Christian Clemenson (born March 17, 1959) is an American Emmy Award-winning film and television actor.
Clemenson spent his childhood in Humboldt, Iowa, as the son of drug store owners Ernest and Ruth Clemenson. In his early teens he delivered the Des Moines Register, which had a long tradition of awarding scholarships to top east-coast preparatory schools to a select few "paper boys". Clemenson, a straight-A junior high school student, won a Register scholarship to Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts. In 1973, while Chris was enrolled at Phillips Academy, his father passed away at age 58.
Upon graduation from Phillips, he entered Harvard College. From his freshman year onward he received important roles in campus stage productions, often receiving more praise from critics than the productions received. When Clemenson starred in a Harvard Lampoon sketch comedy show, a Harvard Crimson theatre critic panned the show but described Clemenson as "hugely talented actor who can trigger hysteria with any of a dozen subtle expressions or inflections." Other Crimson critics described his performances in Shakespeare plays as "a tour de force of sheer talent and intelligence" (in The Winter's Tale) and "a very fine and subtle performance" (in Measure for Measure).
During many summers he would return to Humboldt to star in, and later direct, local community theatre plays at Humboldt's Castle Theatre.
After graduating from Harvard College and the Yale School of Drama, he moved to Los Angeles.
Many of Clemenson's early roles in television and film matched his personality as a bright, soft-spoken professional. He was a law student in the television version of The Paper Chase, Alex Keaton's English teacher in the television show Family Ties, the bailiff in the Ivan Reitman movie Legal Eagles, the flight surgeon in the movie Apollo 13 and Dr. Dale Lawrence in the movie And the Band Played On. While he has been a familiar face for over a decade, until recently his name was not so well-known.
In film, he starred as real-life 9/11 victim Tom Burnett in United 93. On television, he was a regular on The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr. and has had recurring roles on Veronica Mars, and Boston Legal as Jerry "Hands" Espenson. For playing Espenson, he won an Emmy Award for Best Guest Actor in a Drama Series in 2006 and was nominated for the same award in 2007. Boston Legal is not the first time he has worked with James Spader; they co-starred in the 1990 film Bad Influence.
