost, for which he won an Emmy Award in 2007 and was nominated in 2005 and 2010.

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Early life

O'Quinn was born as Terrance Quinn at War Memorial Hospital in Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, one of 11 siblings born to Irish American parents. He grew up in nearby Newberry, Michigan, and was raised Roman Catholic.[1][2] He attended Central Michigan University in , and the University of Iowa in Iowa City. He changed his surname from Quinn to O'Quinn as another registered actor already had the name Terrance Quinn.[3]

Career

Terry began acting in the 1970s during his time at Central Michigan University. He not only was an outstanding actor but also playwright/director. He wrote and directed the musical Orchestrina. This musical featured five main characters: The Man (played by Jeff Daniels), The Boy (Harold Downs), The Woman (Ann O'Donnell), The Girl (Debbie Penwarden), and The Drunk (James Hilliker), plus a female and a male chorus.

Starting in 1980, O'Quinn has appeared in various feature films such as Silver Bullet, Tombstone, Heaven's Gate, Young Guns, and as Howard Hughes in The Rocketeer. His early television roles include guest appearances on Miami Vice (episode "Give a Little, Take a Little"), Earth 2, Moonlighting, Star Trek: The Next Generation (episode "The Pegasus"), The New Twilight Zone (episode "Chameleon"), Homicide: Life on the Street (episode "Hate Crimes"), and a recurring role as Rear Admiral Thomas Boone on JAG.

O'Quinn made his breakthrough by appearing as the deranged serial-killing title character in The Stepfather. His acting performance was praised by film critic Roger Ebert, from the Chicago Sun Times, who commented: "The Stepfather" has one wonderful element: Terry O'Quinn's performance".[4] O'Quinn was nominated for both a Saturn Award and an Independent Spirit Award for his performance. A sequel was released, two years after the first movie, but it wasn't as much of a success as the first movie. It grossed almost a million dollars less at the box office.[5][6] It was never explained why O'Quinn wasn't in the third installment of the series, in which the stepfather character was portrayed by Robert Wightman.

Around 1995, O'Quinn made guest appearances in The X-Files and Harsh Realm, produced by Chris Carter, who also cast him in the film The X-Files: Fight The Future and then once again in the final season. In 1996 O'Quinn started acting in the television series Millennium as Peter Watts, also produced by Chris Carter. O'Quinn held this role for all three seasons of the series. O'Quinn holds the distinction of having played four different characters within the extended X-Files/Millennium continuum (the two shows being classed together since both Lance Henriksen's character of Frank Black and Charles Nelson Reilly's character of Jose Chung have appeared in both shows).

Terry was approached by director of the upcoming reboot of The Stepfather, Nelson McCormick, to make a cameo appearance in the remake, but according to the producers O'Quinn turned down the offer.[7][8]

The Stepfather films

In 1987 and 1989, Terry played the main character and antagonist in the horror films Stepfather I & II. The franchise spawned a third sequel; however, Terry did not star in the third and final sequel. In I, Terry plays the role of a deranged serial killer going by the name "Jerry Blake" (his character's real name and identity are never revealed to the audience), who is obsessed with having the ideal family. When the widowed mother and daughter do not comport with his expectations, he spirals into a spell of madness and attempts to brutally murder them. In II, he escapes from the asylum in which he is placed and steals the identity of a man he murders in the beginning of the film named Gene Clifford. And the fun starts all over again. The 1989 sequel also stars the late Jonathan Brandis as the son of the woman O' Quinn courts. Terry is spectacular as he portrays the strong character of a volatile serial killer who puts on the pretense of being an amicable, loving, compassionate, American family man whose agenda goes from raising the "ideal" family to murder the moment he can no longer tolerate imperfection.

Lost

Further information: John Locke (Lost) and Lost (TV series)

After a string of recurring appearances on Alias (2002–2003), as the FBI Director Kendall, O'Quinn became a favorite of television producer J.J. Abrams. Following a seven-episode guest run on The West Wing in 2003–2004, O'Quinn received a call from Abrams indicating that the producer wanted to cast him in his new television drama Lost without any audition. In 2005 O'Quinn received an Emmy nomination for Best Supporting Actor in a Drama for his work as John Locke on the series Lost. O'Quinn admitted on the TV Guide Channel that he did not have much faith in Lost at first, calling it "The Mysterious Gilligan's Island of Dr. Moreau".[9] The show, however, became one of the most popular on television, and on September 16, 2007 he won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor In A Drama Series for his role, and was nominated again for an Emmy for the role in 2010, which he did not win. In a Tv.com interview O'Quinn commented that the reason he felt comfortable playing this character is because he's a bit like him.[10]

Personal life

O'Quinn has been married to his wife, Lori, for 31 years. Most of that time they lived in Reisterstown, Maryland, but after Lost began airing, the couple decided to follow the example of O'Quinn's co stars and move to Hawaii, where the series was shot. The couple own a home in Hawaii and one in Maryland. They have two sons, Oliver and Hunter. O'Quinn also has one granddaughter.

Filmography

References

  1. ↑ interview with miriam o'callaghan
  2. ↑ Loudermilk, Suzanne. "Lost and Found". Baltimore magazine. http://www.baltimoremagazine.net/article.asp?t=1&m=1&c=32&s=806&ai=94576. Retrieved 2010-07-15. "He's come a long way, literally and figuratively, from his days in small-town Newberry, MI, where he was one of 11 children in a close-knit, Irish-Catholic family." 
  3. ↑ Hatch, Rachel (2008-03-04). "TV Actor Terry O’Quinn Visits With Illinois Wesleyan Theatre Students". Illinois Wesleyan Theatre. http://www2.iwu.edu/CurrentNews/newsreleases08/news_ActorVisitsIWU_308.shtml. Retrieved 2008-08-06. 
  4. ↑ Ebert, Roger (1987-03-02). "The Stepfather". Chicago Sun Times. http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19870302/REVIEWS/703020302/1023. Retrieved 2008-07-30. 
  5. ↑ "The Stepfather". Box Office Mojo. http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=stepfather.htm. Retrieved 2008-08-06. 
  6. ↑ "The Stepfather 2". Box Office Mojo. http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=stepfather2.htm. Retrieved 2008-08-06. 
  7. ↑ "Interview: Never Back Down's Amber Heard". Cinemablend. http://www.cinemablend.com/new/Interview-Never-Back-Down-s-Amber-Heard-8059.html. Retrieved 2009-07-17. 
  8. ↑ "How Dylan Walsh makes the new Stepfather a killer remake". Sci-Fi Wire. http://scifiwire.com/2009/07/how-dylan-walsh-makes-the.php. Retrieved 2009-07-18. 
  9. ↑ "Terry O'Quinn". Flixster. http://www.flixster.com/actor/terry-oquinn. Retrieved 2008-08-06. 
  10. ↑ O'Quinn, Tiffany. Interview with Terry O'Quinn, Yunjin Kim, Daniel Dae Kim and Jack Bender. Jack Bender, Yunjin Kim, Daniel Dae Kim & Terry O'Quinn (Exclusive Interview). TV.com. 2006-10-05. Retrieved on 2008-08-06.

External links

Awards and achievements
Preceded by
James Marsters
for Angel / Buffy the Vampire Slayer		 Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actor on Television
2004
for Lost		 Succeeded by
James Callis
for Battlestar Galactica
Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor – Drama Series

Bradley Whitford (2001) · John Spencer (2002) · Joe Pantoliano (2003) · Michael Imperioli (2004) · William Shatner (2005) · Alan Alda (2006) · Terry O'Quinn (2007) · Željko Ivanek (2008) · Michael Emerson (2009) · Aaron Paul (2010)

(1959–1975) · (1976–2000) · (2001–present)