Tony Danza

Biography

Danza was born in Brooklyn, New York, to parents Anne Cammisa (1925–1993) and Matty Iadanza (1920–1983) His mother was a bookkeeper and his father worked as a waste collector in Brooklyn. Danza's father was an American of Italian ancestry and Danza's mother was an immigrant from the town of Campobello di Mazara in the Sicilian province of Trapani. He has a younger brother, Matty Jr. (born 1954), a Los Angeles restaurant owner. When Danza was 14, he and his family relocated to Malverne, New York, on Long Island. Danza attended Malverne High School, graduating in 1969. In the first episode of his show Teach: Tony Danza, Danza describes himself as a "bad student" in high school. He earned a bachelor's degree in history in 1972 from the University of Dubuque, which he attended on a wrestling scholarship. In 1975, as a joke, Danza's friends entered him in the New York City Golden Gloves. After knocking out his first six opponents all in the first round, Danza was knocked out in the finals.

During his first year of college, he had the Robert Crumb "Keep on Truckin'" character tattooed on his upper right arm. In a 1985 interview in Us Weekly magazine, Danza remarked, "I was playing pool with a guy who had all these tattoos, and I wanted to be friends." Danza also sports a "Keep Punching" boxing gloves tattoo on his right shoulder as well as "Tracy", his (former) wife's name, on his chest. In college, Danza met and married his first wife.

Boxer

Danza was a professional boxer with a record of 9–3 (9 knockouts, 7 in the first round), with all but one of his fights, wins and losses, ending in a knockout.

Acting and show business

Shortly after his college graduation, Danza was discovered by a producer at a boxing gymnasium in New York. He then earned a spot on the television show Taxi. He is well known for his role on Taxi, in which he played a cab driver and part-time boxer Tony Banta, and Who's the Boss?, in which he portrayed retired baseball player, housekeeper and single father Tony Micelli. For his contribution to the television industry, in 1988, Danza was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 7000 Hollywood Boulevard. Danza also plays the role of a baseball player in Angels in the Outfield (1994).

Danza also starred in the short-lived sitcoms Hudson Street (1995) and The Tony Danza Show (1997), not to be confused with his 2004–2006 talk show, The Tony Danza Show. He had a role in the TV drama Family Law from 2000 until 2002.

He was nominated for an Emmy Award for a guest-starring 1998 role in the TV series The Practice. His movie debut was in the comedy The Hollywood Knights (1980), which was followed by Going Ape! (1981). He received critical acclaim for his performance in the 1999 Broadway revival of the Eugene O'Neill play The Iceman Cometh. In 2002, Danza released his debut album The House I Live In as a 1950s-style crooner.

Danza hosted his own TV talk show, The Tony Danza Show, that was produced each weekday morning in his hometown of New York and was syndicated across the US. On May 9, 2005, during a go-kart race with NASCAR star Rusty Wallace, who was a guest on the show, Danza's kart flipped after Wallace accidentally bumped him. Neither he nor Wallace was wearing a helmet at the time, but both were uninjured. Danza returned to go-kart racing on October 20, 2005, to challenge IndyCar driver Danica Patrick, but his brakes malfunctioned and he skidded into a wall, unharmed. His daytime talk show ended in May 2006; the last live episode aired on May 26, 2006.

He starred on Broadway as Max Bialystock in The Producers, from December 19, 2006, to March 11, 2007, and reprised his role at the Paris Las Vegas from August 13, 2007, to February 9, 2008.

In September 2008, it was reported that Danza would host the 4th season of The Contender, which was filmed in Singapore and began airing in December 2008 on the Versus TV sports channel.

A Broadway adaptation of 1992 film Honeymoon in Vegas opened on a pre-Broadway run at New Jersey's Paper Mill Playhouse on September 26, 2013, co-starring Danza and Tony nominee Rob McClure, with Gary Griffin directing. Danza was inducted into the Ride of Fame in December 2014, and the double-decker sightseeing bus commemorated his role in the Broadway musical.

In June 2017 Netflix announced that Danza would star in a new series, The Good Cop. Danza will portray "a disgraced, former NYPD officer who never followed the rules." The show was created and will be written by Andy Breckman, who created and wrote the award-winning USA Network series Monk. The main characters are father and son policemen, both named Tony. Tony Sr. (Danza) was expelled from law enforcement, while his son follows the rules. In the series, according to Netflix, “This ’odd couple’ become unofficial partners as Tony Sr. offers his overly-cautious son blunt, street-wise advice on everything from handling suspects to handling women.”

Teaching

In August 2009, it was reported that Danza would appear in a new A&E reality show Teach: Tony Danza, in which he would co-instruct a 10th grade English class at Northeast High School in Philadelphia. The series was filmed during the 2009-2010 school year and premiered on October 1, 2010. The book I'd Like to Apologize to Every Teacher I Ever Had: My Year as a Rookie Teacher at Northeast High (ISBN 9780307887863), which was released in 2012, was based on his year of teaching.

Personal life

Danza's first marriage was to Rhonda Yeoman. They wed in 1970 and divorced in 1974. Their son Marc appeared with Tony on Taxi in two episodes as Brian Sims. Tony and Rhonda reconciled in 1983 and had a daughter, Gina. Marc has two daughters.

In 1986, Danza married Tracy Robinson. The couple separated in 2006 and filed for divorce on March 10, 2011; the divorce was finalized on February 6, 2013. They have two daughters, Katherine (born 1987) and Emily (born 1993).

In 2008, Danza and his son Marc published a cookbook, Don't Fill Up on the Antipasto: Tony Danza's Father-Son Cookbook.

He was ordained by the Universal Life Church, and has been an ordained minister for many years.

Boxing record

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