John Slattery

Biography

John Slattery (born August 13, 1962, in Boston, Massachusetts) is an American actor best known for playing Roger Sterling in the television drama Mad Men. He has also built a steady career in film, moving between character parts in prestige dramas and recurring roles in large studio productions, including the Marvel Cinematic Universe. He has directed a feature as well, and he has worked extensively on stage.

The son of a retired accountant and a leather merchant, Slattery grew up in a large family of six children in a Catholic household of Irish descent. He attended Saint Sebastian's School in Newton, Massachusetts, and received a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the Catholic University of America in 1984. His early career was on television, where he took recurring parts in shows such as Will & Grace, Sex and the City and Ed, before taking on the role of Victor Lang in Desperate Housewives. On screen he first played supporting roles, such as a teacher in Sleepers or Paul Moore in Mona Lisa Smile, and later took more visible parts in films directed by Clint Eastwood and in big studio thrillers.

His work on Mad Men earned him four Primetime Emmy nominations for outstanding supporting actor in a drama series, and the cast shared Screen Actors Guild awards. As a character actor, he tends to move easily between political drama and comedy. This range is visible in Spotlight, where he played journalist Ben Bradlee Jr., and in his recurring role as Howard Stark across several Marvel films. In Charlie Wilson's War he played a CIA official, and in The Adjustment Bureau he played a mid-level agent in a shadowy paranormal organization.

In 2014 he made his feature directing debut with God's Pocket, an adaptation of a Pete Dexter novel that he co-wrote with Alex Metcalf and that premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. Slattery remains active in film and television, and his career combines television recognition with a steady presence in both commercial and independent cinema.

Key films

• Spotlight (2015): plays Ben Bradlee Jr., a journalist on the team that investigated abuse in the Boston archdiocese.
• Mona Lisa Smile (2003): appears as Paul Moore, the boyfriend of the teacher played by Julia Roberts.
• Sleepers (1996): has a small role as a teacher in an ensemble cast.
• Flags of Our Fathers (2006): in Clint Eastwood's film, plays a government promoter tied to the wartime propaganda effort.
• Iron Man 2 (2010): plays Howard Stark, Tony Stark's father, in an early entry in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
• Ant-Man (2015): returns as Howard Stark in this Marvel film.