CURRENTLY RESIDENCE: Los Angeles, California
YEAR JOINED ENSEMBLE: 1998
POSITION: Actor
AMERICAN BLUES THEATER CREDITS
Stand Up If You’re Here Tonight (Chicago & Paris) – Jeff Award nomination for Solo Performance
One Day Only
Scapin
Train of Thought
ABOUT JIM
Jim Ortlieb graduated from Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University where he studied The Meisner Technique with William Esper, Kathryn Gately-Poole, and a host of other great teachers. In 1983 Jim was invited to Chicago to teach at Lois Hall Studio, a mainstay of professional studios in the early 1980’s. When Lois retired Jim renamed the studio, Chicago Actors Project, which remained vibrant until 1989,
In Chicago Jim has acted at the Steppenwolf, The Goodman, Northlight, Lookingglass, Court, Splinter Theatre Group, Bailiwick Theater, National Jewish Theater, Buffalo Theatre Ensemble, and the Touchstone-Organic theaters. As a member of the Gare St. Lazare Players under the direction of Bob Meyer, Jim worked extensively in Chicago and Europe. Throughout the US, Jim has worked at The Huntington Theater in Boston, La Jolla Playhouse in San Diego, The Ford’s Theater in DC, The City Theatre in Pittsburgh, Merrimack Rep in Lowell, Mass, Great Lakes Theater in Cleveland, Weston Playhouse in Vermont, and Waterfront Playhouse in Key West. In Los Angeles Jim acted with Rogue Machine Theatre Company, Boston Court, Circle X, Echo Theatre, and he helped to inaugurate the The Getty Villa indoor theatrical venue in Meryl Friedman’s adaptation of The Wasps and performed in Nicholas Rudall’s Iphigenia At Aulis in the outdoor space.
Jim’s Broadway work includes Of Mice and Men with James Franco, Chris O’Dowd, and Ron Cephas Jones, directed by Anna Shapiro, Aaron Sorkin’s The Farnsworth Invention with Jimmi Simpson, Stephen Lang, and Hank Azaria, and Guys and Dolls with Oliver Platt and Lauren Graham, directed by Des McAnuff. He toured for two years in the award winning Billy Elliot, the Musical directed by Stephen Daldry. His last musical The Devil Wears Prada in Chicago was directed by Anna Shapiro.
Jim performed in 1st National Tour of Billy Elliot, the Musical for two years, and Encore’s Of Thee I Sing at Orchestra Hall in Chicago.
Jim has appeared in the films Magnolia, Home Alone, A Mighty Wind, L’amico D’invanzia, Crazy As Hell, Latter Days, Say Uncle, Dirty, The Onion Movie, Contagion, The Crash, Inheritance, The Desert, Drunkboat, Next Exit, and Flatliners.
Some of Jim’s television credits include American Horror Story, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Station 19, 9-1-1 Lone Star, Chicago Med, The Rookie, Chicago Justice, Masters of Sex, Vegas, American Body Shop, Boston Legal, The CSI’s, Bones, How to Get Away With Murder, Grey’s Anatomy, The West Wing, The Closer, Roswell, Six Feet Under, and The Shield.
Jim has done many voice overs and commercials over the years.
Jim Ortlieb has taught a two year course in the Meisner Technique at Lois Hall Studio, was an adjunct professor at Northern Illinois University Theatre Department, taught drama for teens in West Cork, Ireland for high school students from Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France, Spain and Italy, and he directed numerous plays and musicals for Highland Hall Waldorf School in Los Angeles.
Jim has twice been a nominee for the Joseph Jefferson Award in Chicago, a Best Actor nominee for Boston’s Independent Reviewers of New England Award for John Kolvenbach’s Marriage Play at Merrimack Rep in Lowell, MA, and won the Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle award and LA’s Stage Scene ‘Scenie’ award for Best Actor in a Solo Performance for his work in Stand Up If You’re Here Tonight also by John Kolvenbach, a play he continues to perform all over the world.
FUN FACT
Neil deGrasse Tyson taught Jim how to take a selfie in the green room of the Longacre Theatre in 2014.
