Timothy "Tim" Blake Nelson is an American director, writer, and actor.
Early life Nelson was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, the son
of Ruth Nelson, who is a noted social activist and philanthropist in Tulsa, and a geologist/wildcatter
father.
Nelson is Jewish.
His maternal grandparents escaped the Nazis shortly before World War II, fleeing to Britain
in 1938 and emigrating to the United States in 1941.
His father's family were Russian Jewish immigrants.
Nelson attended the Oklahoma Summer Arts Institute at Quartz Mountain Resort Arts and Conference
Center in Lone Wolf, Oklahoma.
He is a 1982 graduate of Holland Hall School in Tulsa, and a graduate of Brown University,
where he was a Classics major as well as Senior Orator for his class of 1986.
Additionally, Nelson won the Workman/Driskoll award for excellence in Classical Studies.
He graduated from Juilliard in 1990.
Career Nelson's debut play, Eye of God, was produced
at Seattle Repertory Theatre in 1992.
The Grey Zone premiered at MCC Theater in New York in 1996, where his 1998 work Anadarko
was also produced.
Nelson has appeared as an actor in film, TV and theatre.
He had a featured role as Delmar in the film O Brother, Where Art Thou?.
According to directors Joel and Ethan Coen, he was the only one in the cast or crew who
had read Homer's Odyssey, a work upon which the film is loosely based.
He sings "In the Jailhouse Now" on the soundtrack, for which he received a Grammy.
He played Samuel Sterns in the 2008 film The Incredible Hulk.
He also narrates the 2001 audiobook At the Altar of Speed: The Fast Life and Tragic Death
of Dale Earnhardt, Sr.. He has appeared on stage extensively off Broadway in New York
at theatres including Manhattan Theater Club, Playwrights Horizons, Manhattan Class Company,
Soho Repertory Theater, New York Theater Workshop, and Central Park's Open Air Theater in the
Shakespeare plays Richard III, Troilus and Cressida, and A Midsummer Night's Dream.
He has directed film versions of his plays The Grey Zone and Eye of God, as well as writing
and directing two original screenplays: 1998's Kansas and Leaves of Grass which was released
in 2009.
He is also the director of O, based on William Shakespeare's play Othello and set in a modern-day
high school.
As a film director he has received numerous awards, including, for Eye of God, the Tokyo
Bronze Prize at the Tokyo International Film Festival and the American Independent Award
at the Seattle International Film Festival; for O, the Best Director Award at the Seattle
International Film Festival; and for The Grey Zone, the National Board of Review's Freedom
of Expression Award.
He is on the Board of Directors for The Actors Center in New York City, as well as Soho Rep
Theatre.
Tim guest-starred on the CSI: Crime Scene Investigation season 10 episode "Working Stiffs".
Personal life Nelson currently resides in New York City
with his wife, Lisa Benavides, and his three sons.
On May 8, 2009, Nelson was inducted as an honorary member of the University of Tulsa's
Beta of Oklahoma chapter of the Phi Beta Kappa national collegiate honor society.
Filmography As actor
This Is My Life Motel Blue 19
Amateur Heavyweights
Dead Man's Walk Joe's Apartment
Donnie Brasco Prix Fixe
The Thin Red Line Hamlet
O Brother, Where Art Thou?
The Good Girl Cherish
Minority Report 2 Brothers and a Bride
A Foreign Affair Holes
Wonderland Scooby Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed
The Last Shot Bereft
Meet the Fockers The Amateurs
My Suicidal Sweetheart Warm Springs
The Big White Syriana
Come Early Morning The Darwin Awards
Hoot Fido
The Astronaut Farmer The Incredible Hulk
American Violet Saint John of Las Vegas
CSI: Crime Scene Investigation "Working Stiffs" Leaves of Grass
CHAOS Yelling to the Sky
Flypaper Modern Family
The Big Year Detachment
Big Miracle Lincoln
Child of God Snake and Mongoose
As I Lay Dying The Homesman
Blue Caprice Anesthesia
Klondike The Fantastic Four
As director Eye of God
Kansas O
The Grey Zone Haskett's Chance
Leaves of Grass The Homesman
Anesthesia References
External links Tim Blake Nelson at the Internet Movie Database