Phillip "Phil" LaMarr is an American actor and voice actor.
He was one of the original cast members on the sketch comedy series MADtv, and has had
an extensive voice acting career, with major roles spanning animated series Justice League/Justice
League Unlimited, Futurama, Samurai Jack, Static Shock, and Foster's Home for Imaginary
Friends, video games Metal Gear Solid 2 and 4, Mercenaries series, Metal Gear Rising:
Revengeance, the Jak and Daxter series, Darksiders, Final Fantasy XII, inFAMOUS, and Dead Island.
Early life LaMarr was born in Los Angeles, California.
He is a graduate of Harvard High School in North Hollywood, and Yale University, where
he helped found the improv comedy group Purple Crayon.
One of his biggest roles at Yale was the title character in the British comedy Trevor.
After graduating in 1989, LaMarr became a member of the award-winning sketch and improv
comedy group The Groundlings.
He also studied improv at The Second City and at the ImprovOlympic in Chicago with Del
Close.
He has also improvised with Cold Tofu and Off the Wall.
Career MADtv
LaMarr, unlike most of the other original nine cast members of MADtv, had extensive
television and film jobs experience when he joined the show.
Even before college, he had voiced a character on the Mister T cartoon show.
Some of the recurring characters LaMarr performed on MADtv were Desperation Lee, Jaq the UBS
Guy, "sexy player" Rick, talentless R&B singer Savante and Rocket Revengers star Lieutenant
Abraham Jefferson.
LaMarr has done impressions of celebrities such as
He has done impressions of Moe Howard from The Three Stooges while playing an African-American
version of the character.
LaMarr left MADtv at the end of the fifth season.
Sometimes, LaMarr fills in for Greg Proops on the Odd News small, 4 minute section on
Yahoo.com.
It features odd, but true recent news.
Voice acting work LaMarr's voiceover credits include a starring
role on Justice League/Justice League Unlimited as Green Lantern John Stewart, a major role
as Hermes Conrad and various other characters on Futurama, and the title roles on Samurai
Jack and Static Shock.
LaMarr reprised his role as Hermes Conrad in the Futurama movies Bender's Big Score,
The Beast with a Billion Backs, Bender's Game, Into the Wild Green Yonder, and upon the series
return in 2010.
He also voices Wilt and other recurring characters in Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends, Carver
Descartes on The Weekenders, and he portrayed the character Osmosis Jones in the television
series Ozzy & Drix.
He additionally voices Jazz, Omega Supreme, Oil Slick, and Jetstorm on Transformers Animated.
LaMarr portrayed Nautolan Jedi Master Kit Fisto in Star Wars : The Clone Wars on Cartoon
Network; he also played Amit Noloff, a one time character, and a Tactical Droid.
He also had a major role in Class of 3000 as Philly Phil.
He portrayed Aquaman, and voiced other characters in Young Justice; he is the voice of Baxter
Stockman in the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and voices JARVIS and Wonder Man in The Avengers:
Earth's Mightiest Heroes.
Film and theatre projects LaMarr's stage credits include The Tempest,
As You Like It, Guys and Dolls, Asylum, South Coast Repertory's Make the Break and the Sacred
Fools Theater Company's inaugural production of The Fatty Arbuckle Spookhouse Revue.
On the big screen, LaMarr is most well known as Marvin from Pulp Fiction.
He has appeared in Kill the Man, Free Enterprise, Cherish, and Manna from Heaven.
He appeared in Speaking of Sex with Bill Murray and Catherine O'Hara, and Back by Midnight
with Kirstie Alley, Rodney Dangerfield, and Randy Quaid.
LaMarr's recent film appearances include Fronterz and Choose Your Own Adventure: The Abominable
Snowman.
As of April 2006, LaMarr is filming Cook-Off!, in which he will appear as Rev. Thaddeus Briggs,
Esq.
LaMarr made a cameo appearance in the Will Ferrell film Step Brothers in which he is
viewing a house for sale with his wife.
LaMarr also was in the Yum Corp Sexual Harassment training videos.
LaMarr played Cowboy Curtis in the Los Angeles and Broadway productions of The Pee-wee Herman
Show.
The LA production ran from January 12 to February 7, 2010 at the Club Nokia @ LA Live.
The New York show opened on November 11 and ended its limited engagement on January 2,
2011.
The New York production was recorded for an HBO special that aired in March, 2011.
LaMarr also appeared in Spider-Man 2 as one of the riders standing behind Spidey, as he
was trying to save the subway train.
Video game voiceover work LaMarr performed the English voice over work
for Vamp, a villain of Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty and Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns
of the Patriots.
Additionally, LaMarr voiced the characters Reddas from Square Enix's Final Fantasy XII
as well as Ramza in the PSP version of Final Fantasy Tactics: The War of the Lions.
He also did several voices, including Skelter, for Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines.
He also did the English voice acting for the parts of Sig and Count Veger in the Jak and
Daxter video game series as well as voicing several characters in the game Marvel: Ultimate
Alliance, as well as the voice of Gadon Thek in Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic.
As well as a featuring in the Sega CD game Make My Video C+C Music Factory, he also was
the voice of Chris Jacobs in both Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction and its sequel,
Mercenaries 2: World in Flames.
He plays the character John White/The Beast in the PS3 titles Infamous 1 and 2.
Also, he plays the character Dr. Ragland in the game Prototype.
He also was the voice of the grumpy Kane in the game The Legend of Spyro: A New Beginning,
and Marty in the video game tie-in of Madagascar.
LaMarr also recently voiced the merchant "Vulgrim" in the new action/adventure hybrid Darksiders.
He played the role of "Mr. Sunshine" in the 2008 crime game Saints Row 2, and reprised
his role in Saints Row IV in 2013.
He reprised his role as Kit Fisto for the video game: Star Wars: The Clone Wars - Republic
Heroes.
LaMarr voiced Rick Grimes in the animation film of The Walking Dead.
He also voiced Sam B, one of the playable characters in Dead Island, and recently made
his debut in the Kingdom Hearts series in Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance as
Phoebus, a character originally from The Hunchback of Notre Dame and voiced by Kevin Kline.
He recently returned to the Metal Gear franchise as the voice of Kevin Washington in Metal
Gear Rising: Revengeance.
Webisode projects LaMarr is set to appear as a regular character
in the forthcoming major webisode series Naught for Hire produced by Jeffrey Berman and Farscape's
Ben Browder.
His character, Mark One, is described to be that of an elevator with mood-swings.
It is unclear whether or not he will be solely the voice of this character or if he will
appear in person similarly to that of Max Headroom, a concept which Browder has pulled
from before when writing for Farscape episode John Quixote, which used an elevator displaying
a talking human interface on a screen within.
A date has not yet been set for the series' release.
Selected filmography References
External links Official website
Phil LaMarr at the Internet Movie Database Phil LaMarr at Anime News Network's encyclopedia
Phil LaMarr @ BehindTheVoiceActors An Audio Interview with Phil LaMarr by SiDEBAR
Phil LaMarr Interview w/ Legions of Gotham