Lane made his professional theatre debut in 1978 in an off-Broadway production of A Midsummer Night's Dream. During that time he also briefly appeared as one half of the comedy team of Stack and Lane, until he was cast in the 1982 Broadway revival of Noël Coward's Present Laughter directed by and starring George C. Scott. That led to an extensive career onstage, where he had a long friendship and fruitful collaboration with the playwright Terrence McNally which started in 1989 with the Manhattan Theater Club production of The Lisbon Traviata.
Lane was born Joseph Lane in Jersey City, New Jersey on February 3, 1956.[4] His father Daniel Joseph Lane was a truck driver and an aspiring tenor who died in 1967 from alcoholism when Nathan was eleven.[5] His mother Nora Veronica (née Finnerty) was a housewife and secretary who suffered from bipolar disorder and died in 2000.[6][7][8] Nathan has two older brothers Daniel Jr. and Robert.[9] Their parents were Catholics and all of their grandparents were Irish immigrants.[5][10] He was named Joseph after his uncle, a Jesuit priest.[11] Nathan attended Catholic schools in Jersey City, including Jesuit-run St. Peter's Preparatory School, where he was voted Best Actor in 1974, and in 2011 received the Prep Hall of Fame Professional Achievement Award.[12]
Accepted to Saint Joseph's University in Philadelphia on a drama scholarship, Joseph Lane was accompanied on what was supposed to be his first day there by his older brother Dan. Discovering that the scholarship would not cover enough of his expenses, he decided to leave, and work for a year to earn some money. His brother said, "I remember him saying to me, 'College is for people who don't know what they want to do.'"[9]
In 1994, Lane voiced Timon, the meerkat, in Disney's blockbuster animated film The Lion King and reprised the role in its sequels.[38] In 1995, Lane was the voice of the meerkat in the early episodes of Timon & Pumbaa. In 1995, he played the Cowardly Lion in The Wizard of Oz in Concert at Lincoln Center to benefit the Children's Defense Fund.
The performance was originally broadcast on Turner Network Television (TNT).[39]
Lane collaborated with Stephen Sondheim in several of his projects
In 1996 Lane appeared in the film The Birdcage, for which he received his first Golden Globe nomination.[40] The film, an American remake of the classic French farce La Cage aux Folles, was directed by Mike Nichols with a screenplay by Elaine May, and starred Robin Williams, Lane, and Gene Hackman, and went on to be a big success. The Stephen Sondheim song "Little Dream"[41] in The Birdcage was supposedly written especially for him. In 1999, he appeared with Victor Garber in the workshop of the Sondheim musical Wise Guys (later retitled Road Show).[42] His collaboration with Sondheim would continue when Lane revised the original book for and starred in the Broadway debut of the composer's The Frogs at Lincoln Center in 2004.[43]
Lane appeared in the 1997 dark comedy Mouse Hunt, one of the first films to come out of the newly formed DreamWorks Studios, in which he co-starred with British comedian Lee Evans and Christopher Walken. In 1999, he appeared in the Encores! concert revival of Do Re Mi at City Center.[44][45] That same year he also voiced the role of Snowbell in the family film Stuart Little, opposite his Life With Mikey co-star Michael J. Fox.
Lane starred in the Roundabout revival of The Man Who Came to Dinner as Sheridan Whiteside, with Jean Smart and Harriet Harris in 2000.[52] Charles Isherwood of Variety liked his performance, "Nathan Lane, an actor who makes virtually every role he plays seem like a role he was born to play, is the splendidly seething, delightfully acerbic center of Jerry Zaks' splashy production of the 1939 comedy".[53] The production was taped and shown on PBS. That same year he starred in Kenneth Branagh's film adaptation of William Shakespeare's Love's Labour's Lost (2000). He acted in the comedy Isn't She Great (2000) opposite Bette Midler, the crime drama Trixie (2000), and voiced a character in the animated science fiction film Titan A.E. (2000).
In 2001, he starred as Max Bialystock in the blockbuster musical version of Mel Brooks's The Producers. He acted alongside Matthew Broderick. Chris Jones of Variety wrote "Lane's greatest contribution, though, is this performer's innate sense of pace. He's constantly propelling the show forward and giving all this nonsense a necessary sense of urgency."[54]Ben Brantley of The New York Times praised Lane's performance describing it as his "most delicious performance". He complimented Lane's and Broderick's chemistry adding "Mr. Lane and Mr. Broderick, have the most dynamic stage chemistry since Natasha Richardson met Liam Neeson in Anna Christie.[55] The role earned him his second Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical as well as Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Awards.[56]
In 2009, Lane starred in the musical version of The Addams Family as Gomez in Chicago, a role he reprised on Broadway the following year, receiving Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle nominations.[70] That year he also received a Drama League Award for Distinguished Achievement in Musical Theater. Committed to starring in a revival of the Eugene O'Neill play The Iceman Cometh at Chicago's Goodman Theatre in 2012, Lane assumed the role of Hickey, with Brian Dennehy playing the role of Larry Slade in a production directed by the Goodman's Artistic Director, Robert Falls.[14] Receiving rave reviews,[71][72] it won six Jeff Awards, including Best Ensemble, director, and Production,[73] and is the most successful play to date in the theater's history.[74]
In autumn 2014, he appeared in an all-star ensemble of Terrence McNally's revised and updated It's Only a Play, with F. Murray Abraham, Matthew Broderick, Stockard Channing, Rupert Grint, Megan Mullally, and Micah Stock.[79] The show became one of the biggest hits of the season.[80] In February 2015 he reprised the role of Hickey in the Robert Falls production of The Iceman Cometh to great acclaim at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. New York Post film critic Elizabeth Vincentelli wrote of his performance, "Lane, one of his generation's most brilliant comic actors...[hits] the sweet spot between pretend perkiness and self-loathing".[81][82] He later returned to the Broadway run of It's Only a Play.[83] In 2015, he received the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center Monte Cristo Award for his body of work. In March 2016, he opened the play White Rabbit, Red Rabbit Off-Broadway.
Lane played the role of Lewis Michener on Showtime's Penny Dreadful: City of Angels which premiered April 26, 2020, and ran for one season. He has a recurring role in the Hulu series Only Murders in the Building, starring Steve Martin, Martin Short, and Selena Gomez, for which he received a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series. That was Lane's first Primetime Emmy Award after a record-breaking seven nominations in the guest actor categories, making him the most nominated Comedy Guest Actor in Emmy history, a record he still holds after receiving his eighth nomination in 2023 in the same category.[90] He also plays the recurring role of Ward McAllister in the HBO period series, The Gilded Age, written by Julian Fellowes, which received a 2024 Screen Actors Guild Award nomination for Outstanding Ensemble in a Drama Series[91] and a 2024 Emmy nomination for Best Drama. In 2023, Lane returned to the Broadway stage, marking his 25th Broadway show, in Pictures from Home, a play adapted from the photo memoir by Larry Sultan. Lane portrayed the father and former razor blade salesman to his son a photographer, played by Danny Burstein, who's remembering his visits with his family. Lane's wife in the play was portrayed by Zoë Wanamaker. The production was directed by Bartlett Sher and was helmed at the Studio 54 theatre.[92] The play received mixed reviews but praise for Lane's performance with Marilyn Stasio of Variety writing, "Lane and Burstein are consummate pros, and there are considerable sparks of familial communication between the father and son they play with such warmth and understanding."[93]
Also in 2023, Lane co-starred in Ari Aster's new A24 film, Beau Is Afraid alongside Joaquin Phoenix, Amy Ryan, and Patti LuPone.[94] Max Ceo of Esquire praised Aster for the casting of Lane writing, "There's a palpable sense that the director had seasoned character actors such as Nathan Lane in his mind while writing. He milks every dad-ish 'My dude' the script hands him".[95]
Lane says that when he told his mother at age 21 that he was gay, she said, "I'd rather you were dead." He replied, "I knew you'd understand." He joked that "once I got her head out of the oven, everything went fine."[6][100] He came out publicly in 1999 after the killing of Matthew Shepard[6] and has been a long-time board member of and fundraiser for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS.[101] He was honored with the Human Rights Campaign Equality Award,[102] the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation Vito Russo Award,[103] The Trevor Project Hero Award,[104] and the Matthew Shepard Foundation Making A Difference Award for his work in the LGBT community in 2015.[105]
Lane has made several critical statements about Republican Party figures. He jokingly compared Paul Ryan to the Wicked Witch of the West, due to Ryan's lack of support for Medicaid.[106] In a 2018 interview about playing Roy Cohn in the Broadway revival of Angels in America, Lane portrayed Donald Trump as a liar and said: "Really, what you learn is what [Trump] learned from Roy Cohn: There are certain tactics that are very familiar, that Trump picked up from him. You know, always go on the attack. The counterattack. Hit the accuser ten times harder and deflect. Never admit defeat... outright lying if all else fails."[107] Lane was an active supporter of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama hosting fundraisers for the Democratic Party.[108][109]
.jpg)
