Tim Cummings

Family

Timothy P Cummings was born in Port Jefferson, New York to James A. and Rosemarie Cummings. He has four siblings and one half-sibling. His father was a Lieutenant with the NYFD (Engine 82, Ladder 31) in the South Bronx for thirty years.

Education

Cummings graduated from Comsewogue High School, where he appeared in Brighton Beach Memoirs, Twelve Angry Men, Babes in Arms, You're A Good Man Charlie Brown and Bye Bye Birdie. He was also the president of the school's drama society, and received a scholarship to attend New York University's Tisch School of the Arts from where he received a BFA w/ Honors. While at NYU, he studied at The Stella Adler Conservatory and The Experimental Theater Wing. He performed in productions of The White Album Project, Fornes's The Conduct of Life, Brecht's Threepenny Opera, Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus, Shaw's Man & Superman, Durang's Naomi In The Living Room and Maeterlink's The Intruder.

Cummings is currently pursuing his MFA from Antioch University Los Angeles, slated to graduate in 2018.

Career

After graduating, Cummings began performing as a company member in two of New York City's downtown theater & dance companies, Big Dance Theater and The Builders Association, with whom he toured extensively, performing in festivals across US, the UK, and Europe.

He later joined The Flea Theater as a company member, where he performed in Mac Wellman's Sincerity Forever, Cleveland, and Three Americanisms, as well as the melodrama Billy the Kid written by Walter Woods in 1903.

He directed an original black comedy by playwright Kenny Finkle, Transatlantica. He understudied for the Off-Broadway play The Guys, as well as for the acclaimed Broadway revival of Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune, which starred Edie Falco and Stanley Tucci and was directed by Tony-winning director Joe Mantello.

Cummings subsequently relocated to Los Angeles to take on television and film work in addition to theatrical roles, where he received favorable reviews and numerous awards for his performance as Ned Weeks in Larry Kramer's The Normal Heart as well as his portrayal of Patsy in The New Electric Ballroom by Tony Award-winning Irish playwright Enda Walsh.

For the 2015 World-Premiere production of 'Need To Know' written by Jonathan Caren, KCRW's Opening The Curtain relayed that "Tim Cummings plays the neighbor Mark as a tightrope walk: balanced between stalker-creepy and oddly sympathetic. The play hinges on us not really being sure who this guy is and Mr. Cummings manages to stay one step ahead of us without telegraphing what's coming next. At the play's dramatic climax, he reveals the play's soul to be an impassioned plea for what it really takes to be an artist. His performance is worth the 90 minutes."

For the 2017 World-Premiere production of ‘The House In Scarsdale: A Memoir for the Stage' written by Dan O'Brien (playwright), KCRW's Opening The Curtain relayed that “The reason to go to see The House in Scarsdale is to watch the actor, Tim Cummings, bring everyone who isn't Dan to life. There's something wonderfully odd about all his portrayals. He manages to capture a profound physicality for each of the different characters. Something that reveals their essence without descending into mimicry or caricature. The simple flip of a wife's angry hair, or the way his fingers massage an imaginary earring of an aunt, or the pot-bellied stoop of a troubled brother - subtle, unmistakable details that bring that character to life and also magically keep them at a distance because they're incomplete. Not incomplete through a lack of craft or observation, but incomplete like a memory. In a lesser actor's hands this is the kind of performance that would upstage the play itself and be talked about as a tour-de-force. Mr. Cummings is smarter than that. He keeps everything a little distant and doesn't do all of the work for us in the audience.”

Cummings has served as Associate Director of the Youth Program at The Ojai Playwrights Conference since 2010.

Film

Television

Stage

2010—Present

2000–2009

1990--1999

1985--1989

Writing

-- "Cummings' voice howls boldly, bravely, beautifully, wittily, cunningly, mellifluously into the literary wilderness. He guides us effortlessly to see/to be his characters. He accomplishes his sleights of hand with grace and believability and power. I admire him enormously." - Caroline Thompson

-- "It feels as though you've been transported to multiple worlds and back, leaving you breathless and panting. Through a variety of forms, Cummings gives birth to fascinating characters and stories. His writing is rich and lush, beautifully exploring the paradoxes of the real and the surreal. The only thing that I can compare it to is perhaps a Bosch painting." - Chris Corkum, 2011 Lambda Literary Award Finalist for XOXO Hayden