Today is the birthday of American character actor Terrance Quinn.

Born at War Memorial Hospital in Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, one of 11 siblings, Quinn grew up in nearby Newberry, Michigan.    He attended Central Michigan University in Mount Pleasant, Michigan, where he began acting in the 1970s.

He not only was an actor but also playwright/director. He wrote and directed the musical Orchestrina.,   a musical which featured five main characters: The Man (played by Jeff Daniels), The Boy (Harold Downs), The Woman (Ann O’Donnell), The Girl (Debbie Penwarden), and The Drunk (James Hilliker), plus a female and a male chorus.

Starting in 1980, Terrance appeared in various feature films such as Silver Bullet, Tombstone, Heaven’s Gate, Young Guns, alongside Rutger Hauer in Blind Fury, and as Howard Hughes in The Rocketeer.  He also appeared in the Canadian horror movie, Pin (1988) alongside British-born Canadian actor, David Hewlett.

Quinn played John Locke on the TV series Lost, the title role in The Stepfather and Stepfather II and was cast in 1996 as Peter Watts in Millennium, which ran for three seasons (1996–1999).

He is one of the few cast members of Lost (2004) who did not have to audition, because his former collaborator (from Alias (2001)) J.J. Abrams thought of O’Quinn for the part of Locke before the actor was even offered it.

In 2005 O’Quinn received an Emmy nomination for Best Supporting Actor in a Drama for his work as John Locke on the series Lost. O’Quinn admitted on the TV Guide Channel that he did not have much faith in Lost at first, calling it “The Mysterious Gilligan’s Island of Dr. Moreau”.The show, however, became one of the most popular on television, and on September 16, 2007 he won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor In A Drama Series for his role, and was nominated again for an Emmy for the role in 2010, which he did not win

Because another registered actor already had the name Terrance Quinn,   this Terrance Quinn  changed his surname  to O’Quinn.   Perhaps you know him best as Terry O’Quinn.

Terry O’Quinn is 60 years old today.