Chris Messina

Chris Messina was born on in the Long Island suburb of Northport, NY. He discovered a love of acting while attending Northport High School, where his drama teacher encouraged Messina's interest in improvisation. Inspired to pursue legitimate stage training, Messina enrolled in a theater arts program at Marymount Manhattan College but dropped out after a single semester. He would return to Long Island and buy an old Volkswagen van, with plans for a Kerouac-style journey across America. By the time he had saved the money to make the trip, however, he had made up his mind to be an actor. He returned to Manhattan, found a tiny studio apartment with two roommates, and began to devour theater in every form, seeing every performance and attending every class that he could afford. When he lost out on auditions, he would find out where his competition studied and take private lessons with their instructors. By 1998, his hard work began to pay off; he became a member of the fledgling All Seasons Theater Company, where he would try his hand at directing as well as acting, and landed his first feature film work with small roles in "Rounders" (1998), "The Siege" (1998) and "You've Got Mail" (1998).

For several years, Messina would bounce between bit parts in New York-based television productions such as "Third Watch" (NBC, 1999-2005) and "Law & Order" (NBC, 1990-2010), and in live theater, including the 2001 New York Theater Workshop production of Caryl Churchill's "Far Away" with Frances McDormand, and a 2003 Broadway appearance in Oscar Wilde's "Salome" with Al Pacino and Marisa Tomei. In 2005, Messina found himself for the first time with more feature film work than television or theater. Cast in three small independent feature films shot in New York - "Road," "The Crooked Corner," and "Bittersweet Place," starring Seymour Cassel - Messina decided that the time was right for him to make his move to Hollywood.

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