Peter Van Norden

PETER VAN NORDEN is a native New Yorker whose feature film credits include The Accused (as defense attorney “Ted Paulsen” opposite Kelly McGillis and Academy Award winner Jodie Foster), Police Academy 2 (as Steve Guttenberg's inept partner, “Vinnie Schtulman”), The Naked Gun 21/2 (as White House Chief-of-Staff, “John Sununu”), An Innocent Man (as Tom Selleck's lawyer), as the lead in Don’t Call Me Frankie at the 1993 Cannes Film Festival, Love Hurts (with Jeff Daniels), The Best of Times (with Robin Williams and Kurt Russell), Hard to Hold (with Rick Springfield), Roadhouse 66 (with Willem Dafoe and Judge Reinhold), The Rosary Murders (with Donald Sutherland), Hitting the Cycle, and the 1988 Academy Award winning short film Ray's Male Heterosexual Dance Hall.
On television, he was seen as “Ralph Brentner,” one of the leads in the Stephen King 8-hour mini-series, The Stand. Among his MANY other TV credits are recurring roles on L.A. Law, Murder, She Wrote and Life Goes On, and appearances on Without a Trace, Caroline in the City, Nash Bridges, In the Heat of the Night, Matlock, The Client, Tales From the Crypt, Wings, Hill St. Blues, Cheers, St. Elsewhere, Newhart, Family Ties, Three's a Crowd, Benson, Double Switch (Disney Sunday night movie), as Pierre Salinger in the mini-series Blood Feud.
In N.Y., he appeared in five Broadway shows: Saint Joan (with Lynn Redgrave), The Inspector General, and Romeo and Juliet at Circle-in-the-Square; Macbeth at Lincoln Center's Vivian Beaumont Theatre; and as the "evil" Anthony Anstey opposite Donny Osmond in George M. Cohan's Little Johnny Jones at the Alvin Theatre (also at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in L.A., and on Showtime TV).
Off-Broadway in N.Y., he played the First Gravedigger opposite Kevin Kline in Hamlet, at Joseph Papp's New York Shakespeare Festival/ Public Theatre. Other appearances include Jungle of Cities with Al Pacino, the N.Y. Shakespeare Festival productions of Henry V (with Meryl Streep), and Hamlet (with Sam Waterston) in Central Park, and Shakespeare's Cabaret at The Colonnades Theatre Co. Most recently, he appeared as 'Henry Kissinger' in the L.A. Theatre Works production of Top Secret: The Battle for the Pentagon Papers at the N.Y. Theatre Workshop, on NPR's The Play's The Thing, on tour across the U.S. and in three cities in China!
In L.A., Peter won the first Backstage West Garland Award for outstanding performance as “Inspector Truscott” in Joe Orton’s Loot, for the Blank Thr. Co. He has garnered Drama-Logue Awards for his performances as “Oscar Wilde” in the one-man-show, Wilde...and Wonderful, as "Archie" in William Inge's The Last Pad at the Friends and Artists Theatre, as "Jackie" in Cuba and His Teddy Bear at the Callboard Theatre, and as “Henry Kissinger” in Nixon’s Nixon at San Jose Rep. He also appeared in Arthur Miller’s The Man Who Had All the Luck and as 'The Lawyer' in American Tales: Bartleby the Scrivener for the Antaeus Co., of which he is a member. Other L.A. appearances include the Ovation Award winning musicals Dinah Was at the Coast Playhouse, and The Fantasticks for The Blank Thr. Co., the L.A. Weekly Award winning play The Cradle Will Rock, the Act One festival at the Met Theatre, as the title role of Eliot Rosewater in Kurt Vonnegut's God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater at the Matrix Theatre, The God of Isaac at The Pico Playhouse and appeared in the Mark Taper Forum Spring Repertory season as Pompey in Measure for Measure, and in Tom Stoppard’s Undiscovered Country. Other L.A. stage credits include Jailbirds on Broadway at the Tiffany Theatre (as the tough "female" prisoner, “Maude”); the LATC production of Chekhov's The Seagull, and the Catalina Production of The Wrong Box.
Regionally, Peter has appeared at San Diego Rep. as 'Edna Turnblad' in Hairspray, 'Scrooge' in A Christmas Carol, 'The Judge' in David Mamet's Romance, 'Earl of Kent' in King Lear, and 'Don Quixote' in The Brothers Karamazov's Don Quixote. At San Jose Rep. he appeared in Nixon’s Nixon (also at Seattle Rep.), Mizlansky/Zilinsky, Art, Major Barbara (winning the Bay Area Critics Award as Best Actor), The Matchmaker, The Odd Couple, and Groundswell. Other appearances include The Magic Fire at the Gurthrie Thr., Berkeley Rep. and The Old Globe Thr. in San Diego (directed by Jack O'Brien), and then as the title character in Shakespeare’s Cymbeline (directed by Dan Sullivan) and 'Holofernes' in Loves' Labors Lost (directed by Roger Rees) at The Old Globe. At Center Stage, Baltimore he appeared in Misalliance (directed by Irene Lewis), and in the Arizona Thr. Co. production of Steven Dietz's Inventing Van Gogh at the Intiman Thr. in Seattle in Moonlight and Magnolias, and as 'John Barrymore' in Mr. Shaw Goes to Hollywood at the Laguna Playhouse.
Peter also recently recorded the audio book The Maples Stories - 18 short stories by John Updike for BBC America.
Peter is a Phi Beta Kappa, magna cum laude graduate of Colgate University, and studied with Sanford Meisner, William Esper, Richard Boone, and Peter Gennaro at the Neighborhood Playhouse in N.Y.C. His favorite role is that of husband to his lovely wife, Wendy (science teacher extraordinaire at Harvard-Westlake School in Studio City, Ca.), and their longest-running production to date is their son, Robert, production coordinator for many feature films.
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