Vincent D Onofrio

A husky-voiced and strapping character actor, Vincent D'Onofrio gained 70 pounds for his frightening breakthrough portrayal as the dangerously unstable Private 'Gomer' Pyle in Stanley Kubrick's "Full Metal Jacket" (1987) and played Lili Taylor's lovable hunk in the bittersweet "Mystic Pizza" (1988). He also turned heads as a bleach blond mechanic with a gorgeous body in "Adventures in Babysitting" (1987), essayed a boatyard worker committed to his retarded brother in "Signs of Life" (1989), and romanced Julia Roberts in "Dying Young" (1991).

The 1990s brought D'Onofrio supporting roles in high-profile ensemble pictures: as witness Bill Newman in Oliver Stone's controversial "JFK" (1991), a role he reprised in a bit part for Spike Lee's "Malcolm X" (1992), and as Orson Welles in Tim Burton's affectionate biopic "Ed Wood" (1994). He was most memorable in Robert Altman's winsome industry satire "The Player" (1993). As David Kahane, the beefy, thwarted lover of 50s foreign films and his own scripts, D'Onofrio played a victim of Hollywood and homicide in a small role that was central to the film's brilliantly snaking plot. He also turned up in slight comedies of an "ethnic" variety, playing Matt Dillon's best friend in "Mr. Wonderful" (1993) and Joseph in Nancy Savoca's lovely "Household Saints" (1993).

D'Onofrio has occasionally tackled starring roles like pulp writer and "Conan" creator Robert E. Howard in "The Whole Wide World" (1996, which he also produced) and habitual loser Philip in "The Winner" (1997), but his staple has remained character work. He provided a genuinely touching moment as Al Franken's brother in the dismal "Stuart Saves His Family" (1995) and a chilling turn rising up gun in hand, that "Full Metal Jacket" look in his eyes, for "Strange Days" (1995). His evil intergalactic insect in purloined human skin offered a formidable foe to agents Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones in Barry Sonnenfeld's summer blockbuster "Men in Black" (1997). D'Onofrio then co-starred alongside Matthew McConaughey, Skeet Ulrich and Ethan Hawke as the real-life bank and train robbers, "The Newton Boys" for director Richard Linklater, and with Salma Hayek and Thomas Jane in the triangular romance "The Velocity of Gary (Not His Real Name)" (both 1998).

Following his turn as a former basketball champion in the 1999 Showtime remake of "That Championship Season", the actor played a time-traveling hero from the future who visits 1990s NYC in an attempt to woo and save a woman (Marisa Tomei) with whom he has fallen in love in "Happy Accidents". (The film premiered at the 2000 Sundance Film Festival but did not receive theatrical distribution until 2001). He next tackled the challenging part of real-life "yippie" and government fugitive Abbie Hoffman in the biopic "Steal This Movie" (2000). While he did not exactly resemble Hoffman, D'Onofrio captured his spirit and delivered a finely wrought performance that went overlooked when the film stumbled at the box office. He enjoyed a more commercial fate as a serial killer whose mind is penetrated by a therapist in an experimental fashion in the visually imaginative but dramatically inert "The Cell" (also 2000). While the actor remained busy with film projects (several of which wouldn't be released until 2002 like "The Salton Sea" and "Impostor"), he also accepted an offer from producer Dick Wolf to star in the second spin-off of the popular "Law & Order". Teamed with Kathryn Erbe, D'Onofrio was cast as the highly intuitive detective Robert Goren in "Law & Order: Criminal Intent" (NBC, 2001- ).

• Also Credited As:
  Vincent Phillip D Onofrio, Vincent Phillip D'Onofrio
• Born:
  Vincent Phillip D Onofrio on June 30, 1959 in Brooklyn, New York, USA
• Job Titles:
  Actor, Producer, Director, Bouncer

Family

• Daughter: Leila George D Onofrio. Born March 20, 1992; mother Greta Scacchi
• Father: Gene D Onofrio. One of the founders of the River Run International Film Festival (Winston-Salem, North Carolina), along with his daughter and son
• Sister: Elizabeth D Onofrio. One of the founders of the River Run International Film Festival (Winston-Salem, North Carolina), along with her brother and father
• Son: Elias D Onofrio. Born in January 2000; mother, Carin Van Der Donk
• Son: Luca D Onofrio. Born Feb. 14, 2008; mother, Carin Van Der Donk

Significant Others

• Companion: Greta Scacchi. met while filming Fires Within (1991); together from c. 1990 to 1993

Education

• University of Colorado, Boulder, CO

Milestones

• 1984 Broadway debut in Open Admissions playing an Italian kid with a speech impediment
• 1984 Screen acting debut in The First Turn-On!
• 1987 Breakthrough role as Gomer Pyle, a pathetic Marine recruit who kills a sadistic drill sergeant before committing suicide, in Stanley Kubrick s Full Metal Jacket
• 1987 Had a small role as Dawson, the owner of Dawson s Garage in the comedy Adventures in Babysitting
• 1988 Romanced Lili Taylor in Mystic Pizza ; also first film with Julia Roberts
• 1991 Cast as a local handyman in Dying Young starring Julia Roberts
• 1991 Had small role in Oliver Stone s JFK
• 1992 Played small but integral role in Robert Altman s The Player
• 1993 Appeared alongside Lili Taylor in Household Saints
• 1994 Cast as Orson Welles in Tim Burton s affectionate biopic of Ed Wood
• 1994 Starred in the touching gay-themed short Nunzio s Second Cousin as a tough-talking cop; film later shown as part of the omnibus Boys Life 2 in 1997
• 1995 Producing debut (also co-starred) The Whole Wide World ; first collaboration with director Dan Ireland
• 1995 Provided a genuinely touching moment as Al Franken s brother in the dismal Stuart Saves His Family
• 1996 Collapsed during a stage performance of Sam Shepard s Tooth of Crime reportedly with the flu
• 1996 Starred opposite Rebecca De Mornay in The Winner as a habitual loser who wins big in Las Vegas
• 1997 Appeared in a memorable episode of NBC s Homicide: Life on the Street as a man pinned under a subway car
• 1997 Played the evil insect in purloined human skin in summer blockbuster Men in Black
• 1998 Played one of the titular bank-robbing brothers in The Newton Boys
• 1998 Re-teamed with director Dan Ireland as producer and star of The Velocity of Gary
• 1999 Headlined the cast of the small screen remake of That Championship Season
• 2000 Played 1960s radical Abbie Hoffman in the biopic Steal This Movie
• 2000 Portrayed a man who travels back in time to rescue a woman he has fallen in love with in Happy Accidents
• 2000 Starred as a serial killer in the sci-fi flick The Cell
• 2001 Headlined the cast of NBC s Law & Order: Criminal Intent
• 2001 Played a priest in The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys ; film originally announced for the 2001 Sundance Film Festival but pulled at last minute; premiered at the 2002 Sundance Film Festival
• 2002 Starred in the crime thriller The Salton Sea as a drug dealer named Pooh Bear
• 2002 Supported Lisa Kudrow in Bark ; screened at Sundance
• 2005 Cast in Mike Mills independet feature Thumbsucker as a father whose son attempts to break free from his addiction to his thumb
• 2006 Appeared with Vince Vaughn and Jennifer Aniston in The Break-Up
• Acted in community theater
• Appeared in several NYU student films and worked as a bouncer at rock and dance clubs
• Formed producing partnership with Ken Christmas
• Joined the American Stanislavski Theater; appeared in Of Mice and Men and Sexual Perversity in Chicago
• Moved to NYC in the late 1970s to pursue acting career
• Raised in Hawaii, Colorado and the Hialeah section of Miami, Florida