Award-winning American actor Kelsey Grammer was born on February 21, 1955 in Saint Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands. He studied at the Juilliard School in New York City, but he left to become an intern at the Old Globe Theater in San Diego, and later at the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis. He first appeared on stage, making his debut in 1981 as Lennox in Macbeth. At around the same time, he started his television career, first starting as Stephen Smith in the NBC biographical miniseries Kennedy.
However, it was his role as psychiatrist Frasier Crane that gained him popularity. He first played the character on the sitcom Cheers, which ran from 1982 to 1993. He also appeared on an episode of Wings, which was produced by the same people behind Cheers. After both sitcoms ended, his character was given its own sitcom, simply titled Frasier; it ran from 1993 to 2004. His performance as the well-to-do psychiatrist with an uptight, if not snobbish, demeanor endeared him to audiences and critics alike. Grammer is the only actor to get nominated for Emmy awards for the same character in three different programs, and he ties the record for the longest time a single actor played a single character. He also won seven awards—four Emmys, two Golden Globes and a Screen Actors Guild Award—for Frasier.
Grammer is also known for his voice work. Aside from stints in Toy Story 2, Anastacia and Bartok the Magnificent, he is best known for providing the voice of Sideshow Bob in The Simpsons. The recurring character is a former sidekick of Krusty the Clown who later became a villainous homicidal maniac, always out to kill Bart after implicating him for a robbery. Grammer won another Emmy for his voice work in a 2005 episode, “The Italian Bob.”
His most recent work on television is a regular role in the short-lived sitcom Back to You, where he plays news anchor Chuck Darling, alongside Patricia Heaton. He also recently starred in the films Swing Vote and An American Carol, both politically-themed.