David Margulies made harried officials and New York professionals convincing, giving comedy something solid to work against. We value his unshowy supporting work, though the familiar screen job titles do not tell us everything he could do.
Fi1m perspective
David Margulies’s mayor in Ghostbusters (1984) has the harried air of an official whose job has become unreasonable. Ivan Reitman’s comedy benefits from having someone who takes the trouble seriously. We laughed at the mayor because Margulies treats the predicament as a professional inconvenience, rather than an excuse to announce that he is being funny. The film’s chief pleasures remain Bill Murray’s deadpan and the team’s easy conversation, but that recognisable official helps the comedy along.
His film work began in the mid-1970s, and he played Dr. Levy in Brian De Palma’s Dressed to Kill (1980). Doctors, lawyers, rabbis and mayors became familiar territory, and he was particularly convincing as a New York professional. Such casting lets an audience place a character quickly; it can also leave an actor with little to do beyond establishing his credentials. Margulies’s steadiness was valuable, though we would not mistake being repeatedly cast in authority for being repeatedly given a substantial part.
In Elaine May’s Ishtar (1987), he plays Mr. Clarke, another supporting credit in a comedy we like with reservations. The dreadful songs and the friendship between the two hopeless songwriters make it worth watching; the intrigue too often gets in their way. It is not the place to start if Margulies is the particular interest. The mayor remained his most widely recognised film part, and Ghostbusters II (1989) brought him back to it, an understandable return to a character he made so readily credible.
On stage, he took over the role of Roy Cohn in Tony Kushner’s Angels in America (1993). From 2000 to 2007, he played Neil Mink, Tony Soprano’s lawyer, in eight episodes of The Sopranos, continuing his screen association with professional men. Start with Ghostbusters, and spare a little attention for the man expected to treat all this as a municipal problem.
Biography
David Margulies was an American actor. Born in Brooklyn, New York City, he graduated from City College of New York and made his off-Broadway debut in 1958. His first Broadway appearance came in the 1973 revival of The Iceman Cometh.
He is known for playing Mayor Lenny Clotch in Ghostbusters (1984) and Ghostbusters II (1989). Other film roles include appearances in Dressed to Kill (1980), Nine 1/2 Weeks (1986) and Ace Ventura: Pet Detective (1994). On television he had a recurring role as lawyer Neil Mink in The Sopranos (2000–2007). He also performed in numerous stage productions, including Brighton Beach Memoirs and Angels in America.
Margulies was married to Carol Grant; the marriage ended in divorce. He died in Manhattan on 11 January 2016.
