The John Larroquette Appreciation Thread [Archive] - Sitcoms Online Message Boards

06-05-2018, 09:04 AM

John Bernard Larroquette is an actor best known for many things including narrating The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, playing Dan Fielding on Night Court, and J.B. Biggley in the musical How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying.

But John didn't originally start out as an actor. He had dabbled in various music related jobs such as radio DJ, producer, and even as a musician playing woodwinds in several bands.

Acting was later his calling which was where he met his wife named Elizabeth when he was in a play called Enter Laughing, both ended up getting married not long afterwards. Since then, they are still together to this very day.

After Night Court ended, he had his own show called The John Larroquette Show where he played John Hemingway who worked the night shift at a bus depot and dealt with his own demons along with keeping the station running smoothly, employees, other personalities, etc. The first season also dealt with John's attempts to stay sober with episodes representing each of the AA program's Twelve Steps. John also constantly struggled to maintain control of the station.

While doing that show, John continued to appear in a slew of movies including Richie Rich along with Payne which was a short lived show that didn't last long at all, but got the blessing from John Cleese himself. The show also starred Julie Benz who was married at the time to another John but whose last name was Kassir who is best known for playing The Cryptkeeper on Tales From The Crypt. They later went on to divorce in 2007.

After Payne ended, more movie opportunities popped up for him including the 2000 film Isn't She Great starring Nathan Lane (who had his own short lived show himself called Encore! Encore!) along with David Hyde Pierce, Bette Midler, John Cleese, and Stockard Channing.

John went back to TV in 2001 hosting an A&E show called The Incurable Collector, which showcased people who collected stuff including Elvis, comic books, Star Wars, so on.

A family film called Beethoven's 5th followed soon after, narrating the 2003 remake of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre along with its prequel in 2006, voiceover roles, appearing as Carl Sack on Boston Legal, along with Broadway stints, were just some of the things that John has done since then.

In 2013, John returned to his old hometown of New Orleans along with his wife Elizabeth to get an award from his old school called Holy Cross School and went back again to film a movie that he had a lead role in called Camera Store. 1776 followed later where he played Benjamin Franklin who is one of our founding fathers.

Recently, John appeared in Me, Myself, & I which was just canceled by CBS after only a few episodes airing.

John has also tried directing and executive producing, including directing some episodes of his own show Night Court and executive producer of Payne. Podcast appearances including Marc Maron and Robert Wuhl is what he has also been doing and his son Jonathan hosts a podcast of his own called Uhh Yeah Dude. In addition to all of that, he appeared in a Harry Anderson special on HBO in 1986 called Hello Sucker.

Showing off on Night Court three times was also something he liked to do as well. The first time he showed off was on the Season 4 episode where he described the charges rapidly as a motor mouth against a defendant, the second time was another Season 4 episode Christine's Friend, and lastly on a Season 9 episode called A Guy Named Phantom as an accordion player where he played a song called Mairzy Doats.