Seymour Cassel
Actor
Biography
Seymour Joseph Cassel (January 22, 1935 – April 7, 2019) was an American actor who appeared in over 200 films and television shows, with a career spanning over 50 years. He first came to prominence in the 1960s in the pioneering independent films of writer/director John Cassavetes. The first of these was Too Late Blues (1961), followed by Faces (1968), for which he was nominated for an Academy Award and won a National Society of Film Critics Award. Cassel went on to appear in Cassavetes's Minnie and Moskowitz (1971), The Killing of a Chinese Bookie (1976), Opening Night (1977), and Love Streams (1984). He also appeared in other notable films, including: Coogan's Bluff (1968), The Last Tycoon (1976), Valentino (1977), Convoy (1978), Johnny Be Good (1988), Mobsters (1991), In the Soup (1992), Honeymoon in Vegas (1992), Indecent Proposal (1993), The Sleepy Time Gal (2001), Imaginary Crimes (1994), Beer League (2006), and Fort McCoy (2011). Like Cassavetes, Wes Anderson frequently cast Cassel – first in Rushmore (1998), then in The Royal Tenenbaums (2001), and finally in The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004).
Filmography
The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou
as Esteban du Plantier 2004
Rushmore
as Bert Fischer 1998
The Man Who Wasn't There
as Spectator at Execution (uncredited) 2001
Indecent Proposal
as Mr. Shackleford 1993
Dick Tracy
as Sam Catchem 1990
It Could Happen to You
as Jack Gross 1994
Stuck on You
as Morty O'Reilly 2003
White Fang
as Skunker 1991
Colors
as Sullivan 1988
The Nutty Professor
as Bored Man 1963
Convoy
as Governor Haskins 1978
Postal
as Paul 2007
Coogan's Bluff
as Young Hood 1968
Dead Presidents
as Saul 1995
Honeymoon in Vegas
as Tony Cataracts 1992
The Killing of a Chinese Bookie
as Mort Weil 1976