Clancy Brown
☼ Born on 5 December 1959, in Urbana, Ohio, USA
Biography
A tall, wavy-haired US actor with a deep, resonant voice, Clancy Brown has proven himself a versatile performer with first-class contributions to theatre, feature films, television series and even animation.
Clarence J. Brown III was born in 1959 in Urbana, Ohio, to Joyce Helen (Eldridge), a concert pianist, conductor, and composer, and Clarence J. "Bud" Brown, Jr., who helped manage the Brown Publishing Company, the family-owned newspaper started by Clancy's grandfather, Clarence J. Brown. Clancy's father and grandfather were also Republican congressmen from the same Ohio district, and Clancy spent much of his youth in close proximity to Washington, D.C. He plied his dramatic talents in the Chicago theatre scene before moving onto feature film with a sinister debut performance bullying Sean Penn inside a youth reformatory in Bad Boys (1983). He portrayed Viktor the Monster in the unusual spin on the classic Frankenstein story in The Bride (1985), before scoring one of his best roles to date as the evil Kurgan hunting fellow immortals Christopher Lambert and Sean Connery across four centuries of time in Highlander (1986).
Brown played a corrupt American soldier in the Walter Hill-directed hyper-violent action film Extreme Prejudice (1987), another deranged killer in Shoot to Kill (1988) and a brutal prison guard, who eventually somewhat "befriends" wrongfully convicted banker Tim Robbins, in the moving The Shawshank Redemption (1994). His superb vocal talents were in demand,
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and he contributed voices to animated series, including Mortal Kombat: Defenders of the Realm (1995), Street Sharks (1994), Gargoyles (1994) and Superman: The Animated Series (1996). Brown then landed two more plum roles, one as a "tough-as-nails" drill sergeant in the science fiction thriller Starship Troopers (1997), and the other alongside Robin Williams in the Disney comedy Flubber (1997).
The video gaming industry took notice of Clancy's vocal abilities, too, and he has contributed voices to several top selling video games, including Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex (2001), Lands of Lore III (1999), Star Wars: Bounty Hunter (2002) and Crash Nitro Kart (2003). His voice is also the character of cranky crustacean Mr. Eugene H. Krabs in the highly successful SpongeBob SquarePants (1999) animated series and films, and he contributed voices to The Batman (2004), Jackie Chan Adventures (2000) and Justice League (2001) animated series. A popular and friendly personality, Clancy Brown continues to remain busy both through his vocal and acting talents in Hollywood.
In the role of actor
Dumb Money (24/09/2023)
The story behind the 2021 GameStop short squeeze is told in Dumb Money. Keith Gill (Paul Dano) is an amateur financial analyst, who posts about his stock investments on his YouTube channel Roaring Kitty and on the Reddit forum r/WallStreetBets. Keith makes a huge investment in GameStop stock, which is being short-sold by hedge fund […]
John Wick: Chapter 4 (23/03/2023)
The assassin’s hunt for revenge climaxes in John Wick: Chapter 4. After being betrayed by his friend Winston (Ian McShane) and left for dead in the care of the Bowery King (Laurence Fishburne), John Wick (Keanu Reeves) recovers and continues his quest for vengeance against the High Table. The Marquis Vincent de Gramont (Bill Skarsg?rd) […]
Promising Young Woman (09/01/2021)
A woman seeks vengeance against predatory men in Promising Young Woman. Cassie Thomas (Carey Mulligan) is a 30-year-old med school dropout, who still lives at home with her parents and works in a coffee shop. At night, Cassie makes it a habit to go to clubs and confront the men who try to take advantage […]
The Mortuary Collection (18/08/2020)
A grim mortician tells macabre stories to a prospective young protege in The Mortuary Collection. Montgomery Dark (Clancy Brown) is the resident mortician at the Raven’s End Mortuary, where every corpse tells a story. After a funeral service, Montgomery meets a young drifter named Sam (Caitlin Fisher), who is interested in the open position at […]
The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (16/11/2018)
From the Coen Brothers comes six tales from the wild frontier. In The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, singing outlaw Buster Scruggs (Tim Blake Nelson) enters into a town where he finally may have met his match. In Near Algodones, a Cowboy (James Franco) faces the consequences of a bank robbery gone wrong. In Meal Ticket, an Impresario (Liam Neeson) […]
Stronger (09/09/2017)
A man struggles to recover following the loss of his legs in Stronger. Jeff Bauman (Jake Gyllenhaal) attends the 2013 Boston Marathon to support his on and off girlfriend Erin Hurley (Tatiana Maslany). However, a terrorist’s bomb goes off right beside Jeff and he ends up getting both of his legs amputated. Since his testimony to the […]
Warcraft (12/06/2016)
The orchish Horde goes to war against the human Alliance in Warcraft. With their homeworld Draenor dying, the many orc clans, including the Frostwolves lead by Durotan (Toby Kebbell), seek the help of the shaman Gul’dan (Daniel Wu), who uses the dark magic fel to open the Dark Portal and travel to the world of Azeroth. […]
Second Look: John Dies at the End (28/03/2013)
I don’t often watch films multiple times in the cinema. In fact, I can probably still count the number of times I’ve done so on one hand. However, there are some films that I feel obliged to give another go around. One such film is John Dies at the End, which I “saw” when it […]
John Dies at the End (16/09/2012)
To say that John Dies at the End is a weird film would be a bit of an understatement. The film focuses on a man named David Wong (Chase Williamson), who sits in a restaurant and tells his story to a journalist named Arnie (Paul Giamatti). It’s a hard movie to describe, but in essence, Dave and […]
Cowboys & Aliens (31/07/2011)
This is one of those films where everything that you need to know about it is in the title. The film is pretty much done as a straight-forward western, except for the fact that the villains just happen to be alien invaders. I think it’s this western/sci-fi genre-bending that makes the film so fun to […]
A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010) (01/05/2010)
Ever since seeing this film today, I have been thinking very carefully about my thoughts on the film. On one hand, I have to say that the structure of the plot is very formulaic and I believe the actors playing the main characters aren’t exactly the best choices. On the other hand though, I thought […]