Vincent D'Onofrio

Early life

D'Onofrio was born in Brooklyn, New York. He is of Italian descent, with ancestors from Naples. His paternal grandfather was an upholsterer and his maternal grandparents opened the first Italian restaurant in Hawaii. His parents Gennaro "Gene" Joseph D'Onofrio and Phyllis Ann Minicola met and married while Gennaro was stationed in Hawaii with the U.S. Air Force. Gennaro was trained as an interior decorator but spent most of his spare time in amateur theater. Vincent is the youngest of three siblings and the only son. His older sisters are Antoinette (born 1956) and Elizabeth (born 1957), an actress and drama coach residing in Fort Myers Beach, Florida. He was raised in Hawaii and Colorado during his early years.

D'Onofrio's parents divorced when he was young; his mother later married George Meyer, making Vincent a stepbrother to Guy and Connie, Meyer's children from a previous marriage. The family relocated to the Hialeah, Florida area. D'Onofrio has described himself as a shy boy who spent "a lot of time in my room, staying in my head". He later became interested in magic and sleight of hand, learning from Cuban entertainers who owned a small magic shop.

In his teens, he worked backstage in set building and sound production at a number of community theaters run by his father. He graduated from Hialeah-Miami Lakes Senior High School.

Career

Acting and filmmaking

After graduating from high school, D'Onofrio started to appear on stage. During an 18-month stint at the University of Colorado in Boulder, he was involved with small, community-theater productions. He later studied method acting at the American Stanislavsky Theater and the Actors Studio, under coaches Sonia Moore and Sharon Chatten, which landed him his first paid role in Off-Broadway's This Property Is Condemned. He went on to appear in a number of their productions, including Of Mice and Men and Sexual Perversity in Chicago. D'Onofrio continued his career by performing in many New York University student productions while also working as a bouncer at the Hard Rock Cafe, a bodyguard for Robert Plant and Yul Brynner and also worked as a deliveryman.

In 1984, he made his Broadway debut as Nick Rizzoli in Open Admissions. In 1986, D'Onofrio took on the role often considered the defining moment in his acting career, as Pvt. Leonard Lawrence, an overweight, clumsy Marine recruit in the movie Full Metal Jacket. On a tip from friend Matthew Modine, D'Onofrio was urged to send audition tapes to director Stanley Kubrick, in England. Four tapes later, D'Onofrio landed the role. Originally, the character of Pvt. Lawrence had been written as a "skinny ignorant redneck"; however, Kubrick believed the role would have more impact if the character were big and clumsy. D'Onofrio gained 70 lb (32 kg) for the role, bringing his weight to 280 lb (130 kg). While filming an obstacle course scene for the movie, D'Onofrio injured his left knee, compounded by the excessive weight, which required surgical reconstruction.

Over the course of nine months after filming of Full Metal Jacket was completed, D'Onofrio lost nearly all the weight he had gained for his role. He went on to play Dawson, the owner of Dawson's Garage, in Adventures in Babysitting (1987). He appears in one scene near the end of the film. In 1988, he was cast in another supporting role in the film Mystic Pizza, playing the fiancé of Lili Taylor's character. In the film, which was Julia Roberts' breakout film, he was billed under his full name Vincent Philip D'Onofrio. In 1989 he played a supporting role as Young Gar in The Blood of Heroes alongside Joan Chen and Rutger Hauer, for which he is also billed under his full name.

D'Onofrio continued to play a wide variety of minor or supporting roles, including the father of a saint in Nancy Savoca's Household Saints (1993), director Orson Welles in Tim Burton's Ed Wood (1994), farmer Edgar and the evil "Bug" that possesses him from Men in Black (1997), a man who claims to be from the future in Happy Accidents (2000), and the serial killer Carl Stargher, opposite Jennifer Lopez's character in The Cell (2000).

Directing

D'Onofrio has also had success behind the camera, producing The Whole Wide World (1996), in which he also starred, and Guy (1997) as well as executive producing The Velocity of Gary (1998) and Steal This Movie! (2000). In 2005, he directed and starred in the short film Five Minutes, Mr. Welles (2005), which represented a culmination of D'Onofrio's desire to improve on his performance as Welles in Ed Wood, which reportedly left director Tim Burton underwhelmed. Burton decided to procure the services of Maurice LaMarche, a voiceover artist known for his imitation of Welles' voice, to produce a more dramatically effective rendering of the character's dialogue. Disappointed with his performance, having been given two weeks notice to prepare for the role, D'Onofrio wrote, produced, directed, and starred in the short in answer to the critics and himself. The film depicts D'Onofrio as Welles preparing for his role in The Third Man.

In 2008, he returned to directing with the feature-length musical slasher Don't Go in the Woods (2010), written by his friend Joe Vinciguerra, featuring a score by Sam Bisbee, and starring various unknown actors hand-picked by D'Onofrio. It follows an indie rock band who venture into the woods to write new music, only to meet a crazed murderer (Tim Lajcik). The film, shot in 13 days near Kingston, New York, had a budget of $100,000 and played at numerous festivals throughout 2009 and 2010. Initially slated for national release in December 2011, the film opened to limited theaters on January 13, 2012, and was released on DVD on June 12, 2012. His next project is directing and starring in the 2019 western The Kid.

Music

On October 27, 2009, D'Onofrio made his musical debut, appearing in character as comedic country singer George Geronimo Gerkie at Joe's Pub in New York City. He appeared as Gerkie again at New York's Hammerstein Ballroom on December 6, 2009, during Matt Pinfield's Holiday Extravaganza Show and at the premiere of his movie Don't Go in the Woods at Joe's Pub on May 28, 2010. A fourth concert was held at the pub on July 22, 2010, with proceeds from the event going to the Utah Meth Cops project.

On November 11, 2011, while teaching students at the Tribeca Flashpoint Media Arts Academy, D'Onofrio discussed plans for further concerts, and a George Gerkie documentary which is to be filmed by Ultrasuede: In Search of Halston director Whitney Smith.

In September 2011, Australian hip hop band The Funkoars, released an album titled The Quickening, featuring the song "Being Vincent D'Onofrio", an homage to D'Onofrio's career and his work on Law and Order: Criminal Intent. In February 2012, the band announced their upcoming "Being Vincent D'Onofrio Tour 2012" with artwork featuring D'Onofrio's face in place of the band members'.

In 2014, D'Onofrio released two songs as part of an avant garde spoken-word project with multi-instrumentalist and composer Dana Lyn. The first single, "I'm a Hamster", gathered attention on social media. The full album was made available for purchase in March 2015, on the band's website.

Writing

In August 2022 D'Onofrio announced the upcoming publication of a children's book based on his viral tweet about pigs and their reputed inability to look up. The book, entitled Pigs Can't Look Up, was published in May 2023 and expanded on D'Onofrio's original tweet, creating a character who commits to the act of kindness the tweet described.

Other work

In 1998, D'Onofrio, with his father Gene and sister Elizabeth, founded the RiverRun International Film Festival in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. In 2003, former film producer and dean of the School of Filmmaking at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, Dale Pollock, took over the festival and moved it from Brevard, North Carolina, to Winston-Salem. Annually, the festival showcases the best films offered from the independent and international industry, as well as those from student filmmakers.

In 2008, alongside his sister, Toni, D'Onofrio began hosting events to raise money for the Utah Meth Cops Project. He served as the project's spokesperson from 2009 to 2012.

In the fall of 2011, D'Onofrio became a member of the advisory board for the Woodstock Film Festival, which holds an annual event for independent films. Other members of the board include Griffin Dunne, Ethan Hawke, and Aidan Quinn.

In February 2011, D'Onofrio became a public face of the gun control debate, appearing in an ad by the Citizens Crime Commission of New York City urging a ban on large-capacity ammunition magazines.

In 2012, D'Onofrio returned to teach at the Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute where his daughter was a student.

On August 9, 2012, it was announced that D'Onofrio had been chosen to narrate the documentary, Heroes Behind The Badge (2012). The film follows four fallen officers and the impact their deaths have had on their families, colleagues, and communities. The proceeds are benefitting a memorial museum being built in Washington, D.C. A longtime supporter of the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial, D'Onofrio has been the spokesperson for the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund and Museum since 2010. A follow-up to the documentary, subtitled Sacrifice and Survival, was released in the fall of 2013.

On November 13, 2012, D'Onofrio joined the cast of the off-Broadway production Clive, alongside Brooks Ashmanskas and Zoe Kazan. Produced by Jonathan Marc Sherman and directed by Ethan Hawke, the play, based on Baal by Bertolt Brecht, opened at The New Group at Theatre Row on February 7, 2013.

Personal life

In the early 1990s, D'Onofrio dated actress Greta Scacchi, with whom he starred in several films during that period (including The Player and Fires Within). Their daughter is actress Leila George (b. ~1992). He was the father-in-law of actor Sean Penn, who was married to George from 2020 to 2022.

On March 22, 1997, D'Onofrio married Dutch model Carin van der Donk and the couple had a son (born 1999). They separated in the early 2000s, but reconciled and had a second son (born 2008).

In June 2023, D'Onofrio filed for divorce in Manhattan Supreme Court.

On November 10, 2004, D'Onofrio collapsed on the set of Law & Order: Criminal Intent. He collapsed again at home a few days later and was diagnosed with exhaustion, attributed to his 14-hour days filming Criminal Intent, and the making of his short film Five Minutes, Mr. Welles during the show's hiatus.

D'Onofrio is dyslexic. In 2011, he stated his belief that he might have been diagnosed with autism as a child had knowledge of the condition been more advanced at the time.

Filmography

Audio

Mr. Laughs: A Look Behind the Curtain (2008), narrator for autobiographical documentary based on the life of comedian Sal Richards.

Man on the Ledge (October 2010), radio play.

Heroes Behind the Badge (Fall 2012), narrator for documentary.

Like Father, Like Son and Ram King (October 2012), Tales From Beyond The Pale live radio play performed live at Dixon Place in NYC.

Citizen Jane: Battle for the City (April 2017), voice of Robert Moses for documentary on Jane Jacobs' crusade to save Washington Square Park from being overrun by an expressway.