James Spader

At 64 years old, James Spader has this physical status:

James Todd Spader (born February 7, 1960) is an American actor.

He is best known for his role as eccentric characters in films such as Sex, Lies, and Videotape (1989), the controversial psychological thriller Crash (1994), and the erotic romance Secretary (2002).

In Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015), he portrayed Ultron's titular character in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, which he portrayed via voice and motion capture. Attorney Alan Shore of The Practice and its spin-off Boston Legal (for which he received three Emmy Awards) and Robert California in the comedy-mockumentary The Office are two of his best-known television appearances.

Raymond "Red" Reddington, a high-profile criminal-turned-FBI informant who has received two Golden Globe Award nominations, appears in the NBC crime drama The Blacklist, where he appears in two Golden Globe Award nominations.

Early life and education

Spader was born in Boston on February 7, 1960, and is the youngest of three children. Both parents, Jean (née Fraser) and Stoddard ("Todd") Greenwood Spader, were educators. Libby Spader and Annie Spader are two older sisters. Spader said he grew up in a very progressive and liberal way. "I was always around dominant and influential women, and that left a good impression."

During his early education, he attended many private schools, including The Pike School in Andover, where his mother taught art, and the Brooks School in North Andover, where his father was a tutor. He stayed at Phillips Academy, befriended former President John F. Kennedy's son John F. Kennedy, Jr., who died at the age of seventeen and moved to New York City to pursue his acting career. Spader undertook roles including bartending, teaching yoga, driving a meat truck, loading railroad cars, and being a good boy while learning to become a full-time actor.

Personal life

When Spader first moved to New York City in the 1980s, he encountered his first wife, decorator Victoria Kheel, while working in a yoga studio. They married in 1987 and had two sons. In 2004, Spader applied for divorce from Kheel. Leslie Stefanson, the actor who co-starred Alien Hunter (2003), began dating him in 2002. They have one son together.

Spader revealed that he suffered from obsessive–compulsive disorder in an interview with Rolling Stone in 2014.

Spader is a sixth-generation descendant of Connecticut politician Seth P. Beers.

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Acting career

Spader's first major film role came in the film Endless Love (1981), but his first film appearance was in Tuff Turf (1985). In 1986, he burstened to fame as he starred in Pretty in Pink as the wealthy, arrogant playboy Steff. He appeared in Mannequin (1987) and the film version of Less than Zero (1987), in which he portrayed Rip as a drug dealer. Supporting roles in films such as Baby Boom (1987) and Wall Street (1987) followed his discovery in Sex, Lies, and Videotape (1989), in which he played a sexual voyeur who complicated the lives of three Baton Rouge, Louisiana residents. He received the Best Actor Award at the Cannes Film Festival for his appearance.

Spader's appearances in the early 1990s included a young, affluent widower opposite Susan Sarandon in the romantic drama Bad Influence (1990), John Cusack's best friend in the drama True Colors (1991), and a poker-playing drifter in The Music of Chance (1993). In 1994, he appeared as Egyptologist Daniel Jackson in the Sci-fi film Stargate. In 1996, James Ballard, a car accident fetishist, appeared in the controversial Canadian film Crash and assassinated Lee Woods in 2 Days in the Valley. In 1997, a Spader guest appeared in "The Apology" as an alcoholic who refuses to blame George for mocking him. In The Watcher, he was a drug-addicted detective tracking a serial murderer. In 2002, he appeared as a sadomasochistic boss in Secretary.

Alan Shore appeared on the television show Boston Legal in which he reprised his role from the television series The Practice of (2002). "I was told that no one would ever welcome James Spader into their living room" when he first attempted to portray Spader in the role. "People will see him (Spader) in the films," Kelley said during a TV Game Changers interview, but "people will never let him in their own home."

In 2004 and 2007, he received the Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series, and in 2005 and 2007, he received it again for Boston Legal. With his 2005 win, he became one of the few actors to win an Emmy Award while playing the same character in two series. He received his second straight Emmy Award while playing the same character in two series, which was even rarer. In 2006, he received the Satellite Award for Best Actor in a Series, Comedian, or Musical for Boston Legal.

Spader narrated "China Revealed," the first episode of Discovery Channel's documentary film Discovery Atlas's Discovery Atlas, in October 2006. In several television commercials for Acura, he has also performed voice-over. He appeared in Race, a David Mamet-directed play that opened on December 6, 2009 at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre on Broadway, where he appeared. After 297 performances, the show came to a close on August 21, 2010. He was chosen to appear in the film By Virtue Fall, written and directed by Sheldon Turner in March 2011. The film was in pre-production as of June 2011.

In "Search Committee," the season 7 finale of The Office, a Spader guest appeared as Robert California. On June 27, 2011, it was announced that he would join the cast on a permanent basis. He intended to remain inactive until the eighth season. Although the original intention was simply to do the guest appearance, executive producer Paul Lieberstein said, "those two scenes became a season."

Spader appears in the television series The Blacklist, which premiered on NBC on September 23, 2013. Raymond "Red" Reddington, one of the FBI's most wanted fugitives, is portrayed by the actor. In Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015), he also played villainous robot Ultron.

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