Dean Winters

Early life

Dean Winters was born in New York City, New York to an Irish father and an Italian mother. He has three siblings: actor Scott William Winters, writer Bradford Winters, and Blair Winters. He grew up on Long Island and spent his teenage years in Scottsdale, Arizona. He attended the Jesuit Brophy College Preparatory school in Phoenix, graduating in 1982. He graduated from Colorado College.

Career

Winters has appeared in two of the Law & Order television series: Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, where he was a regular in the first season, and as a guest star in the Law & Order: Criminal Intent episode "Purgatory". More than ten years after his final appearance on SVU, he again portrayed Detective Brian Cassidy in the 13th-season finale "Rhodium Nights", became a recurring character in the 14th season and, in the 15th season, also became Sergeant Olivia Benson's love interest. He has also made guest appearances on Homicide: Life on the Street, Sex and the City, Third Watch, NYPD Blue, CSI: Miami and as Dennis Duffy in 30 Rock as well as previously having an accompanying role in Rescue Me.

He starred in the 1999 romantic comedy Undercover Angel with Yasmine Bleeth and the 2002 direct-to-video horror film Hellraiser: Hellseeker. He played Tom in PS, I Love You. Winters played Detective Sam Tyler's father in the US version of Life On Mars. He also played Charley Dixon, Sarah Connor's love interest, in Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles.

Winters was cast in the ABC drama pilot Happy Town, from the creators of October Road, but was replaced by Steven Weber after shooting the pilot.

On June 20, 2010, Winters was introduced as "Mayhem," the recurring character in a new television and radio advertising campaign for Allstate Insurance created by the agency Leo Burnett Chicago.

Winters co-starred in one season of the CBS Network cop drama series Battle Creek, playing a small town police force detective opposite Josh Duhamel, the FBI Resident Agent assigned to the town. The series was cancelled in May 2015.

Most recently, Winters has reprised his role on Brooklyn Nine-Nine as The Vulture and had a supporting role as a divorce attorney on the HBO series Divorce.

Personal life

In June 2009, Winters contracted a bacterial infection and collapsed upon arrival at his doctor's office. While being transported across Central Park in an ambulance, he went into cardiac arrest for over two minutes. Paramedics were able to revive him, and he was hospitalized in intensive care for three weeks. Over the course of the next year, he developed gangrene, requiring the amputation of two toes and half of one thumb, and ten subsequent operations including a skin graft. Winters was away from acting until 2010, when Tina Fey brought him back to 30 Rock and he started work on the Mayhem campaign.

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