www.robertharper.net
RobertHarper.net is a network of services involving the stage, film and television work of the professional actor, Robert Harper.
Mr.
Harper is a member of Screen Actors Guild (SAG), American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA) and Actors Equity (AEA). He is a member of the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (ATAS), and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS). He is listed with Who's Who in America and is represented by James Weissenbach of Weissenbach Management in Los Angeles, CA.
Mr. Harper has supporting roles in the
motion pictures Creepshow,
Once Upon a Time in America, Final Analysis, Wanted Dead or Alive,
Deconstructing Harry, Gunmen, Molly, The Insider, and
appears in Amazing Grace and Chuck, Twins, Mommie Dearest and
The War of the Roses.
He
co-stars in the cable films Running Mates (HBO), Payoff, The Wrong
Man, and J. Edgar Hoover (all for Showtime);
and Not Quite Human (Disney Channel).
On
television, he starred as the melancholic lawyer Si "Bubba" Weisberger
in the acclaimed CBS series Frank's Place (1987-1988) and as the
acerbic Judge Irwin Hawes in the ABC series Philly (2001-2002). He starred in two true crime CBS miniseries:
Ruby Ridge and Murder Ordained. He had recurring
roles as an attorney on L.A. LAW and as a Federal Agent on Wiseguy.
He has guest starred on episodes of NYPD Blue, Law & Order, Picket
Fences, Murphy Brown, Roseanne, Newhart, The Cosby Mysteries, The Commish, Gabriel's
Fire, Home Court, Matlock, Commander in Chief, Gilmore Girls and Murder, She Wrote.
Mr.
Harper was born in New York City, schooled in New York, Massachusetts, Maryland,
and New Jersey, and educated at Rutgers College. As an undergraduate,
he played leading roles in 10 of the 23 mainstage productions, was an honor's
student, and graduated with High Distinction in English. During his senior year, he co-starred in Neil Cuthbert's The Soft Touch, which
won the American College Theatre Festival's first New Play Award (1974) and
was performed at The Kennedy Center in Washington. He was awarded
a Regents Fellowship to the University of California for graduate work, but
chose instead to join the repertory company at the Arena Stage in Washington,
D.C.
At
the Arena, he performed in plays by Shakespeare, Miller, Ibsen, Hecht &
MacArthur and Wilder as well as the American premieres of The Ascent of
Mt. Fuji and The Tot Family. He
has performed in a Eugene O'Neill revival and a Tom Griffen premiere at the
Long Wharf Theatre in New Haven. On Christmas Eve 1981, he originated
a role in the off-Broadway production of Zeks--a play about Russian
political prisoners. He made his Broadway debut in revivals of Once in
a Lifetime and The Inspector General (each at Circle in
the Square) and last appeared on Broadway in Arthur Miller's The American
Clock in roles he created during the play's world premiere at
the Spoleto Festival USA in Charleston, S.C.
A longtime member of the Modern Language Association (MLA), he delivered a paper at the 1996 convention in Washington D.C. He returned twice to Rutgers as a Guest Artist-- the first time for the premiere of William Mastrosimone's Devil Take the Hindmost (1977) and later in the premiere of Ben Bettenbender's Widow's Walk (1984). In May 2007, he returned yet again to deliver the Commencement Address (view entire speech here) to the graduates of University College, Rutgers.