LaPaglia was born in Adelaide, South Australia, the son of Maria Johannes (née Brendel), a secretary and model, and Egidio "Eddie" LaPaglia (deceased), an auto mechanic and car dealer.[2] LaPaglia's mother was Dutch, and his father emigrated from Bovalino, Calabria, Italy, at the age of eighteen.[2] His younger brother, Jonathan LaPaglia, is also an actor, and his other brother, Michael, is a car wholesaler in Los Angeles. LaPaglia attended Rostrevor College and Norwood High School.
LaPaglia was working in Adelaide as a shoe salesman for Florsheim Shoes in the early 1980s. He asked to be transferred to the US and continued working there while studying acting as he was rejected by the prestigious Sydney drama school NIDA. LaPaglia first began his venture into dramatic art in his late teens, when he enrolled in an acting course at the South Australian Castings Agency (SA Castings) in Adelaide. The two-and-half-year course was to be supplemented with a further three months, which would have included a "boot camp" and a trial listing with SA Castings. After completing one-and-a-half years of the course, LaPaglia left Adelaide for Los Angeles.
Career
LaPaglia's earliest credit was a 1985 part in an episode of the television series Steven Spielberg's Amazing Stories. His first feature film was Cold Steel in 1987, followed that same year by the title role of Frank Nitti in the telemovie Nitti: The Enforcer. LaPaglia had a supporting role as a mobster in the minor hit Betsy's Wedding (1990).
Spike Lee cast LaPaglia as a New York police detective in Summer of Sam (1999). During 2000–04, LaPaglia appeared in eight episodes of the sitcom Frasier, including the finale, playing Daphne Moon's brother Simon.[2] The role won him an Emmy Award for "Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series".
He continued to live mainly in Los Angeles, returning occasionally—especially from about 2000—for roles in major Australian films such as Looking for Alibrandi (2000), Lantana (2001), The Bank (2001), Happy Feet (2006), $9.99 (2008), Balibo (2009), and Happy Feet Two (2011). In 2002, LaPaglia co-starred as a fire captain opposite Sigourney Weaver in The Guys, a film about New York firemen who died in the World Trade Center. He also played the role onstage, rotating with Bill Murray and others. "We did it as a tribute to the men," said LaPaglia. "I've been so lucky to do it, to be part of this experience. But I can't go back to that morning or watch the video. It's too painful."[5] He also played fictional Australian actor Anthony Bella (who played Nicky Caesar in the fictitious series Little Caesar) in the comedy movie Analyze That, but was uncredited in his role.[6]
In 2012 LaPaglia starred in the ABC drama pilot Americana,[11] but it was not picked up.[12] He next appeared in the feature adaptation of Stephen King's A Good Marriage with Joan Allen.[13] In 2014, LaPaglia appeared in a CBS terrorism drama pilot titled Red Zone starring as a retired CIA operative and current high school football coach who returns to active duty after a terrorist attack in Washington, D.C.[14] It was renamed Field of Play but never aired.[15][16][17]
From about 2012, LaPaglia began accepting work in Australia more frequently. Following major roles in Underground (2012) (a biopic about Julian Assange) and the comedy Mental (2012), LaPaglia had a supporting role in the Neil Armfield's Australian romantic-drama film Holding the Man, as Bob Caleo. The 2015 film stars Ryan Corr and Craig Stott, with supporting performances from LaPaglia, Guy Pearce and Geoffrey Rush. Holding the Man was adapted from Timothy Conigrave's 1995 memoir of the same name. For his role within the film, LaPaglia was nominated for an AACTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role at the 5th AACTA Awards in 2015. In that year LaPaglia returned to his home city, Adelaide, to star in A Month of Sundays as Frank, a miserable real estate agent who finds solace and redemption in a chance friendship with an elderly woman (played by Julia Blake) who reminds him of his mother. In 2016 he appeared in his first Australian TV series: The Code, a political thriller set against rising geopolitical tensions between the US and China. The following year he starred in the four-part miniseries Sunshine, an Australian crime drama series screened on SBS,[18] set in the western Melbourne suburb of the same name, playing the role of mentor to a promising young Sudanese-Australian soccer player. The four-part miniseries is an Essential Media production, directed by Daina Reid and written by Matt Cameron and Elise McCredie.[19] In 2018, LaPaglia appeared in the fifth season of the comedy Rake, based loosely on the life and misadventures of Charles Waterstreet.
In 2017, LaPaglia played Vito Rizzuto in the Simon Barry Canadian TV series Bad Blood, which aired on Citytv, in French on ICI Radio-Canada.[20] From 2017 to 2020, he starred in Neil Jordan's series Riviera. Set in the French Riviera, the series follows Georgina Clios, a midwestern art curator whose life is turned upside down after the death of her billionaire husband Constantine Clios (LaPaglia) in a yacht accident. Georgina becomes immersed in a world of lies, double-dealing and crime, as she seeks to uncover the truth about her husband's death.[21]
LaPaglia currently lives in Santa Monica, California. He has said that he adopted an American accent to help him get acting work after moving to the US. His current accent is neither distinctly American nor is it Australian, but, rather, a combination of both.[24] According to an offhand remark by LaPaglia, he has employed an American accent since 1982.[25] LaPaglia is the godfather of Poppy Montgomery and Adam Kaufman's son, Jackson. LaPaglia's first marriage was to actress Cherie Michan. His second marriage was to actress Gia Carides, whom he met at a party;[2] the two starred in the 1994 Australian movie Paperback Romance (a.k.a. Lucky Break) and married in 1998.[citation needed] Their daughter Bridget was born in January 2003. In April 2015, newspapers reported that LaPaglia and Carides had split after 17 years.[26] He married Alexandra Henkel (his third marriage), who is 30 years younger, on 28 April 2018.[27]
Life in soccer
In the 1980s, LaPaglia was a goalkeeper in the National Soccer League, playing for Adelaide City and West Adelaide.[2] LaPaglia was part owner of A-League club Sydney FC until 2008; flying from California to Sydney to attend their matches since their inception in 2005. He was the narrator and executive producer of The Away Game, a critically acclaimed television documentary exploring the experiences of Australian men's soccer players in Europe.
^Davenport, Dawn Meade (16 October 2008). "The Watercooler: How do they lose those accents?". Johnson City Press. Johnson City, Tennessee: Sandusky Newspapers. Archived from the original on 12 January 2009. Retrieved 27 March 2009. Anthony LaPaglia, Australian, Without a Trace, CBS. After years in the movies and a memorable recurring role as Daphne's drunken Mancunian brother on Frasier, LaPaglia took the part of New York FBI agent Jack Malone on Without a Trace. Because American accents vary greatly from region to region, and we don't know where Jack grew up, LaPaglia gets away with diction that sounds neither distinctly American nor Australian.
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