Timothy Olyphant

Early life and education

Born May 20, 1968 in Honolulu, Hawaii, Olyphant moved to Modesto, California, at the age of two. His parents are Katherine (née Gideon) Olyphant and John Vernon Bevan Olyphant, a wine executive. He has an older brother, Andrew, and a younger brother, Matthew. His parents divorced when he was a teenager; both remarried.

Olyphant is a descendant of the Vanderbilt family of New York. His paternal fourth great-grandfather was family patriarch Cornelius Vanderbilt. The surname Olyphant is of Scottish origin. His third great-grandfather, David Olyphant, and great-great-grandfather, Robert Morrison Olyphant, were both prominent businessmen.

Olyphant attended Modesto's Fred C. Beyer High School. Growing up, he was "embarrassed" by the idea of acting, but enjoyed art and drawing. He swam competitively throughout his childhood and was a finalist at the 1986 Nationals, in the 200m Individual Medley. He was then recruited to the University of Southern California by USC Trojans swimming coach Peter Daland. When Olyphant first visited the campus as part of a recruitment trip, he hoped to study architecture but was told it would be unmanageable with his training schedule.

Instead, he opted to earn a Bachelor of Fine Arts. However, Olyphant left university one elective shy of a degree; he returned to finish the degree 30 years later, taking an online course during the COVID-19 pandemic. In 1990, he planned to finish his degree and apply for a master's degree in fine arts and half-heartedly considered a career in commercial art. While working as a swimming coach at Irvine Novaquatics, Olyphant decided to move to New York to explore other options. He initially performed stand-up comedy: "I'd dabbled [before] and then there was a six-month period where I did it with a certain commitment. Then I'd occasionally go back." Ultimately, he decided to become an actor. In his final year of college, he had taken an acting class as an elective at UC Irvine and found it "really enjoyable". He completed a two-year acting program at New York's William Esper Studio and began auditioning for roles.

Career

1995–2003: Early supporting roles

Olyphant's first paid acting job was in a 1995 WB television pilot based on 77 Sunset Strip. Phyllis Huffman cast him in the role but he did not have an opportunity to meet the show's producer, Clint Eastwood, who quit days before filming began. Later that year, he made his professional Off Broadway debut in the Playwrights Horizons' production of The Monogamist and received the Theatre World Award for Outstanding Debut Performance. He starred in the world premiere of The SantaLand Diaries (1996) at the Atlantic Theater Company, a one-man play based on David Sedaris' essay about working as a Macy's department store Christmas elf. Ben Brantley of The New York Times felt the "charming" Olyphant did "a wonderful job" when imitating other characters but had "a harder time finding a convincing style for the running narrative". Howard Kissel of The New York Daily News remarked that he delivered "all the drollery with a perfect deadpan and a twinkle" while David Patrick Stearns of USA Today described him as "an excellent young actor who successfully projects the world-weariness of a young 20-something who slowly evolves into somebody who just might believe in Christmas."

Olyphant made his feature film debut in The First Wives Club (1996) as an eager young director who attempts to cast Elise Elliot (Goldie Hawn) – who thinks she will be playing the leading lady – in the role of the elderly mother. Airing on the same day of that film's release, he made his television debut in the pilot of the CBS spy series Mr. & Mrs. Smith. In 1997, Olyphant made a guest appearance as Officer Brett Farraday in three episodes of the ABC police drama High Incident and returned to New York's Playwrights Horizons to play a supporting role in Plunge. He also had minor roles in the romantic comedy A Life Less Ordinary and the CBS television film Ellen Foster. Olyphant's most high-profile role of 1997 was as a film student later revealed as one of the killers in the successful horror film Scream 2, bringing "a degree of wild-eyed flair to the role," according to HitFix's Chris Eggertsen. He later described the role as "a gift. I had virtually nothing on my resume at that point. I'm sure some of it was made up."

Olyphant returned to television in 1998 for a guest starring role in an episode of the HBO sitcom Sex and the City, playing a love interest for Carrie Bradshaw. Sarah Jessica Parker later said the episode, "Valley of the Twenty Something Guys", was her favorite of the series. Also that year, he had supporting roles in the HBO war film When Trumpets Fade and the independent ensemble drama 1999. Two little-seen films were released in 1999: the drama Advice from a Caterpillar, in which Olyphant played the bisexual love interest of Cynthia Nixon's character, and the offbeat ensemble comedy No Vacancy, in which he starred with Christina Ricci. Olyphant received positive notices for portraying a drug dealer in the cult comedy Go (1999). Janet Maslin of The New York Times noted that the role was "played with offbeat flair" while Todd McCarthy of Variety described it as a "deftly etched" performance. He was set to star in the fantasy film Practical Magic, but he was replaced by Aidan Quinn.

2004–2009: Deadwood and leading film roles

Olyphant came to the attention of a wider audience when he was cast as Sheriff Seth Bullock in HBO's acclaimed western Deadwood, which aired for three seasons from 2004 to 2006. While he had previously been typecast "as a talkative, Jack Nicholson–styled, funny bad boy," in the words of Vulture's Matt Zoller Seitz, Deadwood gave him the opportunity to play a righteous, brooding lawman. The show's creator, David Milch, said of the casting choice: "Bullock's uprightness is an alternative to going medieval on people. You can see that same fire and that possibility in Tim, even at his most genial ... I'm not sure which poet talked about 'thoughts too deep for words,' but he brings that idea alive ... Tim is a guy that doesn't let himself be known easily."

While Bullock was initially introduced as Deadwood's protagonist, Emily VanDerWerff of The A.V. Club noted that the character of Al Swearengen came to "dominate the show ... This is not to slight Timothy Olyphant. He's a fine actor, and his portrayal of Bullock is frequently very, very good. Bullock is still unquestionably one of the most important characters on the show but the character of a Wild West lawman, no matter how revisionist it was in its portrayal of that lawman as someone who seemed barely in control at all times, just ended up not having as much to do in a blatantly revisionist Western about how chaos gives way to civilization." Matt Feeney of Slate described Bullock as "laconic, feral, hot-tempered and a little vain", and said the character was "not so much played as embodied by Olyphant". Alan Sepinwall of HitFix found his performance "fierce and commanding" while Jeremy Egner of The New York Times said that he showed "a capacity for explosive, nuanced performance barely suggested by earlier roles". The cast were nominated for the 2006 Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series.

Years later, Olyphant remarked that Deadwood "almost has done more for me since we wrapped than while it was on. I continue to draw from it, to steal from it. I'm much better at my job now because of the things I learned while doing it. David Milch is one of the greatest writers, storytellers, directors, creative forces I've ever been around." He has been somewhat critical of his own performance: "Frankly, the show is much better than my performance ... Ian was like a little kid, playing with the props and playing with the language and he never lost the sense of fun of it all. I wasn't operating at that same level."

2010–2015: Justified and comedic performances

Olyphant starred in FX's modern-day western series, Justified, as Deputy U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens, who is reassigned to his native Eastern Kentucky following a "Justified," but questionable, quick-draw shooting of a criminal in Miami. There, he encounters many outlaw figures from his childhood, including his father and Boyd Crowder, with whom he dug coal as a teenager. Olyphant was initially drawn to "the ease and the charm and the sort of old-fashionedness" of the character but has said he does not consider him a "good guy". The character of Raylan Givens was created by novelist Elmore Leonard, appearing in his short story "Fire in the Hole" (2001) and the novels Pronto (1993) and Riding the Rap (1995). Leonard was an executive producer of Justified and befriended Olyphant; his final novel, Raylan (2012), was inspired by the television show.

Raylan Givens has been described by many television critics as the "defining role" of Olyphant's career. Brian Lowry of Variety said it was "an unabashed star turn": "There are surely worse ways to be pigeonholed than playing tough, laconic lawmen, and Timothy Olyphant is carving himself a formidable niche in those confines ... It's an enormously appealing performance." Tim Goodman of the San Francisco Chronicle praised "an incredibly riveting performance": "Olyphant's steely gaze, Zen interior and matinee looks called to mind a younger Clint Eastwood." Daniel Fienberg of HitFix described him as "a tremendously compelling actor. It's not that he thrives only on minimalism, but he gets a lot out of a little. His performance is about potential energy, or potential violence. And Olyphant does "intense and coiled" to perfection." Matthew Gilbert of The Boston Globe said: "It's hard to imagine any other actor in the part, as Olyphant milks Raylan's smooth, laconic cowboy style for as much wry humor as he can. He is riveting without a lot of noise — both his body language and his conversation are pared down, and yet his presence is always resonant." Although Olyphant was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series in 2011, he and the show were often perceived to have been "snubbed" by Emmy voters. Matt Zoller Seitz of Vulture suggested this was because it was "the kind of performance that almost nobody recognizes as 'acting.' It's an old-fashioned movie hero performance in which much of the emotional action is internal and articulated with great subtlety." Similarly, Robert Bianco of USA Today commented that his "masterfully complete immersion in the role seems to have masked the talent expended playing it".

Olyphant also served as a co-executive producer on Justified, working with Graham Yost and the writing team on some of the show's storylines and coming to the set on his days off to work with guest stars. He has described producing as "the greatest thing about this job". Yost has said of his producer credit: "Often on shows that really doesn't mean much. On this show it actually doesn't reflect the depth of his involvement, which would be an even bigger credit. Tim is the biggest reminder for everyone that we're in the Elmore Leonard world. And that it needs to be funny and dark and twisted, and it needs to speak with all of those voices at the same time." Justified was awarded a Peabody Award in 2011.

2015–present: Santa Clarita Diet, Deadwood and Justified return

Olyphant had a recurring guest role as a fictionalized version of himself in the Fox comedy The Grinder (2015–2016). His performance received positive critical notices, with USA Today's Robert Bianco declaring it an "Emmy-deserving performance". The role won him the Critics' Choice Television Award for Best Guest Performer in a Comedy Series.

In early 2016, Olyphant starred in the world premiere of Kenneth Lonergan's comedy Hold On to Me Darling at the off-Broadway Atlantic Theater Company. His character, Strings McCrane, is a self-absorbed country singer and actor who returns home to Tennessee following his mother's death. Ben Brantley of the New York Times found him "entertainingly irritating" in a performance that "avoids the obvious route of histrionic posing"; "The startling, bona fide sorrow that Mr. Olyphant brings to [the final scene] truly illuminates everything that has come before." Frank Rizzo of Variety felt his performance was "a stunner, striking just the right notes of guilelessness, obliviousness and narcissism to make Strings one of the most appealing messes in a long time". David Rooney of The Hollywood Reporter felt the role "seems tailor-made for his laid-back swagger and sly humor ... Olyphant's natural charm ensures that Strings' unapologetic self-absorption remains more human than monstrous." He also played Henry, ex-husband of Sandy (Jennifer Aniston), in the universally-panned ensemble romantic comedy Mother's Day (2016); he appeared in Oliver Stone's Snowden (2016) as a CIA agent who befriends whistleblower Edward Snowden just prior to Snowden's fleeing to Russia, after publicly leaking classified US government information.

In February 2017, Olyphant began starring in the Netflix horror-comedy Santa Clarita Diet, and also served as an executive producer for the series, which co-starred Drew Barrymore. Netflix renewed the series for a second season in March 2017 and for a third, ultimately final season in May 2018. Dark Was the Night, an independent drama in which he starred with Marisa Tomei, was filmed in 2015 and premiered at the 2018 Galway Film Fleadh.

In early 2016, HBO announced that David Milch was developing a two-hour film continuation of Deadwood. The follow-up to the television series began production in October 2018. Deadwood: The Movie premiered on HBO on May 31, 2019.

Personal life

Olyphant has been married to his college sweetheart Alexis Knief since 1991. They live in Westwood, Los Angeles, and have three children. His daughter Vivian plays his character's daughter on Justified: City Primeval.

From 2006 to late 2008, Olyphant was the sports reporter for Joe Escalante's morning radio show on Los Angeles' Indie 103.1; film director David Lynch served as the show's weatherman. Olyphant phoned the station every weekday, delivering his reports in an unconventional style. Following the station's demise, he joked: "If you know of anyone looking for sports reports from an actor who is often just going off of what he recalls happened yesterday, or reading it directly from the newspaper, then I'm your guy."

He is also a tennis player, and has participated in many pro-celebrity tournaments. He is a fan of the Los Angeles Clippers and the Los Angeles Dodgers, and he threw out the ceremonial first pitch at a Dodgers game in 2013.

Filmography