Richard Belzer

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Richard Jay Belzer (born August 4, 1944) is an American stand-up comedian, author, and actor.

He is best known for his appearances as BPD Detective, NYPD Detective/Sergeant, and DA Inspector John Munch, who has appeared on NBC's Life on the Street and Order: Special Victims Unit, as well as in a few other series.

From 1993 to 2016, he portrayed the role for 23 years.

Early life and education

Belzer was born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, the son of Frances and Charles Belzer, a tobacco and candy store. He grew up in a Jewish family. He characterized his mother as often physically abused, and he admitted that his comedy career began when trying to convince his mother not to laugh at him and his brother. Belzer worked as a reporter for the Bridgeport Post after graduating from Fairfield Warde High School.

Belzer attended Dean College, then called Dean Junior College, in Franklin, Massachusetts, but was expelled. He worked in various occupations, including sales and as a census taker.

Personal life

Belzer's first two marriages were to Gail Susan Ross (1966–72) and Dalia Danoch (1976 c. 1978), both of whom ended in divorce. In 1981, he met 31-year-old Harlee McBride, a divorcee with two children, Bree Benton and Jessica. McBride, who had been seen in Playboy magazine four years earlier in the year's sex-in-cinema film, was performing in Ford television commercials and acting in a free theater when she met Belzer at the suggestion of a friend. In 1985, the two were married.

In 1983, Belzer was diagnosed with testicular cancer. Also played on HBO's special and comedic version, Another Lone Nut ridicules this medical occurrence as well as his reputation as a well-known conspiracy theorist.

Belzer requested that Hulk Hogan perform one of his signature wrestling moves on March 27, 1985, just days before the inaugural WrestleMania. Hogan placed Belzer in a front chin-lock, causing Belzer to pass out after being asked repeatedly by Belzer. Belzer fell on the floor when Hogan was released, causing a laceration of the scalp that required a short hospitalization. Belzer sued Hogan for $5 million and resigned out of court. He referred to the occurrence in his HBO special Another Lone Nut as part of his stand-up routine.

Leonard Belzer, Belzer's older brother, died of suicide in the early morning hours of July 30, 2014, after descending from the roof of the New York City luxury apartment building in which he had lived. In 1968, Belzer's father died by suicide.

Following his being written out of SVU, Belzer moved to Bozouls, South of France. He spends his time on writing about his obsession with conspiracy theories (Corporate Conspiracies: How Wall Street Will Take Over Washington and Jerry Lewis' forthcoming Conversations).

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Career

After his first divorce, Belzer relocated to New York City, moved in with singer Shelley Ackerman, and began working as a stand-up comic at Pips, The Improv, and Catch a Rising Star. He participated in the Channel One comedy group that satirized television and became the basis for the cult movie The Groove Tube, in which Belzer played the costar of the ersatz TV show The Dealers.

Belzer was the audience warm-up comedian for Saturday Night Live and made three guest appearances on the show between 1975 and 1980. He also opened for musician Warren Zevon during his tour supporting the release of his album Excitable Boy.

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Belzer became an occasional film actor. A short skit of a younger Richard Belzer can be found on Sesame Street in a season 9 episode in 1978 when two young men attempt a picnic and boat ride, only to be thwarted by a dog who eats their food. He is noted for small roles in Fame, Café Flesh, Night Shift, and Scarface. He appeared in the music videos for the Mike + The Mechanics song "Taken In" and for the Pat Benatar song "Le Bel Age", as well as the Kansas video "Can't Cry Anymore". He appeared in A Very Brady Sequel as an LAPD detective.

In addition to his film career, Belzer was a featured player on the National Lampoon Radio Hour with co-stars John Belushi, Chevy Chase, Bill Murray, Gilda Radner, and Harold Ramis, a half-hour comedy program aired on 600 plus U.S. stations from 1973 to 1975. Several of his sketches were released on National Lampoon albums, drawn from the Radio Hour, including several bits in which he portrayed a pithy call-in talk show host named "Dick Ballantine".

In the late 1970s, he co-hosted Brink & Belzer on 660AM WNBC radio in New York City. He has been a frequent guest on The Howard Stern Show.

Following the departure of Randi Rhodes from Air America Radio, Belzer guest-hosted the afternoon program on the network.

Belzer has been a regular guest on the right-wing radio show of Alex Jones and appeared on the episode covering the Boston Marathon bombing, in which he referred to the bombing as a false flag event.

In the 1990s, Belzer appeared frequently on television. He was a regular on The Flash as a news anchor and reporter. In several episodes of Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, he played Inspector William Henderson.

He followed that with starring roles on the Baltimore-based Homicide: Life on the Street (1993–1999) and the New York-based Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (1999–2013), portraying police detective John Munch in both series. Barry Levinson, Executive Producer of Homicide, said Belzer was a "lousy actor" in audition when he read lines from the script for "Gone for Goode", the first episode in the series. Levinson asked Belzer to take time to reread and practice the material, then read it again. At his second reading, Levinson said Belzer was "still terrible", but that the actor eventually found confidence in his performance.

In addition, Belzer has played Munch in episodes on seven other series and in a sketch on one talk show, making Munch the only fictional character to appear on eleven different television shows played by a single actor. These shows were on six different networks:

In March 2016, executive producer Warren Leight announced Belzer would return to reprise the role in a May 2016 episode of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, titled "Fashionable Crimes".

Belzer portrayed Det. Munch for 22 consecutive seasons on Homicide (7 seasons) and Law & Order: SVU (15 seasons), which exceeded the previous primetime live-action record of twenty consecutive seasons held by James Arness (who portrayed Marshal Matt Dillon on Gunsmoke from 1955 to 1975) and Kelsey Grammer (as Dr. Frasier Crane on Cheers and Frasier from 1984 to 2004). This record has since been passed by Belzer's "SVU" co-star Mariska Hargitay.

Belzer appeared in several of Comedy Central's televised broadcasts of Friars Club roasts. On June 9, 2001, Belzer himself was honored by the New York Friars Club and the Toyota Comedy Festival as the honoree of the first-ever roast open to the public. Comedians and friends on the dais included Roastmaster Paul Shaffer; Christopher Walken; Danny Aiello; Barry Levinson; Robert Klein; Bill Maher; SVU costars Mariska Hargitay, Christopher Meloni, Ice-T, and Dann Florek; and Law & Order's Jerry Orbach. At the December 1, 2002, roast of Chevy Chase, Belzer said, "The only time Chevy Chase has a funny bone in his body is when I fuck him in the ass."

Belzer voiced the character of Loogie for most of the South Park episode titled "The Tooth Fairy Tats 2000". He and Brian Doyle-Murray were featured in the tenth-season premiere of Sesame Street.

Belzer believes there was a conspiracy to assassinate President John F. Kennedy and has written four books discussing conspiracy theories:

Dead Wrong and Hit List were written with journalist David Wayne and reached The New York Times Best Seller list. Someone Is Hiding Something was also written with David Wayne as well as radio talk show host George Noory. Belzer's long-time character, John Munch, is also a believer in conspiracy theories, including the JFK assassination.

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