Michael Tolan - Life and Career

Life and Career

Tolan was born Seymour Tuchow in Detroit, Michigan. He graduated from Wayne State University in Detroit and studied under Stella Adler and at Stanford University. He appeared primarily in stage roles in his early career, with only minor parts in films of the early 1950s. His stage roles include Romanoff and Juliet and Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?, his Broadway debut. His first film role was in The Enforcer; he also had roles in Fort Worth, The Greatest Story Ever Told, and Presumed Innocent.

He acted mostly on television from the mid-1950s on, including an appearance on the 1960 CBS summer series, Diagnosis: Unknown, a role in The Doctors and the Nurses, and a continuing role as Jordan Boyle on "The Senator" segments of the anthology umbrella TV series The Bold Ones (1970–71). He had a recurring role on three episodes of The Mary Tyler Moore Show, and made guest appearances on such television series as Mannix, Kojak, McMillan and Wife, and Law & Order. His last known television appearance was on an episode of Murder, She Wrote in 1994.

Tolan appeared in the Bob Fosse film All That Jazz (1979) as lead character Joe Gideon's cardiologist, Dr. Ballinger.

Tolan also helped found the American Place Theatre, of which he wrote:

“We wanted to attract some of the writers who wrote fine, intelligent, deep material about American life, and see if we could interest them in writing for the theater”.