Eric Seltzer(I)

Eric Seltzer was born on May 7, 1964 in Clark, NJ. The youngest of three sons, Eric was inspired and encouraged by his parents, Martin and Marjorie Seltzer, who both saw Eric's unique talents at an early age. As a young woman, Marjorie, an aspiring actress and poet in her own right, was very involved in local community theater. That love of the arts would leave an indelible mark on Eric for the rest of his childhood and carry through into his adult life. As a teenager, Eric was involved in various high school productions. After briefly attending college at Rutgers University, Eric decided to focus all of his attention on his acting career. He started his journey doing what most fledgling actors do; extra work. He appeared in movies (albeit rather briefly) such as "The Muppets Take Manhattan", "Prizzi's Honor", and "Goodfellas". In 1989, Eric got a waiter's job at Vincent's Clam Bar in New York's Little Italy, where he would meet his life-long best friend and collaborator, Jonathan Benefiel. Within a year, he would go on to meet his wife-to-be, Helene, in that very same restaurant. She was a customer and he was her waiter. They married in 1992 and have two grown children; Samantha and Brandon. In 2002, Eric got his first big break on NBC's, "Law and Order". In 2004, he appeared on NBC's, "Ed" and HBO's hit series, "The Sopranos". That same year, he tried his hand at stand-up comedy, and appeared at Caroline's Comedy Club, to rave reviews. In 2005, he was cast as Roy in "The Devil Wears Prada". In 2017, Eric and Jonathan decided to take their careers into their own hands and made a short film based on John Steinbeck's, "Of Mice and Men". The concept was to make it a modern re-imagination, set to a Mafia backdrop. Jon hired Writer/Director Dat Nguyen, along with a company called Rapid Reels, and "Protecting Tony" was born. The film went on to win over 30 awards, and 5 nominations, and has earned Eric, and Jonathan multiple acting awards in the process. In 2019, Eric landed a role as Detective Al Kotcheff on the hit CBS TV series, "Blue Bloods". As of this writing, he will be making his debut appearance on October 11,2019.