Terrence Mann

The year after his feature debut as Larry in Richard Attenborough's disappointing film version of "A Chorus Line" (1985), Mann embarked on the "Critters" franchise, portraying an extraterrestrial bounty hunter in rock star regalia (the aliens had intercepted a music video). Though his film career has pretty much been his "Critters" work, he has fared far better on the small screen, working frequently on the soaps (including an Emmy-nominated 1987 stint on "As the World Turns" as a malevolent prisoner), appearing in his share of unsuccessful pilots and acting in TV-movies and miniseries. An early telepic, "The 10 Million Dollar Getaway" (1981), featured him as one of the gangsters who pulled off the real-life 1978 heist of Lufthansa's cargo hold at NYC's Kennedy Airport, but arguably his best work came as arch-villain toymaker Augustus P. Tavish in the CBS movie musical "Mrs. Santa Claus" (1996), which boasted songs by Jerry Herman and a starring turn by Angela Lansbury. Of late, he has branched into songwriting, co-writing the score of his pop-rock adaptation of "Romeo and Juliet" with Jerome Korman. Though the musical worked on many levels during the Mann-directed first production at Saint Paul's Ordway Music Theater in 1999, much retooling remained before it would be ready for the Great White Way.