Ethan Phillips

Phillips was raised on Long Island, New York. His father was the owner of Frankie & Johnnie's, a steakhouse on 45th and Eighth Avenue in New York City.{{cite news |last= Phillips |first= Ethan |date=November 19, 2018 |title= At Frankie & Johnnie's (Metropolitan Diary) |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/19/nyregion/metropolitan-diary.html |work=The New York Times |url-access=subscription |access-date= November 27, 2018}} He earned a Bachelor's degree in English literature from Boston University and a Master of Fine Arts from Cornell University. He plays the tenor saxophone.{{cite web |date= July 6, 2015|title=Ethan Phillips |url=https://www.fedcon.de/en/about/history/fedcon-25-starguests/ethan-phillips/ |website=fedcon.de |publisher=FedCon GmbH |access-date=30 April 2025}}

Phillips began his show business career in New York City, performing off-Broadway at theaters including Direct Theater, winning the Best of the Actors’ Festival there in 1977; at the Wonderhorse Theater, in the premiere of Christopher Durang's The Nature and Purpose of the Universe; and at Playwrights Horizons in a revival of Eccentricities of a Nightingale. Tennessee Williams, who helped shape the latter production, wrote a new monologue for Phillips, which Williams personally dictated to him when it was realized that leading lady Jill Eikenberry needed more time for a dress change.

In 1979–80, Phillips appeared as Maurice Utrillo in the premier of Dennis McIntyre's Modigliani, with Jeffrey DeMunn, at the Astor Place Theater. It ran for 208 performances.

Phillips performed in many plays in New York over the next 15 years, including Terrence McNally's Lips Together, Teeth Apart at the Lucille Lortel, Measure for Measure with Kevin Kline at The Public Theater's Delacorte Theater; and the Broadway premier of My Favorite Year at Lincoln Center, with Andrea Martin and Tim Curry, as well as new works for Ars Nova (theater), Ensemble Studio Theatre, Playwrights Horizons,{{cite web|url=http://www.ensemblestudiotheatre.org/|title=Home|website=Ensemble Studio Theatre}} the Hudson Guild Theater,{{cite web |url=http://hudsonguild.org/ |title = Hudson Guild}} the American Jewish Theater,{{cite web|url=http://www.jewishtheater.org/|title=Jewish Theater of New York Homepage|website=www.jewishtheater.org}} and many others.

He went on to appear in the premier of David Mamet's November with Nathan Lane and Laurie Metcalf at the Ethel Barrymore Theater and performed it once more with John Malkovich and Patti Lupone for Stars in the House. He played the title character opposite Peter Dinklage in The Imaginary Invalid for Bard College's 2012 SummerScape Festival. In 2013–14 he appeared as Stanley Levison in Robert Schenkkan's All the Way at the American Repertory Theater. Phillips moved with the show to Broadway's Neil Simon Theater where the play won the Tony Award for Best Play and Best Actor, Bryan Cranston. More recently Phillips played leading roles in the premiers of Dennis Kelly’s Taking Care of Baby, Terrence McNally's Golden Age, and Sharyn Rothstein's By the Water, all for the Manhattan Theatre Club (off-Broadway). Most recently, Phillips played Murray Lefkowitz in the Broadway premier of Ayad Akhtar's Junk: The Golden Age of Debt at Lincoln Center's Vivian Beaumont Theater.

Phillips' regional theater credits include leading roles for San Diego's Old Globe Theater, the Alaska Repertory Theater,{{cite web|url=http://www.lifeofanactor.com/alaska.htm|title=Alaska Repertory Theatre Company|website=www.lifeofanactor.com}} at Seattle Repertory Theater, at Baltimore's Centerstage, for the Westport Country Playhouse, Boston Shakespeare Company, Actors Theater of Louisville, The American Repertory Theater, the Salt Lake Acting Co.,{{cite web|url=http://saltlakeactingcompany.org/|title=Salt Lake Acting Company - Home|website=saltlakeactingcompany.org}} and the McCarter Theatre.{{cite web|url=http://www.mccarter.org/home|title=Home - McCarter Theatre|website=www.mccarter.org}} In Los Angeles, Phillips acted in Side Man at the Pasadena Playhouse, in Lips Together, Teeth Apart for the Mark Taper Forum; in You Can't Take It with You at the Geffen Playhouse, in The Bourgeois Gentleman for the Pasadena Symphony, and as Polonius in Hamlet for the Uprising Theater.{{cite web|url=https://www.uprisingtheatreco.com/|title=Home - Uprising Theatre Company|website=Uprising Theatre Company}}

Phillips has been an actor at the Sundance Institute's Playwrights Conference in Utah for six summers, where he developed his play Penguin Blues, which is published by Samuel French Inc.{{cite web|url=http://www.samuelfrench.com/|title=Samuel French – Licensing Plays and Musicals to the Theatrical Community|website=www.samuelfrench.com}} and included in The Best Short Plays of 1989 (Applause, ed. Ramon Delgado). Based on his experiences at Sundance,{{cite web|url=https://www.sundance.org|title=Sundance Institute|website=www.sundance.org}} Phillips helped found First Stage, a playwright development lab in Los Angeles.

Phillips has appeared in over 50 films, beginning with Ragtime (directed by Miloš Forman). Other features include For Richer or Poorer, Jeffrey, The Shadow, Wagons East, The Man Without a Face, Green Card, Lean On Me, Critters, Bloodhounds of Broadway, The Island, Bad Santa, and The Babysitters. His more recent films include Shadow Witness, Audrey, the Coen Brothers' Inside Llewyn Davis, Woody Allen's Irrational Man, and James DeMonaco's The Purge: Election Year.

In 1980, Phillips joined the cast of the sitcom Benson as PR man Pete Downey, for five seasons.

He has made scores of guest appearances on television series and tele films, including Pushing Daisies, Bones, Eli Stone, Criminal Minds, NUMB3RS, Las Vegas, L.A. Law, JAG, Law & Order, Arrested Development, Boston Legal, Touched by an Angel, Castle, Rizzoli & Isles, The Good Guys, The Mentalist, Deadbeat, The Good Wife, New Amsterdam (2018 TV series), Better Call Saul and Veep. He played the recurring role of Keith in the final two seasons of Lena Dunham's Girls. He played Spike Martin in Armando Iannucci's space comedy Avenue 5 on HBO.

In 1990, he began his Star Trek career playing the Ferengi doctor Farek in the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Ménage à Troi". He went on to play the Talaxian character Neelix on Star Trek: Voyager from its inception in 1995, and stayed with the series one episode short of its entire seven-season run. He also cameoed as a holographic nightclub maître d' in the 1996 film Star Trek: First Contact, and appeared as a Ferengi pirate captain in the Star Trek: Enterprise episode "Acquisition".

Phillips has also performed voice work for several of the Star Wars franchise video games: 2000's Star Wars: Force Commander, 2001's Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds, and 2003's Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic.

• {{cite book |first1=Ethan |last1=Philips |first2=William J. |last2=Birnes |author-link2=William J. Birnes |title=The Star Trek Cookbook |year=1999 |publisher=Pocket Books |location=New York |isbn=0-671-00022-5 |url=https://archive.org/details/startrekcookbook0000phil}}

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Category:1955 births

Category:Living people

Category:People from Garden City, New York

Category:Male actors from New York (state)

Category:Boston University College of Arts and Sciences alumni

Category:Cornell University alumni

Category:American male film actors

Category:American male television actors