John C. McGinley
John C. McGinley
John Christopher McGinleyis an American actor, author and former comedian. He is most notable for his roles as Perry Cox in Scrubs, Bob Slydell in Office Space, Captain Hendrix in The Rock, Sergeant Red O'Neill in Oliver Stone's Platoon and Marv in Stone's Wall Street. He has also written and produced for television and film. Apart from acting, McGinley is also an author, a board member and international spokesperson for the Global Down Syndrome Foundation, and a spokesperson for the...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionActor
Date of Birth3 August 1959
CountryUnited States of America
My son, Max, was born the day Princess Di died.
The idea for actors is to make a living telling stories, so if you can do that, then you're way ahead of the game.
With Shakespeare, if you're not going to do the iambic pentameter, do some other play.
Turns out, Down syndrome is the most common genetic disorder, occurring once in every 800 births, and no one really knows why it happens. It just does.
I'm just really proud of 'Dead Head Fred.
I'm a homebody. If I'm not working I'm with my family being a dad.
I wanted to be Red Barber, Mel Allen or Howard Cosell. I loved their personalities and all of their sounds.
As an actor, it's great to play a strong leader with a heart of gold.
TV tends to look for the living equivalents of squeaky-clean Kens and Barbies, but with my dial I'm more like Ken's dirty old uncle.
I would love to have a photographic memory. It would come in handy with the rants I'm given on Scrubs... often on short notice!
I like to be in waiting rooms with people as they're auditioning, because their terror calms me.
I did feel Dr. Cox, the character that I was auditioning for, was too similar to the head of the hospital. He was too arrogant and mean. I approached him kind of like I had a miniature Max sitting on my shoulder. I pictured Max saying, "This guy has got to give love every once in a while. He has to!" I knew there had to be tiny little windows of redemption.
I did an episode of 'Frasier' with my friend Kelsey Grammer once.
The learning curve on soaps is through the roof because it's a three-camera setup. There's a master and then there's two singles. And the great thing about soaps, and soap actors will tell you, is that when you get your line wrong, they don't re-shoot it. They just cut to the person listening.