Before his menacing portrayal of serial killer Buffalo Bill in the 1991 thriller Silence of the Lambs, Ted Levine spent most of his days acting on stage. After studying one year at Marlboro College, he went to join the Remains Theater, where he hoped to further develop and perfect his acting skills. It wasn’t until the 1980’s that he shifted his focus to acting in television and film. Ted Levine was born on May 29th,1957 in Bellaire, Ohio and grew up in the wealthy suburb of Oak Park, Illinois and has been known for his performances in many projects in the industry.
Ted Levine broke out into the mainstream when he was typecast as a villian in many roles. He decided to avoid this by playing more police and military officers in films. Some of the characters he became known for included a cop in Heat,a cop in the horror movie The Mangler, an astronaut in the HBO miniseries From the Earth to the Moon, and the cop Sergeant Tanner in The Fast and the Furious. The most sympathetic character he played was Mare Winningham’s husband in the drama Georgia, released in 1995. Levine was also seen on the Robin Williams film Flubber, and played General ‘Bloodbath’ McGrath on the film Wild Wild West. He also became known for playing a cop on Wonderland, and co-starred on the USA Network’s detective series Monk playing a cop/detective. Levine’s other projects include roles in The Truth About Charlie, The Manchurian Candidate, Birth, and Memoirs of a Geisha in 2005. He later provided the voice for the character Sinistro on the animated series Justice League, Superman: The Animated Series and Justice League Unlimited. Levine next played a ex-cop/father in the remake of The Hills Have Eyes, and portrayed Sheriff James Timberlake in The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. Another of his more famous roles is that of cop/detective Lou Toback in Ridley Scott’s American Gangster, also starring Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe.