John Spencer (born John Speshock Jr.; December 20, 1946 – December 16, 2005) was an American actor. He was best known for his role as Leo McGarry on the NBC political drama series The West Wing and for his role as attorney Tommy Mullaney in L.A. Law. His performance on The West Wing earned him a Primetime Emmy Award in 2002.
Early life
John Spencer was born John Speshock Jr., on December 20, 1946, in New York City, and was raised in Totowa, New Jersey.[1] He was the son of blue-collar parents Mildred (née Benzeroski), a waitress, and John Speshock Sr., a truck driver.[2] Spencer's father was of Irish and Czech descent,[3] while his mother was of Ukrainian and Rusyn ancestry.[4][5] Spencer’s parents were disappointed when he chose to become an actor.[6] With his enrollment at the Professional Children's School in Manhattan in 1963, Spencer found himself sharing classes with such fellow students as Liza Minnelli and violinist Pinchas Zukerman. He attended Fairleigh Dickinson University, but did not complete a degree.[1] Spencer often referred to himself as a "dyed-in-the-wool liberal" and described Franklin Delano Roosevelt as one of his heroes.[7]
Career
Spencer began his television career on The Patty Duke Show, and eventually began appearing in supporting roles in feature films beginning with 1983's WarGames. He won an Obie Award for the 1981 off Broadway production of Still Life, about a Vietnam War veteran, and received a Drama Desk nomination for The Day Room. In 1986 he appeared on Broadway as Dan White, the killer of Harvey Milk, in Execution of Justice, alongside Stanley Tucci and Wesley Snipes. Spencer was a supporting actor in the hit 1990 courtroom thriller Presumed Innocent, portraying a tough veteran homicide detective, starring opposite Harrison Ford. Spencer's work also extended to video games, portraying the role of Captain Hugh Paulsen in the 1995 video game Wing Commander IV: The Price of Freedom. Spencer's subsequent film and television work primarily consisted of supporting roles such as a colleague and friend to Billy Crystal's basketball referee in Forget Paris and a prickly FBI Director in Michael Bay's film The Rock.
L.A. Law
In 1990 Spencer joined the cast of the television series L.A. Law, playing street-wise attorney Tommy Mullaney from 1990 to 1994.[8][9] Spencer originally was not going to take the role but after reading five pages of the script he was convinced and said "it was one of the best scripts I'd read". Spencer said the character's disheveled wardrobe was based on his own.[10] Spencer said he and co-star Cecil Hoffman spent time in New York City to prepare for the role.[11]
At the time of his death, Spencer had filmed two episodes of The West Wing’s seventh and final season that were in post-production – "Running Mates" and "The Cold" (Episodes 10 and 13, respectively).[18] In both episodes, McGarry was portrayed as a candidate for vice president. The show's writers decided to adapt Spencer's absence by saying that McGarry died of a heart attack on election night. McGarry had already suffered a near-fatal heart attack in the show's sixth season. Spencer's name remained in the show's opening credits of each remaining episode aired in the months after his death.
