William Mesnik (born May 21, 1953, age 68) is an American character

actor An actor or actress is a person who portrays a character in a performance. The actor performs "in the flesh" in the traditional medium of the theatre or in modern media such as film, radio, and television. The analogous Greek term is (), li ...

, musician and playwright who appeared in numerous films and television series of the 1990s and 2000s. He started his career as a singer-songwriter in the mid-1970s, playing in such

Greenwich Village Greenwich Village ( , , ) is a neighborhood on the west side of Lower Manhattan in New York City, bounded by 14th Street to the north, Broadway to the east, Houston Street to the south, and the Hudson River to the west. Greenwich Village ...

coffee houses as Paul Colby's ''The Other End''. He honed his playwriting skills as a regular contributor to The West Bank Downstairs Theater Bar repertory during the 80s, then went on to create several genre-bending musical theater pieces, including his music-drama about folk singers during the blacklist ''Three Songs'' (Fremont Centre Theatre, 1997, revived in 2002), garnering "Critic's Choice" in the

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the U ...

and a "Best Ensemble" Nomination (

LA Weekly Theater Award LA Weekly Theater Award was an annual critics' award system established in 1979, organized by the '' LA Weekly'' for outstanding achievements in small theatre productions in Southern California Southern California (commonly shortened to SoCal ...

s). In 2000 he released an

album An album is a collection of audio recordings issued on compact disc (CD), vinyl, audio tape, or another medium such as digital distribution. Albums of recorded sound were developed in the early 20th century as individual 78 rpm records co ...

, ''Campaign Songs'', as an accompaniment to his drama ''Muckrakers: an evening of presidential campaign songs and family dysfunction'', which debuted at FCT on the eve of the

United States presidential election The election of the president and the vice president of the United States is an indirect election in which citizens of the United States who are registered to vote in one of the fifty U.S. states or in Washington, D.C., cast ballots not dir ...

. A graduate of the

Yale School of Drama The David Geffen School of Drama at Yale University is a graduate professional school of Yale University, located in New Haven, Connecticut. Founded in 1924 as the Department of Drama in the School of Fine Arts, the school provides training in e ...

, Mesnik's theatrical resume encompasses

Broadway Broadway may refer to: Theatre * Broadway Theatre (disambiguation) * Broadway theatre, theatrical productions in professional theatres near Broadway, Manhattan, New York City, U.S. ** Broadway (Manhattan), the street **Broadway Theatre (53rd Stree ...

('' La Bête;

Oh! Calcutta! ''Oh! Calcutta!'' is an avant-garde, risque theatrical revue created by British drama critic Kenneth Tynan. The show, consisting of sketches on sex-related topics, debuted Off-Broadway in 1969 and then in the West End in 1970. It ran in Lond ...

''), Off-Broadway (''Modigliani; A Weekend Near Madison; Smoke On The Mountain; The Good Times Are Killing Me; The Rimers of Eldritch'' - and others), major regional venues such as Yale Rep, The Old Globe, McCarter Theatre, The Kennedy Center, and Actors Theater of Louisville, and European-American collaborative productions of

Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's natio ...

's ''King Lear'' and

Chekhov Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (; 29 January 1860 Old Style date 17 January. – 15 July 1904 Old Style date 2 July.) was a Russian playwright and short-story writer who is considered to be one of the greatest writers of all time. His career ...

’s ''Ivanov'' (Moscow Art Theatre). In 2002, he was nominated for an Ovation Award for his role as Holofernes in Shakespeare's ''Love's Labours Lost'', produced by A Noise Within. He became a familiar face in the 90s and 2000s from his numerous commercial, episodic

television Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...

and film appearances, including: ''

L.A. Law ''L.A. Law'' is an American legal drama television series that ran for eight seasons on NBC, from September 15, 1986, to May 19, 1994. Created by Steven Bochco and Terry Louise Fisher, it centers on the partners, associates and staff of a Los ...

, Law & Order,

Lois and Clark ''Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman'' is an American superhero television series based on the DC Comics character Superman created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster. It stars Dean Cain as Clark Kent / Superman and Teri Hatcher as ...

, Murphy Brown,

That '70s Show ''That '70s Show'' is an American television period teen sitcom that aired on Fox from August 23, 1998, to May 18, 2006. The series focuses on the lives of a group of six teenage friends living in the fictional town of Point Place, Wisconsin, ...

Spin City ''Spin City'' is an American sitcom television series that aired from September 17, 1996 to April 30, 2002, on ABC. Created by Gary David Goldberg and Bill Lawrence, the show is set in a semi-fictionalized version of the New York City mayor' ...

, 3rd Rock from the Sun,

Dharma & Greg ''Dharma & Greg'' is an American television sitcom that originally aired on ABC from September 24, 1997, until April 30, 2002, for 119 episodes over five seasons. The show starred Jenna Elfman and Thomas Gibson as Dharma and Greg Montgomery, a ...

, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Minority Report,

Titanic RMS ''Titanic'' was a British passenger liner, operated by the White Star Line, which sank in the North Atlantic Ocean on 15 April 1912 after striking an iceberg during her maiden voyage from Southampton, England, to New York City, Unit ...

, Stonebrooke,'' and two films by

John Schlesinger John Richard Schlesinger (; 16 February 1926 – 25 July 2003) was an English film and stage director. He won the Academy Award for Best Director for ''Midnight Cowboy'', and was nominated for the same award for two other films ('' Darling'' an ...

: ''

The Next Best Thing ''The Next Best Thing'' is a 2000 American comedy-drama film directed by John Schlesinger (his final feature film before his death in 2003) about two best friends who have a child together and a custody battle years after. Starring Madonna, Rup ...

'' and '' Eye for an Eye''.

Filmography

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Mesnik, William American male actors Living people 1953 births Yale School of Drama alumni