James Colby

James Colby was an American actor who worked in film, television and theater. Born in Arlington, Massachusetts, he studied at Bridgewater State University and Brooklyn College before moving to Manhattan in the 1980s to pursue a stage career. He appeared in a 1992 Broadway production of Hamlet and performed widely Off-Broadway, and he had a long association with Hartford Stage that took in several Tennessee Williams plays. His stage roles included Blade to the Heat (1994), The Food Chain (1995) and Dividing the Estate (2007), and he originated the role of Stan in Lynn Nottage's Sweat off-Broadway before reprising it when the Pulitzer Prize-winning play reached Broadway. On screen he was known for Tower Heist (2011), Safe (2012), Solitary Man (2009), Demolition (2015) and The Opponent (2000), and for television roles including Sergeant Ray Dwyer in Chicago P.D. and Burleson in Empire. He died in 2018.