John Spencer was an American film and television
actorAn actor is a person who acts in a dramatic production and who works in film, television, theatre, or radio in that capacity...
. He was most widely known for playing
White House Chief of StaffThe White House Chief of Staff is the highest ranking member of the Executive Office of the President of the United States and a senior aide to the President.The current White House Chief of Staff is Bill Daley.-History:...
Leo McGarryLeo Thomas McGarry is a fictional character played by John Spencer on the television serial drama The West Wing. The role earned Spencer the 2002 Emmy for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series. McGarry's character, the former United States Secretary of Labor, begins the series as the White...
on the
NBCThe National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
political drama series
The West Wing, which earned him an
Emmy AwardAn Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various...
in 2002.
Early life
Spencer was born as
John Speshock, Jr. in
New York CityNew York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, and raised in
Totowa, New JerseyTotowa is a borough in Passaic County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2000 United States Census, the borough population was 9,892.Totowa was formed as a borough by an Act of the New Jersey Legislature on March 15, 1898, from portions of the now-defunct Manchester Township and Wayne...
. He was the son of blue-collar parents Mildred (
néeA married name is the family name adopted by a person upon marriage. When a person assumes the family name of her spouse, the new name replaces the maiden name....
Bincarowski), a waitress, and John Speshock, Sr., a truck driver. Spencer was of
IrishIrish Americans are citizens of the United States who can trace their ancestry to Ireland. A total of 36,278,332 Americans—estimated at 11.9% of the total population—reported Irish ancestry in the 2008 American Community Survey conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau...
and
RusynRusyn Americans are Americans whose ancestors were born in Carpathian Ruthenia. Some Rusyn Americans identify as Russian Americans or Ukrainian Americans.-History:...
/ Ukrainian descent. With his enrollment at the
Professional Children's SchoolProfessional Children's School is a not for profit, college preparatory school that was founded in New York City in 1914 to provide an education to young people working on the New York stage, in Vaudeville, or "on the road."-History:...
in
ManhattanManhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
in 1963, Spencer found himself sharing classes with such fellow students as
Liza MinnelliLiza May Minnelli is an American actress and singer. She is the daughter of singer and actress Judy Garland and film director Vincente Minnelli....
and violinist
Pinchas ZukermanPinchas Zukerman is a world-renowned violinist, violist, and conductor. He is considered one of the greatest violinists of the 20th and 21st centuries, and his ongoing 45-year career has seen him perform with the world's best-known orchestras and record over 100 works...
. He attended
Fairleigh Dickinson UniversityFairleigh Dickinson University is a private university founded as a junior college in 1942. It now has several campuses located in New Jersey, Canada, and the United Kingdom.-Description:...
, but did not complete a degree. Spencer often referred to himself as a "dyed-in-the-wool liberal" and described Franklin Delano Roosevelt as one of his heroes.
Career
Spencer began his television career on
The Patty Duke ShowThe Patty Duke Show is an American sitcom which ran on ABC from September 18, 1963, until May 4, 1966, with reruns airing through August 31, 1966. The show was created as a vehicle for rising star Patty Duke...
, and eventually began appearing in supporting roles in feature films commencing with 1983's
WarGamesWarGames is a 1983 American Cold War suspense/science-fiction film written by Lawrence Lasker and Walter F. Parkes and directed by John Badham. The film stars Matthew Broderick and Ally Sheedy....
. He won an
Obie AwardThe Obie Awards or Off-Broadway Theater Awards are annual awards given by The Village Voice newspaper to theatre artists and groups in New York City...
for the 1981 off Broadway production of
Still Life, about a
Vietnam WarThe Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...
veteran, and received a Drama Desk nomination for "The Day Room." He became a full-fledged supporting actor with the 1990 courtroom thriller
Presumed InnocentPresumed Innocent is a 1990 film adaptation of the best-selling novel of the same name by Scott Turow, which tells the story of a prosecutor charged with the murder of his female colleague and mistress....
, starring opposite
Harrison FordHarrison Ford is an American film actor and producer. He is famous for his performances as Han Solo in the original Star Wars trilogy and as the title character of the Indiana Jones film series. Ford is also known for his roles as Rick Deckard in Blade Runner, John Book in Witness and Jack Ryan in...
. The same year, Spencer joined the cast of the television series
L.A. LawL.A. Law is a US television legal drama that ran on NBC from September 15, 1986 to May 19, 1994. L.A. Law reflected the social and cultural ideologies of the 1980s and early 1990s and many of the cases featured on the show dealt with hot topic issues such as abortion, racism, gay rights,...
, playing rumpled, pugnacious associate attorney Tommy Mullaney. Spencer's work also extended to video games, portraying the role of Captain Hugh Paulsen in the 1995 video game
Wing Commander IV: The Price of FreedomWing Commander IV: The Price of Freedom is the fourth main game in Chris Roberts' Wing Commander science fiction space combat simulator video game series, produced by Origin Systems and released by Electronic Arts for the PC in 1995 and the Sony PlayStation in 1997...
.
From 1999 until his death in 2005, Spencer was cast in the role of
White House Chief of StaffThe White House Chief of Staff is the highest ranking member of the Executive Office of the President of the United States and a senior aide to the President.The current White House Chief of Staff is Bill Daley.-History:...
Leo McGarryLeo Thomas McGarry is a fictional character played by John Spencer on the television serial drama The West Wing. The role earned Spencer the 2002 Emmy for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series. McGarry's character, the former United States Secretary of Labor, begins the series as the White...
on the
NBCThe National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
political drama series
The West Wing. Both Spencer and his character were recovering
alcoholicAlcoholism is a broad term for problems with alcohol, and is generally used to mean compulsive and uncontrolled consumption of alcoholic beverages, usually to the detriment of the drinker's health, personal relationships, and social standing...
s. He won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series in 2002, after being judged on the show's third season episodes "
Bartlet for America"Bartlet for America" is the 53rd episode of The West Wing.-Plot:It is December 23, but no one at the White House is feeling much in the Christmas spirit. Indeed, the most pressing holiday matter is a threat to firebomb black churches in Tennessee on Christmas Eve...
" and "
We Killed Yamamoto"We Killed Yamamoto" is episode 64 of The West Wing. The title refers to Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, who commanded the Japanese Combined Fleet during World War II...
".
Death
Spencer died of a
heart attackMyocardial infarction or acute myocardial infarction , commonly known as a heart attack, results from the interruption of blood supply to a part of the heart, causing heart cells to die...
in a
Los AngelesLos Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
hospital on December 16, 2005, four days before his 59th birthday. At Spencer's private funeral, his
West Wing co-star
Kristin ChenowethKristin Chenoweth is an American singer and actress, with credits in musical theatre, film and television. She is best known on Broadway for her performance as Sally Brown in You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown , for which she won a Tony Award, and for originating the role of Glinda in the musical...
sang the musical number "
For Good"For Good" is a musical number from the hit musical Wicked. It is sung as a duet between Elphaba and Glinda, as a farewell to each other. The song's music and lyrics were written by composer Stephen Schwartz.-Context:...
" from the hit
BroadwayBroadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...
musical
WickedWicked is a musical with music and lyrics by Stephen Schwartz and a book by Winnie Holzman. It is based on the Gregory Maguire novel Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West , a parallel novel of the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz and L. Frank Baum's classic story The Wonderful Wizard...
. Spencer's remains were interred at
Laurel Grove Memorial ParkLaurel Grove Memorial Park is a cemetery in Totowa, New Jersey, United States.-Notable interments:* Robert G. Bremner , Representative from New Jersey's 7th congressional district from 1913-1914....
in his hometown of Totowa, New Jersey. In a strange twist of fate, his
West Wing character Leo McGarry had already suffered a life-threatening heart attack in the show's sixth season episode "
The Birnam Wood-Plot:Israeli-Palestinian peace talks at Camp David result in a momentous peace accord. President Bartlet accepts the resignation of White House Chief of Staff Leo McGarry, who was strongly against the talks...
". At the time of his death, Spencer had filmed two of the five
West Wing episodes that were in post-production: "Running Mates" and "
The Cold"The Cold" is episode 145 of The West Wing. This episode contained the final performance of cast member John Spencer .-Plot:...
". Spencer's death was subsequently written into the final season of the show, when McGarry died of a heart attack on election night. Spencer's name remained in the opening credits of the final season of the show.
Filmography
- WarGames
WarGames is a 1983 American Cold War suspense/science-fiction film written by Lawrence Lasker and Walter F. Parkes and directed by John Badham. The film stars Matthew Broderick and Ally Sheedy....
(1983)
- The Protector
The Protector is a 1985 Hong Kong / USA action film, directed by James Glickenhaus and starring Jackie Chan. It was Chan's second attempt at breaking into the American film market, after 1980's The Big Brawl, a film which had flopped at the box office...
(1985)
- Hiding Out
Hiding Out is a 1987 movie starring Jon Cryer as a Wall Street broker "hiding out" as a high-school student as the mob tries to kill him.- Plot :...
(1987)
- Black Rain (1989)
- Far From Home (1989)
- Sea of Love (1989)
- Law & Order (TV) - Prescription For Death (1990)
- Presumed Innocent
Presumed Innocent is a 1990 film adaptation of the best-selling novel of the same name by Scott Turow, which tells the story of a prosecutor charged with the murder of his female colleague and mistress....
(1990)
- Green Card (film) (1990)
- L.A. Law
L.A. Law is a US television legal drama that ran on NBC from September 15, 1986 to May 19, 1994. L.A. Law reflected the social and cultural ideologies of the 1980s and early 1990s and many of the cases featured on the show dealt with hot topic issues such as abortion, racism, gay rights,...
(1990–1994)
- Forget Paris
Forget Paris is a 1995 film produced, directed, co-written by and starring Billy Crystal as an NBA referee and Debra Winger as an independent working woman whose lives are interrupted by love and marriage....
(1995)
- The Rock
The Rock is a 1996 action film that primarily takes place on Alcatraz Island and in the San Francisco Bay area. It was directed by Michael Bay and stars Sean Connery, Nicolas Cage and Ed Harris. It was produced by Don Simpson and Jerry Bruckheimer and released through Hollywood Pictures. The film...
(1996)
- Wing Commander IV: The Price of Freedom
Wing Commander IV: The Price of Freedom is the fourth main game in Chris Roberts' Wing Commander science fiction space combat simulator video game series, produced by Origin Systems and released by Electronic Arts for the PC in 1995 and the Sony PlayStation in 1997...
(voice)(VG)(1996)
- Cop Land
Cop Land is a 1997 American drama film written and directed by James Mangold. It features an ensemble cast including Sylvester Stallone, Robert De Niro, Harvey Keitel and Ray Liotta.-Plot:...
(1997)
- The Negotiator (1998)
- Twilight
Twilight is a 1998 thriller/Neo-noir film directed by Robert Benton. It stars Paul Newman, Susan Sarandon, Gene Hackman, Reese Witherspoon, Stockard Channing, and James Garner...
(1998)
- The West Wing (TV)(1999–2006)
- Ravenous
Ravenous is a 1999 horror film directed by Antonia Bird and starring Guy Pearce, Robert Carlyle and Jeffrey Jones. The film revolves around cannibalism in 1840s California and some elements bear similarities to the story of the Donner Party and that of Alferd Packer...
(1999)
External links