Michael Cerveris

ABOUT Michael Cerveris

Born in Bethesda, Maryland, in 1960, singer-guitarist-actor Michael Cerveris has demonstrated extraordinary versatility as a performer, with parts ranging from Shakespeare's Romeo to The Who's Tommy, from the German transsexual rock diva Hedwig in Hedwig & the Angry Inch to the homicidal title character of Sondheim's Sweeney Todd. Cerveris himself has described his career as "schizophrenic."

Cerveris grew up in an artistic, musical household. His father was a university music professor who played the piano; his mother, a modern dancer. Music has always been an integral part of his life. He studied the cello briefly but at age ten switched to the more rock-conducive guitar, studying first formally, then teaching himself by ear.

When he was about eight, he appeared on stage in a university production of Brecht's The Caucasian Chalk Circle. He spent his last two years of high school at Phillips Exeter Academy, where he had a small part in a school production of The Comedy of Errors and started a rock band, Ukiah.

At Yale, he studied voice with Blake Stern and worked on German lieder and Italian songs. After graduating, he looked for work in the theater. In repertory theater productions, he traveled across the country, performing lead roles in classics such as Romeo and Juliet and A Midsummer Night's Dream as well as contemporary plays like Sam Shepard's Tooth of Crime and Christopher Hampton's Total Eclipse.

In 1986, he was cast as the British rocker Ian Ware in the television series Fame and later appeared in guest roles on Quantum Leap, The Equalizer, and 21 Jump Street. He also played Bobby Krull in the series Dream On and appeared in movies including Steel and Lace and High School Forever.

In 1992, he played the role of Tommy in the premiere of the musical The Who's Tommy at the La Jolla Playhouse in California. Author Pete Townshend, the author of Tommy, was so impressed he asked Cerveris to perform with him at special appearances, and Cerveris reprised the role for his 1993 Broadway debut in the Tony^®-winning production of The Who's Tommy at the St. James Theater. Cerveris earned a Tony^® nomination for Best Featured Actor in a Musical and won the 1993 Theatre World Award. He sings on the original cast recording, which won a Grammy^® for Best Original Cast Album.

After The Who's Tommy, Cerveris appeared regularly on Broadway, in Stone and Yeston's musical Titanic, Sondheim's Assassins (playing John Wilkes Booth), Passion (playing Giorgio), and Sweeney Todd (title role); Lovemusik (playing Kurt Weill); and, in 2007–08, Shakespeare's Cymbeline (as Posthumus Leonatus). Off-Broadway, he took over the title role in another rock musical, Mitchell and Trask's Hedwig and the Angry Inch, at the Jane Street Theater in 2000.

His television work has included appearances on CSI: Crime Scene Investigation and Law & Order: Criminal Intent, and his films include Lulu on the Bridge, The Mexican, Temptation, and Cirque du Freak.

A rock guitarist, he played gigs in the 1990s in venues both here and abroad with his group, Lame.