Film & TV
Seymour Cassel
1935–2019 · actor
Oscar-nominated star of John Cassavetes's independent films and Wes Anderson favorite, who grew up in Detroit and started out building theater props there.
- Born
Detroit, Michigan- Died
Los Angeles, California
aged 84- Birth name
- Seymour Joseph Cassel
- Detroit years
- 1935–1950s
- Field
- Film & TV
01 / The Detroit story
The Detroit story
Seymour Cassel was born in Detroit to a nightclub owner and a performer. After his mother filed for divorce in the late 1940s, he was sent to live with his godmother in Detroit, and as a teenager he joined a street gang; at 17 he was told to choose between the Navy and jail, and he chose the Navy. After three years of service and a short spell in college, he came back to Detroit, where he built sets and props for a theater company and picked up small acting parts. Convinced he had found his calling, he bought a bus ticket to New York. There he fell in with John Cassavetes, becoming a key player in American independent cinema, from Faces (1968), which earned him an Oscar nomination, to Minnie and Moskowitz and Love Streams. Late in life he became a regular in Wes Anderson's films.
Highlights
- Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor for Faces (1968)
- Appeared in over 200 films and TV shows across five decades
- Regular in John Cassavetes's films, including Minnie and Moskowitz (1971)
- Wes Anderson's Rushmore, The Royal Tenenbaums and The Life Aquatic