Chris Noth

Early life

Noth was born in Madison, Wisconsin, the youngest of three sons of Jeanne L. Parr, a former CBS news reporter, and Charles James Noth, an attorney and insurance salesman. He has German and Irish ancestry. Noth's father died in 1966. During his childhood, Noth traveled with his mother and brothers throughout the United Kingdom, Spain and Czechoslovakia.

Noth spent a part of his undergraduate years at Marlboro College where he built himself a log cabin. He earned an MFA from Yale School of Drama, where he acted in some 25 plays and was a pupil of acting coach Sanford Meisner.

Career

Noth played small parts in films, including Smithereens (1982) and Baby Boom (1987) before his first starring role in the low-budget 1988 film Peluru dan Wanita (Bullets & Women) in Indonesia. Noth joined the cast of Hill Street Blues in the sixth season in 1986, where he was billed as "Christopher Noth." He also appeared in Another World. He filmed a pilot for the legal/police drama series Law & Order in 1988. In 1990 NBC began airing the show, which slowly gained recognition from critics and fans. Noth was fired from the show in 1995. Personality differences between Noth and L&O creator/executive producer Dick Wolf settled down long enough to film a TV movie, Exiled: A Law & Order Movie (1998).

In 1998 Noth returned to prime-time television when he took the role of Carrie Bradshaw's enigmatic on-again, off-again boyfriend "Big" on HBO's Sex and the City. He played the role for six years, during which he also appeared in a small role as Helen Hunt's husband in the hit film Cast Away (2000), and starred in a Broadway revival of The Best Man. In 2001 he played an FBI agent on a three-episode arc of Crossing Jordan, re-uniting him with Law & Order co-star, Jill Hennessy. Noth returned to the role of Mike Logan on Law & Order: Criminal Intent in 2005, joining the show in its fifth season following a guest appearance on a fourth-season episode. On this spin-off of the original Law & Order, Noth's detective team alternated episodes with Vincent D'Onofrio and Kathryn Erbe's characters. On June 26, 2008, it was announced that Noth was leaving the series, and that Jeff Goldblum would be joining the cast.

Noth reprised the role of Big for the Sex and the City film, released on May 30, 2008. and its 2010 sequel. Noth stars with Julianna Margulies in the CBS series The Good Wife, which debuted on September 22, 2009. Also in 2009, Noth became the spokesperson for the North American market for the Biotherm line of male skin-care products.

Noth starred in a revival of Gore Vidal's 1960 Broadway play The Best Man in 2000, and also starred in a Broadway revival of the 1972 play That Championship Season in 2011, playing Phil Romano, a role originated by his one-time Law & Order co-star Paul Sorvino. Starting in 2013 he is appearing in a theater festival in Napa Valley, California, called Plaza Del Sol with other performers including Dennis Haysbert.

Personal life

Noth is co-owner of The Cutting Room, a music venue in New York City that opened in late 1999, with Steve Walter, a former student at Berklee College of Music. Noth met his wife, Tara Lynn Wilson, while she was working at The Cutting Room; they married on April 6, 2012. Their son, Orion Christopher Noth, was born in January 2008.

Noth also owned the semi-private club The Plumm with Noel Ashman, David Wells, Damon Dash, Ann Dexter-Jones, Joey McIntyre, and Bo Dietl. Noth and Wilson owned Once Upon a Tea Cup, a tea-party themed restaurant franchise with branches in Windsor and London, Ontario (both locations now closed). He is also a supporter of Da Marino in New York City, where he has performed as a singer.