Information about Peter Falk

Peter Falk
Peter Falk giving an interview
Birth name	Peter Michael Falk
Born	September 16 1927 (1927--) (age 80) New York City, New York, U.S.
Died
Resting place
Official site	[1]
Awards Emmy Awards Emmy 1990 Columbo - "Agenda for Murder" Emmy 1976 Columbo Emmy 1975 The NBC Mystery Movie - Columbo Emmy 1972 The NBC Mystery Movie - Columbo Emmy 1962 The Dick Powell Show - "The Price of Tomatoes" Golden Globe Awards Golden Globe 1973 Columbo

Peter Michael Falk (born September 16, 1927) is a two-time Academy Award-nominated, five-time Emmy Award-winning American actor, best known for his role as Lt. Columbo in the television series Columbo.

Biography

Early life

Falk was born in New York City, New York of Eastern European Jewish descent, the son of Madeline (née Hockhauser), an accountant and buyer, and Michael Falk, who owned a clothing and dry goods store.^[1] Falk attended Ossining High School in Westchester County, NY and was president of his class. After graduating, he joined the United States Merchant Marine as a cook, before completing a Bachelor of Arts in political science at the New School for Social Research in 1951. Gaining a Masters degree in public administration at Syracuse University in 1953, he applied unsuccessfully for a job with the CIA before becoming a management analyst with the Connecticut State Budget Bureau in Hartford.

Acting

After deciding to be an actor and studying at the White Barn Theatre in Westport, Connecticut, in 1956 at the age of 29, he left his job with the Budget Bureau and moved to Greenwich Village. He made his professional debut Off Broadway in Molière's Don Juan at the Fourth Street Theatre on January 3, 1956, and the same year his Broadway debut playing an English soldier in Shaw's Saint Joan with Siobhán McKenna. He won an Emmy for "The Price of Tomatoes", a Dick Powell TV drama. Falk has been nominated for a Best Supporting Actor Academy Award twice, for Murder, Inc., and Pocketful of Miracles.

Columbo

Falk is best known for the title role in the long-running TV series Columbo, a shabby and ostensibly absent-minded police detective. In reality, Columbo possessed a keen mind and invariably solved his cases by paying close attention to tiny inconsistencies in a suspect's story, hounding them until they confessed; he merely put on a good show of being dim-witted so that the criminals and even his colleagues would be more at ease around him. Columbo's signature technique was to exit the scene of an interview, only to stop in the doorway to ask a suspect "just one more thing" (the title of Falk's recent memoir), which always brought to light the key inconsistency. The role won Falk five Emmy Awards and a Golden Globe.

Subsequent work

Falk was a close friend of independent film director John Cassavetes and appeared in Cassavetes's films Husbands, A Woman Under the Influence, and a cameo appearance at the end of Opening Night. Cassavetes guest-starred in the Columbo episode "Étude in Black."

Falk is also known for his roles in several films, including his performance as a possible ex-CIA agent of dubious sanity in the Arthur Hiller comedy The In-Laws. He also starred in such films as The Great Race, The Princess Bride, Wim Wenders' Wings of Desire (cast as himself) and the 1963 mega-comedy It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World. He also played Guy Gisborne in the 1964 Robin Hood spoof Robin and the 7 Hoods.

In 1998, Falk returned to the New York stage to star in an off-Broadway production of Arthur Miller's Mr. Peters' Connections. Falk has a brief appearance in the 2007 Nicholas Cage thriller film Next.

Personal life

Falk's unusual gaze is due to a glass eye that he has had for most of his life. His right eye was surgically removed at the age of three because of a malignant tumor.

He married Alyce Fayo on April 17, 1960. They had two daughters, Catherine (who is a real life private investigator) and Jackie. They were divorced in 1976. On December 7, 1977, he married Shera Danese.

References

External links

• Peter Falk Official Site
• The Ultimate Lieutenant Columbo Site
• Peter Falk at the Internet Movie Database
• Peter Falk at the Internet Broadway Database
• Peter Falk at the Notable Names Database