Jon Polito

Jon Polito was an American character actor whose 35-year career, spanning more than 220 credits, began on Broadway opposite Faye Dunaway in The Curse of an Aching Heart (1982) and in the Tony-winning 1985 revival of Death of a Salesman, in which his performance as Howard Wagner caught the attention of the Coen Brothers. He went on to appear in five of their films, including a memorably blustery gangster in Miller's Crossing (1990), a studio flunky in Barton Fink (1991), and a rival private eye in The Big Lebowski (1998). On television he played Detective Steve Crosetti on the first two seasons of Homicide: Life on the Street. He met actor Darryl Armbruster in 1999, and the two married in October 2015 after sixteen years together. Polito died of multiple myeloma less than a year later, in September 2016. He was warmly remembered by the Coen Brothers and by colleagues as a deeply skilled and prolific character actor.