Tony Nominee John Ellison Conlee Joins Cast of HBO's BOARDWALK EMPIRE

By: Sep. 04, 2014
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Tony nominee John Ellison Conlee has joined the cast of HBO's BOARDWALK EMPIRE for its final season, BroadwayWorld has confirmed.

Conlee will take on the role of a younger 'Commodore', originally played by Dabney Coleman in earlier seasons.

BOARDWALK EMPIRE premieres this Sunday, Sept. 7, on HBO.

From Terence Winter, Emmy-winning writer of "The Sopranos," and Academy Award®-winning director Martin Scorsese, BOARDWALK EMPIRE is set in the Prohibition era and chronicles the life and times of Enoch "Nucky" Thompson, the leader of Atlantic City. The first four seasons took place during the 1920s. In the final season, which takes place in the depths of the Depression in 1931, Nucky recalls his Atlantic City roots and plots a post-Prohibition future.

BOARDWALK EMPIRE stars Steve Buscemi as Nucky Thompson; Kelly Macdonald as Margaret, Nucky's estranged wife; Michael Shannon as former Federal Agent Nelson Van Alden, caught up in gangland conflicts; Shea Whigham as Nucky's brother Eli, who went underground after killing a federal agent; Stephen Graham as gangster Al Capone; Vincent Piazza as gangster Lucky Luciano; Paul Sparks as gangster Mickey Doyle; Michael Kenneth Williams as Nucky's former ally Chalky White; Gretchen Mol as Gillian, now battling her demons; and Jeffrey Wright as Valentin Narcisse, Chalky's nemesis.

Other returning cast members in season five include Anatol Yusef as gangster Meyer Lansky; Ben Rosenfield as Eli's son, Willie Thompson, now a young prosecutor on the rise; Patricia Arquette as Nucky's ally, Sally Wheet, now based in Cuba; and Michael Zegen as gangster Benjamin "Bugsy" Siegel.

New cast members include Jim True-Frost as crimefighter Eliot Ness; Matt Letscher as wealthy, politically connected businessman Joseph Kennedy; Giampiero Judica as Salvatore Maranzano, the "boss of all bosses"; and Louis Cancelmi as Capone enforcer Mike D'Angelo.

Conlee's other credits include Watson(s) in The(curious case of the)Watson Intelligence at Playwrights Horizons(2014 Obie Award),Murder Ballad(MTC/Union Square), and The Madrid (MTC). Recent film and tv work includes the upcoming films When I Live My Life Over Again and Ned Rifle. Broadway: The Full Monty (Tony, Drama Desk, Outer Critics nominations), The Constant Wife, and 1776. Off Broadway includes Pig Farm (Roundabout), Ethan Lipton's LUTHER (Clubbed Thumb), The Butter and Egg Man, Once in a Lifetime, and The Bald Soprano(Atlantic). Many with NYSF in the park, and at Williamstown. Other film and tv credits include recurring roles on Parks & Recreation, and Brotherhood(Showtime). NCIS:LA, Common Law, Medium, Dirty Sexy Money, Law & Order,Third Watch, Spin City, and others, and the films Serendipity, The Rebound, Trust The Man, Kinsey, Brief Reunion, the recent documentary Showing Up, and the film So Close, which he also co-produced. He received his MFA from NYU and is married to multiple Tony nominee, actress Celia Keenan Bolger.

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