Anthony Rapp Biography

Anthony has been an actor since he was six years old when he was cast as the Cowardly Lion in a summer camp production of The Wizard of Oz. Lots and lots and lots of years later (he's now 35), he's appeared in many other plays, musicals, films, and television shows. Favorites include: the Broadway productions Precious Sons (for which he received an Outer Critics Circle Award), Six Degrees of Separation, and the revival of You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown; the films Adventures in Babysitting, School Ties, Dazed and Confused, Six Degrees of Separation, David Searching, Man of the Century, Road Trip, A Beautiful Mind, Open House, Winter Passing, Danny Roane: First Time Director, and Scaring the Fish; and the television shows "The X-Files", "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit", and "Kidnapped". But above all else, he's best known for creating the role of Mark Cohen in Jonathan Larson's landmark rock opera Rent. He took the show from Off-Broadway to Broadway to Chicago to London, and finally reprised his role in the 2005 Sony Pictures feature film. He wrote a book about his experiences on and offstage during the original run of Rent, entitled Without You: a Memoir of Love, Loss, and the Musical Rent, which was released in 2006 by Simon & Schuster and became a national bestseller.

Besides acting and writing, he also creates music with his band Albinokid, (having released a solo cd, Look Around, in 2000), speaks regularly at colleges and universities around the country, and serves on the board of the non-profit organization Friends In Deed. He lives in New York City with his partner Rodney To and their three cats, Emma, Sebastian, and Spike.