Tom Noonan

A towering presence at 6 feet 5 inches, with an aggressively balding pate that left even the hair on the side of his head looking wispy, Tom Noonan was destined to become a “character actor.” That he became one of such note speaks to his uncommon talent. 

Noonan first appeared on screen in 1980, in Paul Mazursky’s Willie and Phil as “Man in Park,” John Cassavetes’ Gloria as “2nd Man/Gangster, and lastly in Michael Cimino’s financial disaster, Heaven’s Gate. Only in the latter was Noonan’s character given a name, “Jake.”

From 1980 through 1985, Noonan could be seen in films of some merit (Easy Money, FX), and those less so (Best Defense, The Man With One Red Shoe). The fledgling actor would score his defining role in 1986 in Michael Mann’s Manhunter. As Francis Dolharyde, a technician at a film laboratory by day, and a serial killer by night. Noonan’s stillness, large frame, and distant affect created a chilling character that was terrifying, but not without empathy. 

Manhunter had a tortured path to the screen. The infamous producer Dino De Laurentiis hated Mann’s final cut and practically sabotaged the film before it could be released. Based on the Thomas Harris novel Red Dragon, De Laurentiis changed the film’s title to the generic Manhunter, removing a connection to the built-in audience of the best-selling novel. Red Dragon was the first Harris novel to contain the character of Hannibal Lecter (played in Manhunter by the great Brian Cox). Without any support from the film’s producer, saddled with a nondescript title, and starring the then unknown William L. Petersen as the haunted FBI profiler tracking Dolharyde, the film all but opened and closed on the same weekend. 

Those few who saw it never forgot Noonan as Dolharyde. While the local police and media referred to his serial killer as “the tooth fairy,” due to unmentionable acts he would commit while wearing his dead mother’s dentures, Dolharyde saw himself as “the great red dragon” in William Blake’s paintings. In Dolharyde’s deeply unwell mind, he believed that each kill led him closer to becoming the “red dragon” of Blake’s creation. The scene where he explains his plan of ascent, however obliquely, to an unscrupulous reporter (Stephen Lang) who has humiliated him in print is terrifying. 

It’s not just that Noonan is physically imposing, or even his strange speech patterns, it is the sense that this is a man impervious to reason. He is only that which he is becoming, and no reporter, police officer, or FBI agent will stand in his way. There is a brief interlude between kills where Dolharyde strikes up an unlikely romance with a blind co-worker (a young Joan Allen). Ever so briefly, Dolharyde connects with his buried humanity. He might be saved by this woman, you think. But the red dragon’s call, coupled with an unfortunate misunderstanding, is too loud to ignore, and Dolharyde returns to his mission with a frightful vengeance.

By all rights, Tom Noonan should have been able to write his ticket in Hollywood after Manhunter, but the film’s financial failure and critical dismissal turned Manhunter and those involved with the film into cinematic orphans. Mann, Petersen, and Allen all recovered to have careers of distinction, but it took time. Noonan, with his unusual appearance and particular on-screen demeanor, was not quite as fortunate. 

That’s not to say that Noonan didn’t find and do good work after Manhunter; it’s just that the time between roles of note was often longer than it should have been.

Noonan’s next truly great role would arrive in 1994 with What Happened Was… An opportunity he had to create on his own. Based on his own play, Noonan not only wrote and starred in the film adaptation, but he also directed the picture. Essentially a two-hander about a couple, played by Noonan and an outstanding Karen Sillas, having an extraordinarily awkward first date. The film is almost entirely a conversation taking place in the woman’s Manhattan apartment. The likelihood of the two having a second date seems beyond slim, but they can’t seem to break the night off early. 

What Happened Was… casts a sad, unnerving spell, depicting two people starved for connection but swallowed up by the massive city that surrounds them. Approaching middle age, the sense of desperation is palpable. In the film’s final moments, Noonan delivers a monologue that goes far beyond oversharing on a first date, exposing a tragic sort of loneliness that all but dares you not to look away from the screen. It’s a confession of sorts, and one of the most heartbreaking I’ve ever seen. What Happened Was… didn’t get seen by many, but critics adored it, and, if your heart is up for the challenge, it is a film well worth seeking out.

The next year, Michael Mann called upon Noonan again to play an almost mystical criminal named Kelso who sets up the fateful bank heist in Mann’s cops-and-robbers masterpiece, HEAT. As Kelso explains the bank’s inner workings to Robert De Niro’s master criminal, Neil McCauley, his depth of knowledge gives McCauley pause. 

“How do you get this information?” McCauley asks.

“It just comes to you. This stuff just flies through the air. They send this information out, it’s just beamed out all over the fucking place. You just gotta know how to grab it. You see, I know how to grab it.”

McCauley looks at this odd man like he’s a fortune teller, but he can’t dismiss his data. And the way Noonan’s Kelso gestures with his hand, his long fingers extended, as if whatever he wishes for he can pull out of the atmosphere, convinced McCauley to go forward. 

The whole scene, and Noonan’s entire performance as Kelso, lasts less than three minutes. But for those three minutes, you rest right in the palm of Tom Noonan’s large hand. It’s staggering how easy he made it look. 

Noonan kept plugging away for another two decades after HEAT. The size of his roles and the quality of the projects varied, but he had a little over a handful’s worth of memorable appearances in projects that deserved to have him on the roll call. Sean Penn’s The Pledge (2001), starring Jack Nicholson, the western Seraphim Falls (2006) with Pierce Brosnan and Liam Neeson, Snow Angels (2007) with Kate Beckinsale and Sam Rockwell, and Charlie Kaufman’s mind bender Synecdoche, New York (2008) were all quality films that, like so much of Noonan’s work, were far too underseen. On television, Noonan had a 17-episode run from 2009 to 2011 on the award-winning potboiler Damages starring Glenn Close and Rose Byrne. Even better was the deeply underrated Hell on Wheels (2011-2014), a western series starring Anson Mount with Noonan in support as a troubled man of god. 

Noonan teamed up with Kaufman again, lending his vocal talents to the much-lauded, nearly uncategorizable animated film Anomalisa (2015). He also appeared in Todd Haynes’ Wonderstuck (2017). An 18-episode run on the television adaptation of the Terry Gillian film 12 Monkeys (2015-2018), and voice work on the series Animals in 2018 would be Noonan’s final two credits. 

Years ago, Noonan was interviewed about his career and was asked about the escapist nature of the performing arts. He gently pushed back on that notion, stating, “I don’t think you go to a play to forget, or to a movie to be distracted. I think life generally is a distraction and that going to a movie is a way to get back, not go away.”

I had never seen that quote until yesterday. In just two sentences, I felt as if Noonan explained my relationship with the arts to me. 

I go there to get back. Not to go away. That’s my whole life. Now I know how to tell it.

Tom Noonan died on February 14, 2026. He was 74 years old.