What do Elia Kazan, Rene Angelil, J. Edgar Hoover and Gianni Versace have in common? Not much in real life, but onscreen it’s a different story: they have all been played by Toronto actor Enrico Colantoni.
Over the past two decades, the versatile Colantoni has jumped into the shoes of countless personas in TV and film, creating several memorable characters along the way. As womanizing fashion photographer Elliott DiMauro, he spiced up the David Spade TV vehicle Just Shoot Me. In Veronica Mars, he is private investigator Keith Mars, a rock of support for his detective daughter Veronica.
As Flashpoint’s Sergeant Gregory Parker, he did double duty as leader of the strategic response team and crisis negotiator. Also, Colantoni’s turn as credulous alien commander Mathesar in the 1999 film Galaxy Quest was pure, scene-stealing showmanship.
“I have yet to play an Italian mobster,” says Colantoni, with a touch of genuine surprise in his voice. Despite his Italian heritage (and unmistakably Italian name), he has easily avoided being typecast during his 20-year career.
The only theme that seems to persist in his work is authority: more often than not, Colantoni portrays a person in power. Speaking from a New York hotel room as he wraps up a promotional tour for the Veronica Mars movie, he considers that trend. “I never imagined having a career playing those characters for sure — cops, doctors —it’s fun. But I’m not authoritarian. I still feel like I’m a humble servant, an actor for hire.” Yet the newest name on the Colantoni character roster is another man in command: Dr. Allen Conner, patriarch and chief of staff at the fictional Bethune General Hospital in Toronto.
As Conner, Colantoni is headlining Remedy, a new medical/family drama that recently debuted on Global. The ensemble cast is packed with Canadian actors, three of whom play Conner’s children. (His two daughters and son are also hospital staff, a source of much of the drama).
It is fitting that Colantoni is back on a show that is both filmed and set in his hometown. (This follows the precedent of Flashpoint, notably the first Canadian television series airing on a major American network that was fully set in Canada. It was also the gig that brought Colantoni home after 25 years in the U.S.)
Although he now divides his time between L.A., where his children live, and Toronto, Colantoni is quick to proclaim his T.O. love. “I always knew somehow I was going to end up back in Toronto. Sure enough, fate finally took over and brought me back for Flashpoint,” he says. “I feel spread out through North America so home is sort of a dubious feeling. But I’m always grateful for places like Tre Mari bakery on St Clair.”
St. Clair is Colantoni’s old stomping ground. He grew up in the Corso Italia area, the son of two Italian immigrants. In his teens, he was a waiter at a few different local cafés and has fond memories of watching the ’82 World Cup in the ’hood. As he headed to the University of Toronto, “actor for hire” was not a job he was considering.
“I was going down the road most travelled — get a degree and go to teachers’ college or try to get into a law school or something,” says Colantoni. “Anything that would make my parents’ journey to the new world less in vain, I guess,” he adds with a chuckle. The teacher of an elective theatre course set Colantoni on his current course by encouraging him to move to the States and pursue acting. He first attended the reputable American Academy of Dramatic Arts and then the (equally prestigious) Yale School of Drama.
Obviously, he had talent to be mined, but Colantoni’s parents were nonetheless uncertain of his choice. “My parents will both be 89 years old this year, and they have such pride for how far I’ve come, but they still don’t understand it,” he says. “They always panic when I’m between jobs, and every time there is that between-jobs time, I can hear my mother and my father panicking, and I feel a little bit of panic with them.” To ease those moments of panic, Colantoni has always relied on the guidance and encouragement of his teachers to propel him forward.
He took to heart the words of one acting coach who told him to dedicate the first 10 years of his life to learning only, not job hunting. It gave him the confidence to live in New York developing his craft and be all right with the fact that he didn’t begin getting steady work until the mid-’90s. And the advice seems to have been right on target because Colantoni has not stopped working since. He has had the unusual distinction of being on a spate of successful, long-running television shows — a feat for which he only takes a bit of credit.
“When you read something there is a spidey sense that this is really unique and really wonderful, and given the chance, it will survive,” he says. “But when you think of the math involved in a TV show just ending up on the air, it’s remarkable, so you always feel lucky. Luck always sort of seems to follow me around. It’s the only way I can explain it.”
The question now is whether Colantoni’s luck will carry over to Remedy. He is confident in the script and his fellow actors, and upon further reflection, he admits to projecting some of that Colantoni brand of authority on set. “Now that I think about it further, because I’ve been doing this so long, I have to sort of lead the charge in a lot of ways since most of the actors I work with are much younger,” he says.
“It might not be spoken openly, but I think I just naturally set a tone at work of let’s work hard, let’s have fun, but let’s not waste too much time.”
That could easily be Colantoni’s actor-for-hire motto: after two decades of steady work, it would be difficult to accuse him of wasting time. Colantoni is the first to admit that the years of moving from job to job (presumably to avoid the between-jobs panic) have been exhausting. But he is reflective about his chosen path. “It takes such a great amount of energy to say, ‘What’s next? what’s next? what’s next?’” says Colantoni.
“I guess what’s next is the next thing that comes along, and I’ll just keep going with the flow and hopefully find peace in that because I trust that I belong here.”
