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Peter Falk
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Peter Michael Falk (born September 16, 1927) is an American actor of Jewish descent. He was born in New York City, the son of Michael Falk and Madeline Hauser Falk. Falk is a descendent of Miksa Falk, who was the editor of the liberal Hungarian newspaper, the Pester Lloyd.
Falk attended Ossining High School in Westchester County, NY and was president of his class. After graduating, he joined the United States Merchant Marine as a cook, before completing a Bachelor of Arts in political science at the New School for Social Research in 1951. Gaining a Masters degree in public administration at Syracuse University in 1953, he applied unsuccessfully for a job with the CIA before becoming a management analyst with the Connecticut State Budget Bureau in Hartford.
After deciding to be an actor and studying at the White Barn Theatre in
Westport,
Connecticut, in 1956 at the age of 29, he left his job with the Budget Bureau and moved to
Greenwich Village. He made his professional debut
Off Broadway in
Molière's
Don Juan at the Fourth Street Theatre on January 3, 1956, and the same year his
Broadway debut playing an English soldier in
Shaw's
Saint Joan with
Siobhán McKenna. He won an
Emmy for "The Price of Tomatoes", a
Dick Powell Theater TV drama.
He is best known for the title role in the long-running TV series Columbo, a shabby and ostensibly absent-minded police detective. In reality Columbo possessed a keen mind and invariably solved his cases by paying close attention to tiny inconsistencies in a suspect's story, hounding them until they confessed; he merely put on a good show of being dim-witted so that the criminals and even his colleagues would be more at ease around him. Columbo's signature technique was to exit the scene of an interview, only to stop in the doorway to ask a suspect "just one more thing" (the title of Falk's recent memoir), which always brought to light the key inconsistency. The role won Falk five Emmy Awards and a Golden Globe.
Falk is also known for his roles in several films, including his performance as a possible ex-CIA agent of dubious sanity in the Arthur Hiller comedy The In-Laws. He also starred in two films directed by friend John Cassavetes, A Woman Under the Influence, (opposite Gena Rowlands) and Husbands (with Cassavetes and Ben Gazzara) and in Wim Wenders' Wings of Desire.
Falk has been nominated for a Best Supporting Actor Academy Award twice, for Murder, Inc., and Pocketful of Miracles.
Falk wears an
ocular prosthetic ("glass eye"). His right eye was surgically removed at the age of three because of a malignant tumor.
Falk is also an artist and has had several gallery shows and exhibits. He started to draw as a way to pass time while filming on location.
He married Alice Mayo on April 17, 1960 and has two daughters, Catherine (who is a real life private investigator) and Jackie. They were divorced in 1976 and on December 7, 1977 he married Shera Danese.
Filmography
Television Work
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