I'm going to attempt a regular thread I post to, referencing some under-acknowledged or little known actor, ideally once a month.
This month, I've chosen John Kassir:
Johnny Kassir (born October 24th, 1957 in Baltimore, Maryland) is an American actor, voice actor, and comedian who is perhaps best known for voicing the Crypt Keeper on the hit HBO show Tales from the Crypt.
Kassir played the Bulgarian kicker, Zagreb Shkenusky, for six years in the HBO comedy series 1st & Ten (TV Series), about a fictional football team. His other live action credits include sketch-acting on The Amanda Show and a portrayal of Shemp Howard in a biopic about The Three Stooges, produced by Mel Gibson, and Ralph in Reefer Madness: The Movie Musical. He was also able to get his own Pee Wee Herman style show in 1997 called Johnnytime, but it was canceled after airing for two seasons on the USA network. He starred as The Atom in the Justice League of America film. John has appeared in over a dozen feature films, starred in eight TV pilots (six of which went to series and two of which lasted on air for over six years each) and guest starred in dozens of TV series in both comic and dramatic roles.
As a standup comic, he has opened for the likes of Lou Rawls, Tom Jones, The Temptations and Four Tops on their TNT tour, Bobby Vinton, Richard Belzer, and Harry Blackstone, Jr. among others. John has also appeared on stage performing improvisation with Robin Williams.
More recently, John has specialized in voice-over work for animation, video games, and other productions. Notable in this regard has been his acting the roles of Raymundo on Rocket Power. He also provides the voice in the video games X-Men Legends II: Rise of Apocalypse and Marvel: Ultimate Alliance for fan favorite superhero/villain Deadpool. He was also featured in the very first commercial for the Nintendo cornerstone video game series The Legend of Zelda in the United States in 1986.
A few of his many theater credits include: originating the role of Kenny in Three Guys Naked From The Waist Down(also starring Scott Bakula/Enterprise), for which he was nominated for both a Drama Desk and an Outer Critics Circle award. John also originated the role of Ralph in the musical Reefer Madness, on stage and in the film version.
He provided the voice of the mischievous raccoon Meeko in Disney's 1995 animated feature Pocahontas.
He also made one voice appearance on Ben 10 as Zombozo in the episode, "Last Laugh."
Recently, he voiced the character Adam MacIntyre and others in the video game Dead Rising.
He is married to actress Julie Benz. The couple have done voice overs in the Xbox game Halo 2.
During Ed McMahon's original Star Search Kassir had beaten Rosie O'Donnell and Sinbad in the talent competition, winning the $100,000.00 Grand Prize.
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