JON LOVITZ

'Jonathan M. Lovitz' (born July 21, 1957) is an American actor and comedian perhaps best known as a cast member of ''Saturday Night Live'' and the voice of Jay Sherman in ''The Critic''.

Contents

Early life

Career

''Saturday Night Live''

Voice over work

Movie cameos and television guest appearances

Broadway theatre

Stand-up comedy

Confrontation with Andy Dick

Filmography

Films

Television

References

External links

Early life

Lovitz was born in Tarzana, California to a Jewish couple.^[1] He attended and studied theater at the University of California at Irvine and graduated in 1979. He studied acting with Tony Barr at the Film Actors Workshop. He became a member of The Groundlings comedy troupe where he befriended Phil Hartman and Paul Reubens. His father was an immigrant from Albania who lived in Jacksonville, Florida, and later moved to California.

Career

''Saturday Night Live''

Lovitz was a cast member of ''Saturday Night Live'' from 1985 to 1990. He later said in an interview for the book ''Live From New York: An Uncensored History of Saturday Night Live'' that his time on ''SNL'' was the most memorable in his career. He went from having no money to being offered a $500,000 movie contract. He was nominated for an Emmy his first two years on ''Saturday Night Live''. One of his most notable ''SNL'' characters was "Tommy Flanagan, The Pathological Liar" that generated the catch phrase, "Yeah! That's the ticket!" Some of his other recurring characters included Master Thespian, Tonto, Mephistopheles, Hanukkah Harry, and Michael Dukakis.

Voice over work

Lovitz has lent his voice to several cartoons and films. In the series ''The Critic'' he played the title character of Jay Sherman. On ''The Simpsons'' he played Marge's ex-prom date Artie Ziff, theater director Llewellyn Sinclair (and his sister, who runs a daycare center) on the season four episode "A Streetcar Named Marge", Jay Sherman from ''The Critic'' in the Season 6 crossover episode "A Star Is Burns", and paparazzo Enrico Irritazio in the season eighteen episode "Homerazzi". He also played Professor Lombardo and Aristotle Amadopolous.

Movie cameos and television guest appearances

In the late 1990s, Lovitz was "the man who wrote the Yellow Pages", in a series of commercials and print ads for the American Yellow Pages industry.
He also had an uncredited cameo as a rival crooner to Adam Sandler in the movie ''The Wedding Singer''.
Lovitz has also appeared on ''Friends'' twice, first in the Season 1 episode "The One with the Stoned Guy" and then in the Season 9 episode "The One with the Blind Dates". He appeared on ''Seinfeld'' as Gary Fogel, a man who lies about having cancer ("The Scofflaw") and later dies in a car accident.

Broadway theatre

He has appeared on Broadway at the Music Box Theatre in Neil Simon's play ''The Dinner Party'', taking over the lead role from Henry Winkler. He sang at Carnegie Hall three times (including Great Performances' ''Ira Gershwin at 100: A Celebration at Carnegie Hall'') and sang the national anthem at Dodger Stadium and the U.S. Open.
On October 10, 2001, Lovitz sang a duet (with Robbie Williams) of the song "Well, Did You Evah" at the Royal Albert Hall in the UK. The recording can be found on the ''Swing When You're Winning'' album.

Stand-up comedy

In 2005, Lovitz entered stand-up comedy for the first time in his career. He also appeared in the film ''The Producers'' as the strict accounting firm chairman, Mr. Marx. In 2006, he became the spokesperson in an advertising campaign for the Subway restaurant chain. He was dropped from the campaign later that year by Fred De Luca after test audiences and a number of phone calls and letters deemed him not funny enough to cause people to eat.
On May 31, 2007 the Laugh Factory on Sunset Strip announced that Lovitz had signed a deal to appear there every Wednesday night for the rest of his life. Or, Lovitz could appear in New York if he is there on a project such as a movie. In addition, Lovitz will write a Laugh Factory blog giving advice to up-and-coming comedians. Lovitz commented "Who knows? I could become the Don Ho of Los Angeles," he said. "God knows I've got enough Hawaiian shirts".^[2]

Confrontation with Andy Dick

On July 11, 2007, Lovitz got into a violent confrontation with fellow comedian Andy Dick at the Laugh Factory. Lovitz had long blamed Dick for reintroducing Phil Hartman's wife Brynn to cocaine (after 10 years of sobriety) just five months before she would murder her husband and commit suicide. Laugh Factory owner Jamie Masada said, "Jon picked Andy up by the head and smashed him into the bar four or five times, and blood started gushing out of his nose." Dick had previously said to Lovitz he would "put the 'Phil Hartman hex' on you - you’re the next one to die."^[3] Lovitz told ''Page Six'', "All the comedians are glad I did it because this guy is an asshole." He has not commented further. Lovitz succeeded Hartman on the comedy series ''NewsRadio'' following Hartman's murder; Dick was a co-star.^[4]

Filmography

Films

Film	Year	Role
Hamburger The Motion Picture	1986	''Security Guard''
Last Resort	1986	''Bartender''
Jumpin' Jack Flash	1986	''Doug''
Ratboy	1986	''Party Guest''
¡Three Amigos!	1986	''Morty''
The Brave Little Toaster	1987	''The Radio'' (voice)
Big	1988	''Scotty Brennen''
My Stepmother is an Alien	1988	''Ron Mills''
Cranium Command (short subject)	1989	''Right Cranium''
Mr. Destiny	1990	''Clip Metzler''
Tales from the Crypt	1991	''Barry Blye''
	1991	''T.R. Chula''
A League of Their Own	1992	''Ernie Capadino''
Mom and Dad Save The World	1992	''Emperor Todd Spengo''
Loaded Weapon 1	1993	''Becker''
Coneheads	1993	''Dr. Rudolph, Dentist'' (uncredited)
	1994	''Glen Robbins''
North	1994	''Arthur Belt''
Trapped in Paradise	1994	''Dave Firpo''
The Great White Hype	1996	''Sol''
Matilda	1996	''Million $ Sticky Host''
High School High	1996	''Richard Clark''
The Wedding Singer	1998	''Jimmie Moore'' (uncredited)
Happiness	1998	''Andy Kornbluth''
Lost and Found	1999	''Uncle Harry''
Small Time Crooks	2000	''Benny''
Little Nicky	2000	''Pepper''
Sand	2000	''Kirby''
3000 Miles to Graceland	2001	''Jay Peterson''
Cats & Dogs	2001	''Calico'' (voice)
Rat Race	2001	''Randall 'Randy' Pear''
Good Advice	2001	''Barry Sherman''
Eight Crazy Nights	2002	''Tom Baltezor'' (voice)
	2003	''Sidney Wernick''
The Stepford Wives	2004	''Dave Markowitz''
Pancho's Pizza (short film)	2005
Bailey's Billion$	2005	''Bailey'' (voice)
The Producers	2005	''Mr. Marks''
The Benchwarmers	2006	''Mel''
Southland Tales	2006	''Bart Bookman''
Farce of the Penguins	2007	''My eyes are up here Penguin'' (voice)
I Could Never Be Your Woman	2007

Television

Show	Years	Role
''Saturday Night Live''	1985-1990	various
''Seinfeld''	1989-1998	'Gary Fogle' in The Scofflaw
''The Simpsons''	1991-	''Llewellyn Sinclair, Ms. Sinclair, Professor Lombardo, Enrico Irritazio, Artie Ziff, Aristotle Amadopoulos, and Jay Sherman''.
''Friends''	1995 & 2003	''Restaurant owner who interviews Monica Geller and later goes out on a date with Rachel Green''
''The Critic''	1994-1995	''Jay Sherman''
''NewsRadio''	1998-1999	''Max Louis'', ''Fred'',[5]

References

1. http://www.filmreference.com/film/59/Jon-Lovitz.html
2. http://www.eonline.com/news/article/index.jsp?uuid=cdc5216b-4a43-48d0-89cd-65bbf8c763af
3. http://www.nypost.com/seven/07172007/gossip/pagesix/pagesix.htm
4. http://video.msn.com/v/us/msnbc.htm?g=85cde3f0-f86d-41d2-bbd2-deee6b84c48f&f=00&fg=copy
5. http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001484/filmoseries#tt0112095 and ''Mike Johnson''http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newsradio#Cast

External links

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★ Mephistopheles in The People's Court 50 images