In 1990, Lee accompanied Fontana to Los Angeles to help him move. While dining at a restaurant on the day after arriving in L.A., a casting director and friend of Fontana's asked Lee if he was an actor. It was this encounter that led to Lee being cast in the surfing-action-detective movie "Point Break”.
Lee subsequently appeared as Terry, the cameraman, in "Wayne's World" and became part of two major pieces of pop culture: The "Bohemian Rhapsody" scene and uttering the "I love you, man" line that was adopted for Budweiser commercials.
In 1993, he began a series of recurring appearances in Tom Fontana's "Homicide: Life on the Street." He then was a series regular in 1994-1997 as Chett, the bullying older brother, in "Weird Science."
In 1997, Lee went East for an episode of "Homicide" and met up with Tom Fontana. They discussed a prison drama that Fontana was producing for HBO. Soon, Lee was cast as a central character in "Oz," playing Tobias Beecher, a part Fontana wrote for him.
After "Oz" ended its run in 2003, Lee had numerous guest appearances and/or supporting roles in TV shows and movies.
From October 2004 into January 2005, following his desire to return to theatre, he appeared in an off-Broadway play, "The Foreigner," a comedy with Matthew Broderick.
Most recently, Lee can be seen in a new TV series, "Wanted," which begin airing July 31, 2005, on TNT and has also appeared on several episodes of “Desperate Housewives” in spring 2006. His most recent film is as a biker in the horror/slasher film, “Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning”.
Lee spent a night in jail in L.A. and lost his license for 18 months after being arrested for driving while intoxicated in April 1992. He had been sentenced to 10 days, but because the incident occurred just after the riots that followed the Rodney King verdicts they sent him home after one day.
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Lee's second wife, Leslie Howitt, caught the bouquet at Lee's first wedding.
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Lee's first wife, Tanya Lewis, appeared with him on an episode of Weird Science
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Lee's mother, Ruth, died of breast cancer in 1989.
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Lee has a tattoo on the back of his right calf. It's the Japanese symbol for "mother," written inside a sun.
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Lee's brother is Chris Tergesen, music supervisor/engineer of dozens of television shows.
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Lee's height is 6' (1.83 m).
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Lee graduated from The American Musical and Dramatic Academy (AMDA) in New York.
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Lee lost all feeling in his index fingers after repeatedly banging his hands on prisons bars in his first scene as Tobias Beecher on Oz.
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Lee is of Norwegian and Swedish decent.
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Lee: A 70-year-old woman stopped me on the street downtown in New York a couple of years ago, and she was like, "Oh my God, you're Beecher!" And she went into this whole thing about how she loved the show so much, and you know, "It's so great! I can't believe I'm standing here with Beecher!" She was 70! And I said, "What are you doing watching this show?!"
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Lee: I'll never get a script that will shock me the way those Oz scripts used to shock me.
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(On why the Emmy committee has consistently ignored his character Beecher, as well as the series)
Lee: I don't know, how do you give an Emmy for this? It scares people. And nobody wants to say, 'for his role as the sodomized prisoner ...' But I'm proud of my work. (edit) Lee: I was the first man ever to be branded with a swastika on TV. (edit) (On his OZ Character Tobias Beecher)
Lee: At first, I saw him as a poor guy in the wrong place. Now, after having everything stripped away from him - his freedom, his family, his profession - he's evil. He's using what's at his core. Lawyers play with power. They're opportunists, and they can be vengeful. (edit) Lee: There was this moment, I think I was about 4 years old, and my parents and their friends were having a party and they were all sitting around the living room, the music was playing and I was sort of dancing wildly. I mean, I was really into it and everyone there was entertained. And I remember I was like, 'Wow, man, I'm watchable!' (edit) Lee: I would go in and read for these parts, and it never excited me to play the guy who doesn't have any sort of point of view and edge. I think I knew I wasn't what people looked at and saw in me. I love characters. I love things that have dimension and depth, that are hard to figure out. (edit) Lee: One of the things I realized early on was that the leading man, very clean-cut-good-guy-type was never something I was drawn to. (edit) Lee: I know what it's like to be ignored, and I think that is the big problem about the prison system: These people are being thrown away. There is no sense of rehabilitation. In some places, they are trying to do things. But, in most cases, it's a holding cell. (edit) Lee: Before I did Weird Science I definitely wasn't thinking, 'Oh my God, I'd LOVE to do a series for four years where I got to be a loud, obnoxious, militaristic asshole!' And certainly when I finished that, I didn't think, 'Oh man, if I could play a lawyer-turned-convict who gets anally raped and learns to love it...' (edit) (About which is the better kisser: his wife, or OZ co-star Christopher Meloni)
Lee: Definitely Meloni. When I kiss my wife, I don't see any cash. (edit)
Lee: I don't know, how do you give an Emmy for this? It scares people. And nobody wants to say, 'for his role as the sodomized prisoner ...' But I'm proud of my work. (edit) Lee: I was the first man ever to be branded with a swastika on TV. (edit) (On his OZ Character Tobias Beecher)
Lee: At first, I saw him as a poor guy in the wrong place. Now, after having everything stripped away from him - his freedom, his family, his profession - he's evil. He's using what's at his core. Lawyers play with power. They're opportunists, and they can be vengeful. (edit) Lee: There was this moment, I think I was about 4 years old, and my parents and their friends were having a party and they were all sitting around the living room, the music was playing and I was sort of dancing wildly. I mean, I was really into it and everyone there was entertained. And I remember I was like, 'Wow, man, I'm watchable!' (edit) Lee: I would go in and read for these parts, and it never excited me to play the guy who doesn't have any sort of point of view and edge. I think I knew I wasn't what people looked at and saw in me. I love characters. I love things that have dimension and depth, that are hard to figure out. (edit) Lee: One of the things I realized early on was that the leading man, very clean-cut-good-guy-type was never something I was drawn to. (edit) Lee: I know what it's like to be ignored, and I think that is the big problem about the prison system: These people are being thrown away. There is no sense of rehabilitation. In some places, they are trying to do things. But, in most cases, it's a holding cell. (edit) Lee: Before I did Weird Science I definitely wasn't thinking, 'Oh my God, I'd LOVE to do a series for four years where I got to be a loud, obnoxious, militaristic asshole!' And certainly when I finished that, I didn't think, 'Oh man, if I could play a lawyer-turned-convict who gets anally raped and learns to love it...' (edit) (About which is the better kisser: his wife, or OZ co-star Christopher Meloni)
Lee: Definitely Meloni. When I kiss my wife, I don't see any cash. (edit)
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