Alfred Molina — Nominee for Best Performance by a Leading Actor in a Play

Show:
Red

Role:
Mark Rothko, the celebrated Abstract Expressionist artist who accepted a commission in the late 1950s to create a series of murals for the new Four Seasons restaurant in New York.

Bio Brief:
The prolific Molina has been a popular film presence in everything from Raiders of the Lost Ark and Enchanted April to Spider-Man 2, An Education and the forthcoming Prince of Persia—but he always makes time for a juicy theatrical role.

Other Honors for This Role
—Drama Desk Award nomination for Outstanding Actor in a Play
—Drama League nomination for Distinguished Performance Award

Tony History:
1998: Tony Award nomination for Best Actor in a Play, Art
2004: Tony Award nomination for Best Actor in a Musical, Fiddler on the Roof

Fun Fact:
This is Molina’s second time on Broadway in a play with an artistic storyline and a three-letter title: Twelve years before playing Mark Rothko in Red, he won rave reviews as the odd man out in Art, Yasmina Reza’s Tony-winning comedy about an all-white painting.

Quotable Quote:
“It’s not a ‘bio play’ because it only looks at a two-year period in Mark Rothko’s 68 years on the planet. So it’s a small chunk of his life, but it’s able to focus very specifically on that one event [of painting murals designed to hang in the Four Seasons restaurant]. It’s a beautiful play, and we’ve had a fantastic time doing it, so I’m very happy to bring it to New York because it is a quintessential New York play.” —Molina in an opening night interview with Broadway.com, 4/1/10