James McCaffrey

Biography: James McCaffrey was Born in 1960 in Belfast Ireland and raised in Albany, NY. He attended the University of New Haven on football, baseball, and Fine Arts scholarships. From there, he moved to Boston where he barely earned a living as an artist, graphic designer and commercial art director before getting his acting starts in a stage production of "Electra: A Central American Tragedy" and in the PBS television production, "Concealed Enemies," starring Peter Riegert and Edward Herrmann.

In 1985, he moved to New York City and became a member of The Actor's Studio, where he studied with, among others, Academy Award winner, Shelley Winters. While there, he appeared in productions with Paul Newman, Arthur Penn, Estelle Parsons and many others. McCaffrey's passion for theater led him to form the Workhouse Theater with directors/writers Damien Gray and Andrew Heckler in 1991.

Around the same time, McCaffrey made his television debut in the pilot "Philadelphia Heat." From there, he co-starred with Mariel Hemingway in four episodes of "Civil Wars" and appeared in several mini-series including, "Telling Secrets" with Cybill Shepherd. This led to his original role as Michael Payton aka. Joseph Payne Astor on VIPER as well as a co-starring role on Fox's "New York Undercover." He also starred in the Dick Wolf/Don Kurt series, "Swift Justice," for UPN.

McCaffrey has also appeared in several feature films including Twentieth Century Fox's "The Truth About Cats and Dogs" with Uma Thurman and Janeane Garofalo, and in "Nick and Jane," a romantic comedy set in New York City. His other projects include the feature films "The Tic Code" with Gregory Hines and Polly Draper, and the Francis Ford Coppola/Zoetrope Films production of "The Florentine" starring Chris Penn, Michael Madsen and Hal Holbrook.… Expand