Local Footlights Shone Brightly on Comic Actor

David Marks, 49, an award-winning comic character actor who was a fixture on local theater stages for 21 years, died June 3 at his home in Washington after a heart attack.

Mr. Marks, nominated five times for the prestigious Helen Hayes Award, won in 1990 for his lead role as a potbellied handyman in Deborah Pryor's black comedy "Briar Patch" at the Arena Stage.

"David Marks couldn't be more vivid in the role," wrote reviewer David Richards in The Washington Post. "He has the eyes of a dead fish, and his greasy hair hangs in his face like rain. But inside his skull, wheels are silently turning and gears are meshing.

"At the same time, Marks manages to appear retarded and calculating, bashful and perverted. He's the kid and the colossus, and the wonder of this performance is that it keeps shifting back and forth so deftly. You're never sure which side of him will out -- which accounts for a lot of the play's suspense."

He was also known for his role as the "lusty, sly, animal-innocent" Tony Lumpkin in Oliver Goldsmith's "She Stoops to Conquer" in 1991.

"Tony Lumpkin is his first real star part, and he goes supernova with it," Post reviewer Lloyd Rose wrote. "Though heavy, Marks is extremely light on his feet; this surprising grace characterizes his whole performance. Though his Tony is limpid of eye and guileless of face, Marks has a small boy's slyness, as well as a small boy's guiltless greed. Tony is a wallower in life's pleasures, an animal-innocent sensualist. The only thing wrong with Marks's performance is that you realize you're going to have to wait 20 years for his Falstaff."

Mr. Marks was born in Seattle, the son of a Lutheran minister. He had performed on stage since the fourth grade. "We made the puppets and we did 'How the Grinch Stole Christmas,' and I was hooked from then on," he told The Post in 1999.

He graduated from the University of Washington and earned a master's degree in acting at New York University in 1987, part of the first class taught by stage producer, director and educator Zelda Fichandler. She brought him to Washington's Arena Stage company, where she was the artistic director. He worked there for 11 seasons, once losing 60 pounds for a role as an idealistic inner-city teacher. One season, he played three police officers in three plays.

Mr. Marks appeared at the Kennedy Center, the Folger Theatre, the Woolly Mammoth Theatre, the Studio Theatre, the Shakespeare Theatre Company, the Round House Theatre and Olney Theatre Center. Nationally, he performed at the New York Shakespeare Festival, the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Denver Center Theater and the Contemporary American Theater Festival in Shepherdstown, W.Va.

He, like many Washington actors, also did voice-overs and was one of those who provided President Abraham Lincoln's voice in Ken Burns' "Civil War" series. Mr. Marks also worked for "Nightline," ABC News, National Geographic magazine and other commercial entities. He had non-speaking parts in films shot in the area, including "The Shadow Conspiracy," "Deep Impact," "Random Hearts" and "Shot Through the Heart."

A fly fisherman, an organic gardener and Little League coach, Mr. Marks also enjoyed playing piano and bass guitar and baking, although he refused to follow a recipe, said his wife of 14 years, Garland Scott.

"He was a born improviser, on stage and off," she said.

In addition to his wife, survivors include a son, Harris Marks of Washington; his mother, Joan Marks of Seattle; his father, Frank Marks of Sun City, Ariz.; and a brother.