Jesse L. Martin Add to My Celebs Age 43 Birthday Jan. 18th, 1969 Born in Rocky Mount, Virginia, USA Height 190 cm

Jesse L. Martin's Main TV Roles Show Character(s) Law & Order Detective E… The Philanthropist Philip Maid…

Main Movie Roles 2009 - Peter and Vandy 2008 - Rent: Filmed Live on Broadway 2007 - The Cake Eaters 2005 - Rent

NOTE: Complete List of Works can be found at IMDB


BIOGRAPHY:

Jesse was born in Virginia's Blue Ridge mountain range. His mother, Virginia Price, was a college career counselor. His father, Jesse Reed Watkins, was a truck driver. His parents divorced when he was very young. His mother then moved his family to Buffalo, New York. He and his four brothers took the surname of his mother's second husband. His family calls him by his middle name, Lamont. As a fourth-grader, a teacher cast him in a play and he found his passion. After graduating from high school, he worked in restaurants to afford the tuition at New York University. He then got work on soaps and did commercials. His breakthrough came in a role in Jonathan Larson's Pulitzer Prize-winning Broadway musical Rent (2005). That was followed up with TV exposure in his first starring role in the series "413 Hope St." (1997), which aired on Fox.


TRIVIA:

• On April 2, 2006, Martin was a featured guest at the awards ceremony of the SunDeis Film Festival at Brandeis University. Martin, introduced to a standing ovation, presented his "Law and Order" co-star S. Epatha Merkerson with the first-ever SunDeis Entertainer of the Year Award, the highlight of the festival weekend.
• Appeared in episodes of three different series with 'Jerry Orbach' (qv): _"Law & Order" (1990)_ (qv), _"Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" (1999)_ (qv) and _"Law & Order: Criminal Intent" (2001)_ (qv).
• Attended the prestigious Lee Strasberg Theatre & Film Institute.
• Performed the song "Razzle Dazzle" from the musical Chicago at the 2005 Tony Awards just as the "In Memoriam" section of the show was finishing. The last photo shown during the memorial was that of Jerry Orbach, who was both Martin's costar on Law and Order and the first person to perform "Razzle Dazzle" in the original Broadway production of Chicago.
• Returning back to Buffalo, N.Y., to work on an independent film, in October of 2006, his luggage was stolen from an SUV as he signed autographs in a restaurant. Martin's belongings have not been returned.
• Almost Graduated from NYU
• The storyline of Detective Green being shot in the line of duty was written into the Law and Order script so that during his 'recovery', Jesse could be in San Fransisco to film Rent.
• Tom Collins and Angel Dumott Schunard, his character and character's boyfriend in Rent, take their last names from their characters counterparts in La Boheme. Tom Collins (known simply as Collins) is based on Colline, and Angel is based on Schaunard.

Jesse L. Martin Photos

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