Stephen Kunken | |
---|---|
![]() | |
Born | April 30, 1971 |
Education | Tufts University (BA) Juilliard School (GrDip) |
Occupation | Actor |
Spouse | Jenn Thompson (m. 2005) |
Children | 1 |
Website | Official website |
Stephen Michael Kunken (born April 30, 1971) is an American actor. He is known for the roles of Ari Spyros on Showtime's Billions and Commander Putnam on Hulu's The Handmaid's Tale . His film work includes work with Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, Woody Allen, Paul Greengrass, Ang Lee, Barry Levinson, Ron Howard and others. Graduating with top honors from The Juilliard School, Kunken has an extensive and celebrated theater career appearing on Broadway in 7 different Productions and countless off-Broadway and Regional productions. He is most readily known for playing Andy Fastow in the Broadway play Enron , for which he received a Tony Award nomination for Featured Actor in a Play. Other Broadway credits include Frost/Nixon and Rock 'n' Roll'.
Kunken was raised on Long Island in Upper Brookville, New York. His father is a dentist and his mother is a former grade school teacher. [1] Kunken received a B.A. degree from Tufts University in 1993. [2] He is a graduate of the Juilliard School's Graduate Acting program, where as a member of the Drama Division's Group 26 (1993–1997) he was awarded both The John Houseman Prize and the Pearl and Rolands Grant. His classmates included David Denman and Alan Tudyk. [3] He is Jewish. [4]
Kunken has appeared on Broadway as David Halberstam in David Auburn's The Columnist (2012); [5] opposite Kathleen Turner in High (2011); [6] Tom Stoppard’s Rock 'n' Roll (2007); [7] Frost/Nixon (2007) (for which he received Outer Critics Circle Award (Outstanding Featured Actor in a Play) and Drama League Award nominations),; [8] Festen (2006); [9] and Proof (replacement, 2002). [10] For his role as CFO Andrew Fastow in Lucy Prebble's Enron , he received a 2010 Tony Award nomination for Featured Actor in a Play. [11]
Off-Broadway, he played Tim Andrews in the award-winning Richard Nelson cycle of Apple Plays, which includes That Hopey Changey Thing, Sweet and Sad, and Regular Singing in 2013 at The Public. [12] [13]
He played the title role as Nikolai Nabakov in Lincoln Center Theater's production of Richard Nelson's Nikolai and the Others in 2013. [14] He has appeared as Dr. Phil in the critically acclaimed production of Kate Fodor's romantic comedy RX (2012, Primary Stages production); [15] as the Stage Manager in the 2009 David Cromer-directed revival of Thornton Wilder's Our Town (replacement as of January 5, 2010, Barrow Street Theatre); [16] Theresa Rebeck's Our House (2009, Playwrights Horizons); [17] Fabulation at Playwrights Horizons (2004); [18] A Very Common Procedure by Courtney Baron at Manhattan Class Company (2007) [19] (for which he received a Drama League Award nomination); Journals of Mihail Sebastian by David Auburn with the Keen Company in 2004 [20] and Misalliance at the Roundabout Theatre Company (1997). [21] [22]
He performed in The Story (2003), [23] Henry VIII (1997) [24] and A Dybbuk (1997) at the Public Theater. [25]
Regionally, Kunken has appeared in Quartermaine’s Terms (2009), [26] True West (2009), [27] Three Sisters as Solyony (2008) all at the Williamstown Theatre Festival; [28] and Mister Roberts as Doc at the Kennedy Center in 2005, [29] among many other credits.
His television credits include: Unforgettable , Blue Bloods , The Good Wife , Gossip Girl , The Unusuals , New Amsterdam , Law & Order , Law & Order: Criminal Intent , Law & Order: SVU , The Sopranos , Spin City , Far East (2001, TV movie), Mary and Rhoda (2000, TV movie) [30] and The Affair . [31] [32]
In film, Kunken's work includes The Wolf of Wall Street (2013), Still Alice (2014), [33] Café Society (2016), A Birder's Guide to Everything (2013), [34] The Bay (2012), [35] Price Check (2012), [36] Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close (2011), All Good Things (2010), Taking Woodstock (2009), The Girl in the Park (2008), [37] Wait 'til This Year , Light and the Sufferer (2014), [38] and Bamboozled (2000). [39] [40] [32]
Kunken and stage director Jenn Thompson were married in 2005 [41] [42] [43] The couple reside in Brooklyn, New York with their daughter, Naomi, [1] whom they adopted from Ethiopia. [44]
Film | |||
---|---|---|---|
Year | Title | Role | Notes |
2000 | Bamboozled | David | |
2007 | The Girl in the Park | Leo | |
Light and the Sufferer | Douglas | ||
2009 | Taking Woodstock | Mel | |
2010 | All Good Things | Todd Fleck | |
2011 | Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close | Teacher | |
2012 | Price Check | Cartwright | |
The Bay | Dr. Abrams | ||
2013 | A Birder's Guide to Everything | Ted | |
Blumenthal | Barry | ||
The Wolf of Wall Street | Jerry Fogel | ||
2014 | Still Alice | Dr. Benjamin | |
2015 | Bridge of Spies | William Tompkins | |
2016 | Custody | Mark Dooley | |
Café Society | Leonard | ||
Jason Bourne | Baumen | ||
2016-2023 | Billions | Ari Spyros | 38 episodes |
2019 | Otherhood | Joel Lieberman | |
2020 | Hillbilly Elegy | Phillip Roseman | |
2022 | A Spy Among Friends | James Jesus Angleton | TV series [45] |
Donald Margulies is an American playwright and academic. In 2000, he won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for his play Dinner with Friends.
David Auburn is an American playwright, screenwriter and theatre director. He is best known for his 2000 play Proof, which won the 2001 Tony Award for Best Play and Pulitzer Prize for Drama. He also wrote the screenplays for the 2005 film version of Proof, The Lake House (2006), The Girl in the Park (2007), and Georgetown (2019).
John Patrick Shanley is an American playwright, screenwriter, and director. He won the 1988 Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for the film Moonstruck. His play, Doubt: A Parable, won the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the 2005 Tony Award for Best Play; he wrote and directed the film adaptation and earned a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay.
Lewis Jefferson Mays is an American actor. He is the recipient of numerous accolades, including a Tony Award, a Helen Hayes Award, a Lucille Lortel Award, two Drama Desk Awards, two Outer Critics Circle Awards and three Obie Awards.
John Guare is an American playwright and screenwriter. He is best known as the author of The House of Blue Leaves and Six Degrees of Separation.
Lynn Nottage is an American playwright whose work often focuses on the experience of working-class people, particularly working-class people who are Black. She has received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama twice: in 2009 for her play Ruined, and in 2017 for her play Sweat. She was the first woman to have won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama two times.
Jay Olcutt Sanders is an American film, theatre and television actor and playwright. He frequently appears in plays off-Broadway at The Public Theatre.
Richard John Nelson is an American playwright and librettist. He wrote the book for the 2000 Broadway musical James Joyce's The Dead, for which he won the Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical, as well as the book for the 1988 Broadway production of Chess. He is also the writer of the critically acclaimed play cycle The Rhinebeck Panorama.
Stephen Adly Guirgis is an American playwright, screenwriter, director, and actor. He is a member and a former co-artistic director of New York City's LAByrinth Theater Company. His plays have been produced both Off-Broadway and on Broadway as well as in the UK. His play Between Riverside and Crazy won the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
Maryann Plunkett is an American actress and singer. Plunkett made her Broadway debut playing Sister Agnes in Agnes of God. In 1987, she won the Tony Award for Best Leading Actress in a Musical for her performance as Sally Smith in Me and My Girl. In addition, she has made appearances in various films and series’ such as Little Women, Manifest, A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, and Dr. Death.
Jason D. Danieley is an American actor, singer, concert performer and recording artist. He was born in St. Louis, Missouri, and was married to fellow performer Marin Mazzie.
Peter Friedman is an American stage, film, and television actor. He made his Broadway debut in the Eugene O'Neill play The Great God Brown in 1972. His other Broadway credits include roles in The Rules of the Game (1974), Piaf (1981), The Heidi Chronicles (1989), and Twelve Angry Men (2004). He earned a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical nomination for his role as Tateh in Ragtime (1998).
David Cromer is an American theatre director, and stage, film, and TV actor. He has received recognition for his work on Broadway, Off-Broadway, and in his native Chicago. Cromer has won or been nominated for numerous awards, including winning the Lucille Lortel Award and Obie Award for his direction of Our Town. He was nominated for the Drama Desk Award and the Outer Critics Circle Award for his direction of The Adding Machine. In 2018, Cromer won the Tony Award for Best Direction of a Musical for The Band's Visit.
Enron is a 2009 play by the British playwright Lucy Prebble, based on the Enron scandal.
The Waverly Gallery is a play by Kenneth Lonergan. It is considered a "memory play". The show, first produced Off-Broadway in 2000, follows a grandson watching his grandmother slowly die from Alzheimer's disease. The play was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 2001.
Michael Hayden is an actor who has appeared both on the stage and on television.
Anne Kauffman is an American director known primarily for her work on new plays, mainly in the New York area. She is a founding member of the theater group the Civilians. She made her Broadway debut with the Scott McPherson play Marvin's Room (2017) and returned with the revival of the Lorraine Hansberry play The Sign in Sidney Brustein's Window (2023).
Sam Gold is an American theater director and actor. Having studied at Cornell University and Juilliard School he became known for directing both musicals and plays, on Broadway and Off-Broadway. He has received Tony Award and nominations for three Drama Desk Awards.
Mary Wiseman is an American actress. She is best known for starring as Sylvia Tilly in the Paramount+ science fiction drama series Star Trek: Discovery (2017–present).
The Columnist is a play by American playwright David Auburn. It opened on Broadway's Samuel J. Friedman Theatre, under the direction of Daniel J. Sullivan. The play opened on April 25, 2012 and closed July 8, 2012 with John Lithgow starring as Joseph Alsop. The cast also included Margaret Colin, Boyd Gaines, Grace Gummer, Stephen Kunken, Marc Bonan and Brian J. Smith.