Daniel Benzali

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Daniel Benzali (born January 20, 1950) is a Brazilian-American actor of television, film and theater.

[edit] Biography

Benzali was born in Rio de Janeiro to Brazilian Jewish parents.^[1] He is the middle child of three boys born to a father who was an actor in the Yiddish theater in New York and a mother who was a homemaker.

Benzali was a notable theatre actor before making guest-starring roles on television series such as Star Trek: The Next Generation, The X-Files, NYPD Blue and L.A. Law. L.A. Law creator Steven Bochco was so impressed with Benzali's performance that he cast him in the lead role of his 1995 series Murder One, playing attorney Ted Hoffman. For this role he was nominated for a Golden Globe award. More recently, Benzali starred on the series The Agency, and in films such as By Dawn's Early Light (1990), Murder at 1600 (1997) and The Grey Zone (2001).

He has recently appeared in the post-apocalyptic CBS series Jericho as the enigmatic former Department of Homeland Security director Thomas Valente.

Benzali is also a respected star of musical theater. He played Juan Peron in the London cast of Evita, and played faded film director Max von Mayerling, alongside Patti LuPone, in the original cast (1993) of Andrew Lloyd Webber's Sunset Boulevard.

Benzali had previously appeared on Broadway in Fiddler on the Roof, and other smaller productions. Benzali was also formerly engaged to actress Kim Cattrall.

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Daniel Benzali at the Internet Movie Database
• Daniel Benzali at Allmovie
• Daniel Benzali article at Memory Alpha, a Star Trek wiki