Timothy "Tim" Daly (born James Timothy Daly on March 1, 1956) is an Emmy Award and the Screen Actors Guild Award nominated American stage, screen and voice actor, director and producer.
The only son and youngest child of actor James Daly and actress Hope Newell. He is a younger brother of actress Tyne Daly, who is 10 years his senior, and is a brother-in-law of television and film composer Mark Snow. He is also related to former game show host and newsman John Charles Daly. He has two other sisters, Mary Glynn (Snow's wife) and Pegeen Michael. He attended The Putney School, where he started to study acting.
Daly began his professional career while a student at Vermont's Bennington College, where he studied theatre and literature, in which he now holds a Bachelor of Arts, and acted in summer stock. He graduated from college in 1979 and returned to New York to continue studying acting and singing.
Daly debuted on stage when he was seven years old in Jenny Kissed Me by Jean Kerr, together with his parents and two sisters. The show also starred Sharon Laughlin and John D. Irving.
Daly appeared for the first time on TV when he was 10 years in an American Playhouse adaptation of An Enemy of the People by Henrik Ibsen, which starred his father James Daly. He dreamed about a sports or music career and also considered becoming a doctor or a lawyer, but finally decided to become an actor. Daly started his professional acting career when he appeared in a 1978 adaptation of Peter Schaffer's play Equus.
His first leading film role was in the film Diner, directed by Barry Levinson, in which he shared screen time with actors including Kevin Bacon and Mickey Rourke. Starring roles soon followed in Alan Rudolph's feature, Made in Heaven, the American Playhouse production of The Rise & Rise of Daniel Rocket, and the CBS dramatic series, Almost Grown created by David Chase.
In theatre he has starred in the Broadway production of Coastal Disturbances by playwright Tina Howe (he received a 1987 Theatre World Award for his performance) opposite Annette Bening, Oliver, Oliver at the Manhattan Theatre Club, Mass Appeal by Bill C. Davis and Bus Stop by William Inge at Trinity Square Repertory, The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams (at the Santa Fe Festival Theatre), A Knife in the Heart and A Study in Scarlet (at the Williamstown Playhouse) and Paris Bound (at the Berkshire Theatre Festival). In 2006 Daly returned to Broadway when he appeared on stage opposite David Schwimmer and Željko Ivanek in the Broadway revival of The Caine Mutiny Court Martial. Daly is well known for his role as straight-laced pilot Joe Hackett on the long-running NBC sitcom Wings. He beat Kevin Conroy for the part. Daly made several appearances on The Sopranos as J.T. Dolan, an old friend of Christopher Moltisanti (Michael Imperioli). Daly received a 2007 Emmy nomination for his work on the series. He appeared on the midseason ABC crime series Eyes, which got good reviews but was canceled after only five episodes. Tim Daly was very famous for his role as Superman in Superman: The Animated Series.
In 2006, Daly played the role of Nick Cavanaugh on the new ABC drama The Nine. Starting May 3, 2007, Daly began playing a new love interest for Kate Walsh on the new Grey's Anatomy spinoff, Private Practice. Daly and his wife have also created Wandering Park Productions, a company designed to develop and produce a variety of film, television and theater projects. The company producing credits include the critically acclaimed and award winning Los Angeles premiere of Vincent Cardinal's play A Colorado Catechism, starring both Daly and his wife. The play received outstanding reviews and earned both Daly and his wife the DramaLogue Awards for Best Actor and Best Actress.
Tim Daly is an activist in various liberal political and social causes. In 2004 he became active in the presidential politics of the Democratic Party by joining "John Kerry for President," an organization dedicated to John Kerry's presidential candidacy for the 2004 election. In the beginning of 2007, Daly became a member of The Creative Coalition, a nonprofit, nonpartisan, politically-active group formed of members of the American film entertainment industry. As a member of TCC Daly has joined the National Task Force on Children's Safety, a program co-founded by The Creative Coalition and Safety4Kids, "the first children's media brand focused solely on safety and health."
Daly and his wife, actress Amy Van Nostrand, have two children (son Sam born in 1984, and daughter Emelyn, born in 1989), and have both won DramaLogue Awards for Best Actress and Best Actor in the Coast Playhouse's The Colorado Catechism by Vincent J. Cardinal in Los Angeles. They married on September 18, 1982.