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Role: J.T. Baylock
Birthplace: Baltimore, Maryland
Birthday: 1-30-1951
With a career spanning theater, television and film, Charles S. Dutton is one of the few actors to earn Tony, Emmy and Golden Globe nominations for the same role. Best-known for his performance in the title role of the comedy-drama Roc, Dutton also starred in director Robert Altman's comedy-drama Cookie's Fortune, for which he received an Independent Spirit Award nomination. Some of Dutton's additional films include Random Hearts, co-starring Harrison Ford.and Kristin Scott Thomas, D-Tox, opposite Sylvester Stallone, and Gothika, with Halle Berry and Robert Downey Jr.
Dutton earned a B.A. from Towson State University and became active in Baltimore Theater where he performed in such plays as The Blacks, The Great White Hope, Of Mice and Men, Detective Story and the world premiere of Eugene Ionesco's Man With Bags. Later, he was accepted to Yale Drama School where his roles included Othello, King Leaf and Baal. Also at Yale, he began working with playwright August Wilson and director Lloyd Richards, who became
friends and mentors, and after graduation, Dutton moved to New York City, where his relationships with Wilson and Richards led to work with the Yale Repertory Theater. Dutton made his Broadway debut in August Wilson's Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, for which he received a Tony Award nomination. He also appeared in Wilson's Joe Turner Come and Gone and starred in Wilson's Pulitzer Prize-winning play The Piano Lesson, for which he received his second Tony Award nomination. He later received both Emmy and Golden Globe Award nominations in the CBS Hallmark Hall of Fame adaptation of the play.
Making his directorial debut with First-Time Felon, an HBO Original Picture that garnered some of the network's highest ratings, Dutton also directed the HBO miniseries The Corner, hailed by critics as a work of both artistic and social importance. As an actor, Dutton has numerous credits to his impressive filmography, some of which include the critically acclaimed Showtime original feature Blind Faith, which earned him SAG and Independent Spirit Award nominations, the Miramax/Dimension Films' thriller Mimic, opposite Mira Sorvino, Spike Lee's Get on the Bus, A Time to Kill, No Mercy, Jacknife, Crocodile Dundee II, and Q & A. Dutton also starred in Mississippi Masala, Alien 3, The Distinguished Gentleman and Menace II Society, as well as Rudy, Surviving the Game, A Low Down Dirty Shame, Cry, the Beloved Country and Nick of Time. On television, Dutton starred and executive-produced Roc, earning two Image Award nominations and winning the Award for Lead Actor in 1993. He has also appeared in numerous made-for-TV films, including For Love or Country: The Arturo Sandoval Story, in which he played Dizzy Gillespie, the TNT original movie Deadlocked, 10,000 Black Men Named George, Conviction and most recently, D.C. Sniper: 23 Days of Fear, in which he portrayed the real-life Chief Charles Moose.
In addition to his most recent television-work, Dutton appeared in the NBC miniseries The '60s and starred with Jack Lemmon in the Emmy Award-winning miniseries The Murder of Mary Phagan. He also served as executive-producer of the HBO Limited Series Laurel Avenue and starred in Nickelodeon's Are You Afraid of the Dark? Finally, Dutton appeared in Zooman, a Showtime Center Piece film, and in one of the cable industry's Voices Against Violence contributions. Dutton currently divides his time between his native Baltimore, Maryland, and Los Angeles. |
