Richard Belzer Movies and Career Information

Richard Jay Belzer (born August 4, 1944) is an American stand-up comedian, writer, and actor. He is perhaps best known for his role as John Munch, which he has portrayed as a regular cast member on the NBC police drama series Homicide: Life on the Street and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. Belzer was born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, the son of Frances and Charles Belzer. His father was a candy and tobacco wholesaler. Belzer grew up with his parents and older brother Leonard. As a youth, Belzer worked as a paperboy and at Modern Tobacco (his parents' business) part-time while attending high school. He was "kicked out of every school he attended." Nonetheless, Belzer attended and graduated from Andrew Warde High School in the neighboring town of Fairfield, Connecticut. Both parents died while he was young; he was 18 when his mother died of cancer and 22 when his father committed suicide. After high school, Belzer worked as a reporter for the Bridgeport Post. He attended Dean Junior College in Franklin, Massachusetts, for two semesters and part of a third before the school asked him to leave for leading too many student demonstrations. According to one interview, he was majoring in