American actor whose films include “The Right Stuff,” “Glengarry Glen Ross,” “Places in The Heart,” “Alamo Bay,” “The Abyss,” “Absolute Power” and “The Truman Show.” In the 1995 film “Apollo 13,” he was nominated for the Golden Globe Award and won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor.
Harris grew up in Tenafly NJ. His father Robert Harris was a singer in the Fred Waring chorus, which regularly appeared on “The Gary Moore Show,” “The Perry Como Show” and “The Carol Burnett Show,” and mother Margaret was a homemaker. Middle
son Harris, (brother Robert was born in 1949 and Spencer in 1956), was a quiet, intense child and adolescent who was consumed by sports, winning a letter each in baseball and football in high school. “I worked real hard because I needed to feel worthy, and I felt that when I carried a football. You score a touchdown, and the crowd cheers, and your teammates pat you on the back, and you’re a hero for a few minutes. I started every game. I had my name in the paper every week. I liked the attention, the approval.”
He attended Columbia University in New York on a football scholarship, yet realized while he was there that he lacked the size and speed to be a pro. Dropping out in 1971, he moved to Oklahoma where his parents were then living. “When I realized I couldn’t play football, I was pretty lost. I needed to find something I could be good at. I wasn’t even thinking about making a living. It was about survival. I was becoming an adult, and didn’t have a way in. I needed to feel I belonged in the world.”
While living in Oklahoma, he attended performances of “Tartuffe” and “Man of La Mancha.” Those shows changed his life. “Acting. It was the closest thing I could think of to scoring a touchdown.” The following year Harris enrolled in the drama department at Oklahoma University, yet quit a year later to pursue a series of small parts in community theaters, finally landing the role of King Arthur in “Camelot, ” a role which earned him his first standing ovation. “Playing in “Camelot” was an ecstatic experience for me, kind of as close to God as you can get…I couldn’t let that go.”
Now fully committed to a career in show business, Harris moved to Los Angeles in 1973 and worked as a housepainter to make ends meet. While landing roles on community stages, he took acting classes at the California Institute of the Arts, where he earned a
BFA in 1975. Following small roles in TV, his first movie role came three years later in “Coma” followed by the cult film “Knightriders.” After winning the Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Award for “Prairie Avenue” in 1981, he made three more movies and won an Obie award for his performance in the Off Broadway production of Sam Shepard’s “Fool for Love.”
Harris married actress Amy Madigan in 1983 during the filming of “Places in the Heart” in which Madigan co-starred. They live in Malibu California where their daughter Lily was born in 1993. “I would be scared if I didn’t act. I’m in it to keep myself alive and growing. It’s what I love to do,” Harris said.
Link to Wikipedia biography