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Josh Pais

American actor (born 1964)

Summary

American actor (born 1964)

Field	Value
name	Josh Pais
image	File:Josh Pais at the 2024 New York Film Festival (cropped).jpg
caption	Pais in 2024
birth_name	Joshua Atwill Pais
birth_date
birth_place	New York City, U.S.
occupation	Actor
Acting coach
years_active	1988–present
spouse	{{plainlist
* {{marriage	Lisa Emery	1990	2003	end	divorced}}
children	1
parents	Abraham Pais
Lila Lee Atwill

Acting coach

Lila Lee Atwill

Joshua Atwill Pais (born June 21, 1964) is an American actor and acting coach. He has appeared in the films Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990), Music of the Heart (1999), Assassination of a High School President (2008), I Saw the Light (2015) and Motherless Brooklyn (2019). He also appeared in nine episodes of Ray Donovan.

He is also the director of the 2002 documentary 7th Street (the street he grew up on in Alphabet City, Manhattan) depicting various personages living there between the years 1992–2002.

Early life

Pais was born in New York City, and is the son of Lila Lee (née Atwill), a painter and poet, and Dutch-born physicist, professor, and writer Abraham Pais. His father was from a Jewish family of Portuguese descent, and his mother converted to Judaism.

Career

He has appeared in Hollywood films including Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (in which he was both in the costume and was the voice) as Raphael, Music of the Heart, Scream 3, It Runs in the Family, Phone Booth, Little Manhattan and Find Me Guilty. He played Assistant M.E. Borak in 15 episodes of the series Law & Order, between 1990 and 2002. He also played the Spanish teacher in the film Assassination of a High School President. He had a recurring role as an obnoxious movie producer on the American crime drama series Ray Donovan. He also appeared as a lawyer on 2 Broke Girls.

Personal life

Pais married actress Lisa Emery on August 27, 1990. They are parents of the actor Zane Pais. Pais and Emery divorced in 2003. In 2006 he married entrepreneur Marie Forleo.

Filmography

Film

Year	Title	Role
1989	Jacknife	Rick
1990	How to Be Louise	Mike
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles	Raphael
1996	I'm Not Rappaport	Rodney
1997	Colin Fitz Lives!	Cathartic Fan
1998	Safe Men	Mitchell
Rounders	Weitz
A Civil Action	Law Clerk
Karma Local	Charlie
1999	Music of the Heart	Dennis
2000	Scream 3	Wallace
Swimming	Neil Wheeler
2001	Scotland, PA	Douglas McKenna
A Beautiful Mind	Princeton Professor
2002	Phone Booth	Mario
2003	The Station Agent	Carl
It Runs in the Family	Barney
2005	Little Manhattan	Ronny
Confess	Allen Kelner
The Reality Trap	Tom
2006	Unconscious	Warner Wilcott
2007	Teeth	Dr. Godfrey
Year of the Dog	Robin
Watching the Detectives	Andy
Neal Cassady	Calbert Holt
2008	Assassination of a High School President	Padre Newell
Synecdoche, New York	Ophthalmologist
Lifelines	Ira Bernstein
2009	Adventureland	Mr. Lewin
Reunion	Saul
Leaves of Grass	Ken Feinman
Gentlemen Broncos	Todd Keefe
2010	Please Give	Adam
2011	The Key Man	Dr. Abraham Meyer
Detachment	Meredith's Father
2012	Arbitrage	John Aimes
Price Check	Doug Cain
The Normals	Dr. Honeysack
2013	Touchy Feely	Paul
Syrup	Davidson
2014	That Awkward Moment	Fred
5 Flights Up	Jackson
2015	I Saw the Light	Dore Schary
The Family Fang	Freeman
2016	Bakery in Brooklyn	Alexander Johnson
2017	Crown Heights	D.A. Mengano
Going in Style	Chuck Lofton
2018	The Land of Steady Habits	Larry Eichner
2019	Motherless Brooklyn	William Lieberman
Joker	Hoyt Vaughn
2020	The Mimic	The Neurotic Lawyer
2021	Checkout	Dov
2022	Funny Pages	Lewis
Spoiler Alert	Scott
2023	You Hurt My Feelings	Josh Pais
2024	The Friend	Jerry
2025	If I Had Legs I'd Kick You	Brad

Television

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1988	The Cosby Show	Andy	Episode: "Waterworks"
1989	Murphy Brown	Secretary #18	Episode: "Funnies Girl"
Teething with Anger	Dog Guy	Television film
1990–2009	Law & Order	Various roles	16 episodes
1993	Roseanne	Sean	Episode: "Be My Baby"
1994	The Second Greatest Story Ever Told	Joey Joesephson	Television film
1996	On Seventh Avenue	Donny
1997, 1998	Star Trek: Deep Space Nine	Gaila	2 episodes
1998	Homicide: Life on the Street	M.E. #2	Episode: "Shaggy Dog, City Goat"
Sex and the City	Nick Waxler	Episode: "Models and Mortals"
The Crow: Stairway to Heaven	Myron	Episode: "Death Wish"
2000	The Street	Elliot Bando	Episode: "Closet Case"
2000–2016	Law & Order: Special Victims Unit	Robert Sorensen	10 episodes
2001	The Job	Mark	Episode: "Anger"
2002	Porn 'n Chicken	Prof. Hoffman	Television film
2003, 2007	Law & Order: Criminal Intent	Noah Brezner	2 episodes
2004	Hope & Faith	Harvey Zak	Episode: "Hope Gets a Job"
2005	Rescue Me	Leon	Episode: "Reunion"
2006	The Sopranos	Zev Charney	Episode: "Mr. & Mrs. John Sacrimoni Request..."
2007	The Bronx Is Burning	Phil Pepe	3 episodes
Damages	George Berber	Episode: "She Spat at Me"
2009	Michael & Michael Have Issues	Jim Biederman	7 episodes
2010	Outlaw	Doc Levin	2 episodes
2011	How to Make It in America	Garrett	Episode: "In or Out"
2012	2 Broke Girls	Leo	Episode: "And the Drug Money"
NYC 22	Maxwell Tanner	Episode: "Jumpers"
2013	Psych	Dr. Richard Umma	Episode: "No Trout About It"
2013–2019	Ray Donovan	Stu Feldman	9 episodes
2014	The Good Wife	Howard Lampey	Episode: "We, the Juries"
Alpha House	Owen Lefkowitz	Episode: "The Nuptials"
Duty	Ira	Television film
2015	Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll	Ira Feinbaum	8 episodes
2015–2021	Younger	Todd Heller	5 episodes
2018	High Maintenance	Ira	Episode: "Ghost"
Maniac	Andy	3 episodes
I Was A Teenage Pillow Queen	David	Television film
2019	Tales of the City	Doug	Episode: "Rainbow Warriors"
Mrs. Fletcher	Barry	5 episodes
2020	The Plot Against America	Maurice Silverman	Episode: "Part 5"
2022	The Dropout	Wade Miquelon	2 episodes
2023	Paul T. Goldman	Ryan Sinclair	2 episodes
2024	Power Book III: Raising Kanan	Lowell Gelfand	Episode: "Home to Roost"
A Man in Full	Herb Richman	5 episodes

References

"Josh Pais Biography (1958–)".
Crow, Kelly. (November 4, 2017). "Neighborhood Report: Citypeople; For Seventh Street, a Love Letter on Film". New York Times.
Dollar, Steve. (August 16, 2013). "Spotlight Turns to 'That Guy' on TV". Wall Street Journal.
(September 4, 2013). "How Josh Pais Learned To Be Invisible – The Arty Semite – Forward.com". Blogs.forward.com.
"Josh Pais – Yahoo! Movies".

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.

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