Multiple-award winner Gary Sinise came to fame in the role of the disabled and emotionally-scarred Lt. Dan in Forrest Gump. Before that, he had performed on screen and on the stage, including directing and starring in a critically acclaimed remake of Of Mice and Men.
Born on March 17, 1955, in Chicago, IL, Sinise was bitten by the acting bug when he performed in a production of "West Side Story" in high school. He and a few friends formed the Steppenwolf Theatre Company in 1974, performing in a church basement. The theatre group met with much success, and is still actively presenting plays in their improved quarters, an $8 million theatre.
A founding member of the Chicago's influential Steppenwolf Theatre Company (along with Terry Kinney and Jeff Perry) when he was barely 19, Gary Sinise made his professional acting debut at the age of 17 in a 1973 production of The Physicist. Sinise himself would sum up his career best by noting that the secret to a successful career is not to focus on taking off like a rocket, but to "always keep the engine running." With a prolific and well-defined career on each side of the camera in addition to his stage work, keeping the engine running is precisely what Sinise has done, and that engine has been well maintained.
Born in Blue Island, IL, and attending school in Highland Park, Sinise's attraction to the stage was supported early on through the encouragement of Barbara Patterson, his high school drama teacher. After a role in West Side Story, Sinise's love for the stage was set in stone, leading him to found the Steppenwolf Theatre Company, where he would meet his future wife, actress Moira Harris. Initially based in a church basement, the Steppenwolf quickly grew in stature and respectability, serving as the breeding ground for such talents as John Malkovich and Laurie Metcalf, and earning critical praise with productions like Sam Shepard's True West, which would eventually become the company's Broadway debut.
Sinise's film and television career began as a director on such television series' as Crime Story and thirtysomething, eventually leading to his feature directorial debut with the rural drama Miles From Home (starring fellow Steppenwolfers Metcalf and Malkovich) and his feature acting debut in the haunting war drama A Midnight Clear (1991). Sinise's love for the stage resurfaced with his ambitious 1992 remake of Of Mice and Men (in which he also starred, again with fellow Steppenwolf alum Malkovich, in the roles they had both portrayed on stage).
But it was his performance as the physically crippled and emotionally shattered Lt. Dan in Robert Zemeckis' blockbuster Forrest Gump (1994) that brought Sinise to light as an actor of considerable talent. His sensitive portrait of a once invincible soldier reduced to a pathetic self-pitying ghost of his own former glory was the perfect vessel for the actor's quiet intensity and florid emotional capabilities, and brought him the Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor. That same year Sinise had a starring role in the long-anticipated television adaptation of Stephen King's apocalyptic thriller The Stand.
Sinise continued to display his dramatic abilities through the '90s, rejoining Gump co-star Tom Hanks in Ron Howard's Apollo 13 and starring as both Harry S. Truman and George Wallace in the biopics Truman (1995) (for which he won a Cable Ace Award and a Golden Globe) and George Wallace (1997) (for which he won an Emmy). With minor appearances in The Green Mile and Being John Malkovich (both 1999), Sinise brought in the year 2000 in a sci-fi mode, with Brian De Palma's existential thriller Mission to Mars and as a weapons engineer with questionable motives in Imposter. Throughout the next decade Sinise worked in a variety of films including The Big Bounce, The Human Stain, and The Forgotten. However he had is most visible role on the small screen when he was cast as the male lead in the third of the popular CSI series, CSI: NY. In 2006 he brought his theater trained voice to the animated Open Season.
In 2004, he began his first regular television series, in the crime drama CSI: New York, in which he plays Detective Mac Taylor. He was credited as a producer from season 2 onwards and wrote the storyline of an episode. Several episodes have allowed Sinise to demonstrate his musical prowess, including a Season 2 episode where Mac Taylor plays the bass guitar in a jazz club with musicians Kimo and Carol Williams and Danny Gottlieb, members of the Lt. Dan Band, which Sinise and Kimo Williams co-founded in 2003. The band is named for Sinise's character in Forrest Gump.
Apart from his television and movie work, Sinise is the host in the video for the Epcot ride Mission: SPACE, at Walt Disney World, Orlando, Florida, and a model for Baume & Mercier watches.[7] He co-founded Operation Iraqi Children. Sinise said, "Iraq is in the news every day, and most of it is bad. But there are some positive stories. And how our soldiers are rebuilding schools and helping kids is one of them."[8]
Sinise was the narrator for the Discovery Channel's mini series When We Left Earth in 2008. He was awarded the Presidential Citizen Medal by George W. Bush for work he did supporting the U.S Military and humanitarian work supporting Iraqi children.[9]
Sinise narrated Army and Army Reserve Army Strong recruitment ads[10] in late 2008.
Sinise serves as the National Spokesperson for the American Veterans Disabled for Life Memorial. He spends much of his time raising awareness for the Memorial and other veterans' service organizations.
In November 2009, Sinise narrated the highly acclaimed "World War II in HD" on the History Channel. In 2010, he narrated the World War II documentary "Missions That Changed The War" on the Military Channel.
Since late 2002, he started the Cadillac commercials starting with the 2002–2003 Season's Best commercial and has been with the Break Through campaign since it started the campaign in the 2002 Super Bowl with Led Zeppelin's Rock and Roll then ended in late 2006.
Sinise has been married to actress Moira Harris since 1981 and they have three children: Sophie Anne (b. 1988), McCanna Anthony (b. 1990), and Ella Jane (b. 1992). In 2003, Sinise was awarded an honorary doctorate in humane letters by Amherst College.[14] Sinise converted to his wife's Roman Catholic faith.[15]
He has devoted countless hours to the National Vietnam Veterans Arts Museum now called the National Veterans Art Museum. On June 8, 2011, he put on a real space suit to become one of the few people to fly in a U-2 spy plane at up to 70,000 feet.[16]
Sinise is also on the Advisory Council of Hope For The Warriors, a national non-profit dedicated to provide a full cycle of non-medical care to combat wounded service members, their families, and families of the fallen from each military branch.[17]
Nicolle Wallace, a former adviser to George W. Bush and the presidential campaign of John McCain, stated in May 2009 that she believed Sinise could help bring about a resurgence of the Republican Party. Wallace stated, "The natural strengths that an actor brings to politics would come in handy to anyone going up against Obama in 2012. We will need an effective communicator who can stand toe to toe with Obama’s eloquence." Other names mentioned were those of Generals David Petraeus and Ray Odierno.[20] Sinise narrates the online virtual tour for the Ronald Reagan Presidential library and spoke at the centennial celebration of Reagan's birth at the library in February 2011.
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