John Cariani

---

title: "John Cariani" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["1969-births", "male-actors-from-maine", "male-actors-from-massachusetts", "20th-century-american-dramatists-and-playwrights", "american-male-musical-theatre-actors", "american-male-television-actors", "amherst-college-alumni", "living-people", "writers-from-brockton,-massachusetts", "people-from-presque-isle,-maine", "singers-from-massachusetts", "american-lgbtq-male-actors", "american-lgbtq-dramatists-and-playwrights", "lgbtq-people-from-massachusetts"] description: "American actor and playwright (born 1969)" topic_path: "arts" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Cariani" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary American actor and playwright (born 1969) ::

::data[format=table title="Infobox artist"]

Field	Value
name	John Cariani
image	John Cariani Enfermo Amor Premiere.jpg
image_size	200x300px
caption	Cariani in 2022 at the premiere of Enfermo Amor in Mexico City
birth_date
birth_place	Brockton, Massachusetts, United States
education	Amherst College
occupation	Actor, playwright
known_for	Law & Order, Almost, Maine, Fiddler on the Roof, Something Rotten!, The Band's Visit
spouse	John Lloyd
::

| name = John Cariani | image = John Cariani Enfermo Amor Premiere.jpg|thumb| | image_size = 200x300px | caption = Cariani in 2022 at the premiere of Enfermo Amor in Mexico City | birth_date = | birth_place = Brockton, Massachusetts, United States | education = Amherst College | occupation = Actor, playwright | known_for = Law & Order, Almost, Maine, Fiddler on the Roof, Something Rotten!, The Band's Visit | spouse = John Lloyd

John Edward Cariani (born July 22, 1969) is an American actor and playwright. Cariani is best known as the forensic expert Julian Beck in Law & Order. On stage, he earned a Tony Award nomination for his role as Motel the Tailor in the 2004 Broadway revival of Fiddler on the Roof. He is also known for his roles in Broadway shows Something Rotten! and The Band's Visit, and for writing Almost, Maine, one of the most produced plays in American high schools.

Early life

Born in Brockton, Massachusetts, Cariani was eight when his family moved to Presque Isle, Maine.

He attended Presque Isle High School where he was active in the music and theater programs. After graduating in 1987, he attended Amherst College, where he was a member of the Zumbyes, Amherst's oldest a-cappella group, and the Glee Club. After graduating from Amherst College in 1991 with a B.A. in history, he studied acting and directing at now defunct StageWest in Springfield, Massachusetts. He then moved to New York at age 27 to pursue acting.

Career

Cariani spent his early years in New York working with the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival, and acting in Off-Broadway plays, television commercials, and films.

His first break came in 1999 when he was cast in the Off-Broadway play It's My Party (and I'll Die If I Want To), starring F. Murray Abraham and Joyce Van Patten.

Cariani broke into film and TV in 2000 when he was cast in the independent film, Scotland, PA, opposite Christopher Walken and guest-starred on the TV series Ed

In 2001, he landed his first major film role opposite Robert De Niro in the Warner Brothers film Showtime (2002)

In 2002, he joined the cast of Law & Order, playing the role of forensic expert Julian Beck from 2002 to 2007.

Since then, he has appeared in several TV shows, films, plays and musicals, both on and off-Broadway, and in regional theaters across the country.

Playwriting

As playwright, Cariani is best known for his first play, Almost, Maine, which was developed at the Cape Cod Theatre Project in 2002. It premiered at Portland Stage Company (in Portland, Maine) in 2004. Almost, Maine opened Off-Broadway in 2006 and was featured in Smith and Kraus' New Playwrights: Best Plays of 2006.

The play was published by Dramatists Play Service in 2007 and has since become one of the most popular plays in the United States with nearly 100 professional productions and over 5000 community, university, and high school productions to date.

Over the past decade, it has become one of the most frequently produced plays in North American high schools.

In 2014, Transport Group revived Almost, Maine Off-Broadway to critical acclaim. The Advocate named the production to its "Best Theatre of 2014" list, and Lincoln Center recorded the production for its Theatre on Film and Tape Archive.

Dramatists Play Service recently published its 80th Anniversary Edition, a boxed set of 8 definitive titles representing each decade of the Play Service's history. Almost, Maine was selected to represent DPS' eighth decade.

In 2020, Cariani adapted Almost, Maine into a novel, Almost, Maine: A Novel, published by Macmillan.

Cariani's second play, cul-de-sac premiered Off-Broadway in April 2006 in a Transport Group production. The New York Times described cul-de-sac as "charming, witty and macabre." The play was reworked and presented at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts (New York City) and at High Point University (High Point, NC) in 2016 and received further development at the Cape Cod Theatre Project. It received a professional production at Half Theatre in Poughkeepsie in 2016.

Cariani's third play, Last Gas premiered at Portland Stage Company (Portland, Maine) in 2010. Cariani noted that "Almost, Maine is almost a love letter to northern Maine and Last Gas is a more realistic look at that part of the world." It has been described as "a bittersweet romance about two people who lack the courage to admit they love one another ... it's an undeniable winner despite its predictable twist." The play ran at Opera House Arts, Stonington Opera House, Maine, in 2013 and at Geva Theatre Center in Rochester, New York in the winter of 2014. It was published by Dramatists Play Service in 2014.

LOVE/SICK is Cariani's most recent play. It premiered at High Point University in the fall of 2010, then was presented at the Portland Stage Company in the spring of 2013, and was produced by Hartford TheaterWorks in 2014. The play ran Off-Broadway in February 2015 at the Royal Family Performing Arts Space. The Huffington Post gave the Off Broadway production a positive review: "Sometimes playwright John Cariani looks at the world — actually the worlds of love and relationships — through rose-colored glasses. Just as often he views those worlds through lenses tinted a middling-to-dark-gray or maybe a jaundiced yellow. … While poking fun at the happily-ever-after notion by means of a strong dose of happily-never-after, Cariani shoots his cockeyed valentines with a quiver full of funny lines. He knows how to keep audiences laughing while passing along disappointing news."

LOVE/SICK has been performed in Riga, Latvia and Mexico City and was recently made into a Spanish language feature called Enfermo Amor on Vix+.

Two new vignettes from LOVE/SICK premiered at Stonehill College in Easton, MA for a filmed version of the play, directed by Cariani.

Personal life

Cariani and his husband John Lloyd, a retired NYPD detective, have been together since 1999 and live in the Bronx.

Filmography

Film roles

::data[format=table]

Year	Film	Role	Notes
2001	Kissing Jessica Stein	Chuck
2001	Scotland, PA	Ed the 'not-too-bright' Cop
2001	The Shaft	Security Guard Gary
2002	Showtime	Charlie Hertz
2003	Robot Stories	Salesman
2004	The Reunion	Scott	Short
2004	Messengers	Derek the Cop
2008	High Street Plumbing	Big Boy	Short
2011	Certainty	Odd Interviewer
2011	Henry	Henry	Short
2012	Elephant Sighs	Joel
2013	Sleeping With The Fishes	Louis Belsky
2014	Deliver us from Evil	Zookeeper
2014	Child of Grace	Ollie
2015	Paper Dreams	Ethan
2018	Thrasher Road	TSA Supervisor
2019	Nasa Seals	Josh Peters
::

Television

::data[format=table]

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2000	Ed	Howard Pissle	NBC, episode 1.2: "The World of Possibility"
2001	Big Apple	ER Doctor	CBS, Episode 1.7
2001–2003	Law & Order: Criminal Intent	Perry	NBC, 2 episodes
2004	The 58th Annual Tony Awards	Himself - Nominee	CBS
2002–2007	Law & Order	CSU Tech Beck	NBC, 26 episodes
2006	Six Degrees	Blogger	ABC
2009–2010	Numb3rs	Otto Bahnoff	CBS, 3 episodes
2011	The Onion News Network	Michael Falk	IFC, 5 episodes
2012	Homeland	Jeff Ricker	Showtime, episode "The Choice"
2014	The Good Wife	Stuart	CBS
2015	The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon	Himself - Nigel Bottom	NBC
2016	The Blacklist	Aaron Mulgrew	NBC, episode "Drexel"
Broadway.com #LiveatFive	Himself - Guest	Broadway.com
2018	Theater Talk	Himself - Guest	PBS
The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel	Hank	Amazon Prime Video
::

Stage appearances

::data[format=table title="Theatre"]

Start year	Production	Role	Notes
1997	As You Like It	Sylvius	Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival
1998	The Winter's Tale	The Clown
Much Ado About Nothing	Verges
1999	Twelfth Night	Andrew Aguecheek
It's My Party	Ted	Arclight Theatre Company
2003	The Unrepeatable	Robert	The Lark
2004	Fiddler on the Roof	Motel	Broadway
2005	Modern Orthodox	Hershel	Ars Nova
Two Gentlemen of Verona	Speed	Off-Broadway
2006	Cul-de-sac	Joe	Transport Group
2007	The Front Page	Mr. Pincus	Williamstown Theatre Festival
2009	Minsky's	Jason	The Ahmanson
The Mystery of Irma Vep	Lord Edgar	The Old Globe Theatre
2011	Much Ado About Nothing	Dogberry
The Tempest	Trinculo
2015	Love/Sick	Various	Off-Broadway
Something Rotten!	Nigel Bottom	Broadway
2016	Picnic	Howard	Transport Group
Come Back, Little Sheba	Postman/Milkman/Messenger	Transport Group
The Band's Visit	Itzik	Atlantic Theater Company
2017	The Band's Visit	Itzik	Broadway
2019	The Music Man	Marcellus Washburn	The Kennedy Center
2021	Caroline, or Change	Stuart Gellman	Broadway
::

Awards and nominations

::data[format=table]

Year	Award	Category	Nominated Work	Result
2004	Tony Awards	Best Featured Actor in a Musical	Fiddler on the Roof
Outer Critics Circle Awards	Best Featured Actor in a Musical
2015	Something Rotten!
Grammy Awards	Best Musical Theater Album
2019	Daytime Emmy Awards	Outstanding Musical Performance in a Daytime Program	The Band's Visit
2022	Grammy Awards	Best Musical Theater Album	Caroline, or Change
::

Playwriting bibliography

::data[format=table]

Bibliography	Year	Title
2004	Almost, Maine
2006	cul-de-sac
2010	Last Gas
2012	Love/Sick
::

References

References

1. (30 September 2017). "Actor-playwright John Cariani on The Band's Visit, The Final Frontier, and more". Twin Cities Arts Reader.
2. Williams, Roger M.. (Winter 2012). "One Up on Shakespeare". Amherst College.
3. Sodhi, Simran. (November 11, 2004). "Cariani takes Broadway by storm". The Amherst Student.
4. (September 28, 2014). "Zumbyes alumni".
5. Burns-Fusaro, Nancy. (February 2, 2015). "10 questions with playwright John Cariani". The Westerly Sun.
6. (August 4, 1999). "Abraham and van Patten are couple with no time to lose in ''It's My Party ...''". Playbill.
7. [https://www.rottentomatoes.com/celebrity/john_cariani "John Cariani Credits"] rottentomatoes.com, retrieved June 23, 2019
8. [https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0137121/ "Cariani Film and TV"] imdb.com, retrieved June 23, 2019
9. [https://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/23/nyregion/nyregionspecial2/23curtainwe.html "A Romantic Comedy for Guys"] ''The New York Times'', March 23, 2008
10. [https://capecodtheatreproject.org/history/ "Cape Cod Theatre Project History 1995-2021"]
11. [https://www.almostmaine.com/praise "Almost, Maine Awards-Accolades-Honors"]
12. [https://www.broadway.com/shows/almost-maine-off-broadway/#:~:text=Almost%2C%20Maine%20is%20a%20delightful,love%20at%20an%20alarming%20rate "Almost, Maine Off-Broadway"]
13. [https://www.dramatists.com/cgi-bin/db/single.asp?key=3759 "Almost, Maine John Cariani"]
14. [https://www.almostmaine.com/about-the-play "Almost, Maine About The Play"]
15. "Official Site, ''Almost, Maine''".
16. Rampell, Catherine. (October 27, 2014). "Theater censorship is alive and well". Washington Post.
17. "Almost, Maine".
18. "New York Theater 2014".
19. Gans, Andrew. (February 25, 2014). "Transport Group's ''Almost, Maine'' will be taped for archives; One scene will be filmed two ways". Playbill.
20. [https://www.dramatists.com/cgi-bin/db/single.asp?key=5442 "The 80th Anniversary Collection"]
21. [https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250102898/almostmaine "Almost, Maine A Novel"]
22. (20 April 2006). "cul-de-sac".
23. Horn, Miriam. (May 3, 2006). "''cul-de-sac'': A study in suburban doldrums". [[The New York Times]].
24. (30 September 2017). "Actor-playwright John Cariani on ''The Band's Visit'', ''The Final Frontier'', and more". Twin Cities Arts Reader.
25. Feeney, Steve. (November 7, 2010). "''Last Gas'' a full tank of unfulfilled desires". Portland Press Herald.
26. Considine, Basil. (March 26, 2014). "Playwright John Cariani talks ''Almost, Maine'' and ''Love/Sick''".
27. Morphy, Marcia. (January 13, 2014). "Geva's ''Last Gas'' an everyday love story". Democrat and Chronicle.
28. (February 6, 2013). "Talk back to Maine playwright John Cariani".
29. (2013-03-31). "That Thing Called Love". Press Herald.
30. Clement, Olivia. (February 6, 2015). "John Cariani's ''Love/Sick'', co-starring the playwright, begins tonight off-Broadway". Playbill.
31. [https://www.huffpost.com/entry/first-nighter-john-carian_b_6654194 "First Nighter: John Cariani's Love/Sick"]
32. [https://www.mct.lv/en/productions "Chekhov Theatre"]
33. [https://vix.com/es-es/detail/video-4271402 "Tráiler: Enfermo amor"]
34. (May 29, 2014). "Love Is Out of This World. Far Out.". New York Times.
35. (April 17, 2017). "StarsInTheHouse #59 Friday 4/17 at 2PM: Broadway Cast Reunion: Caroline, or Change". youtube.

::callout[type=info title="Wikipedia Source"] This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page. ::