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Vincent Michael Irizarry was born November 12, 1959 in Queens, New York. He was the middle child of six. At the age of eight the Irizarry family moved to Long Island, New York where they still live. Vincent has always had a passion and a great talent for the arts. Beginning at the early age of eleven, he started studying photography, which he still enjoys. He also studied piano, becoming classically trained. He then continued his training at Berklee College of Music in Boston. It was there that he became actively involved in acting, performing in many productions with the regional repertory company. Some of his Boston Theater credits are Death Watch, The Long Goodbye, and The Imaginary Invalid. Vincent moved from Boston to New York to begin a career as a professional actor, receiving a full-time scholarship with the late Lee Strasberg at his Theater Institute. Vincent's first professional acting performance was at the New York Shakespeare Festival in The Death of Von Richtoven. Off-Broadway he has portrayed Paul McCartney in Lennon and has performed leading roles in Modigliani and Everyman. He has also appeared in productions of The Indian Wants the Bronx, The Taming of the Shrew, Death Watch, The Long Goodbye, and The Imaginary Invalid. Vincent's first daytime television work was as the anti-hero, Lujack, in The Guiding Light, a role he received while he was waiting table and sleeping in the back of New York's 13th Street Theater. His portrayal of Lujack earned him a Daytime Emmy nomination in 1986 and made Vincent a nationally popular star. In one month, he pulled in more fan mail than any other actor in the history of any Proctor and Gamble daytime drama Soon after his success in The Guiding Light, Vincent moved to Los Angeles, where he worked opposite Nancy NcKeon in the Television movie Firefighter, and with Treat Williams and Peter Coyote in Joseph Wambaugh's Echoes in The Darkness; as well as many guest-starring roles in series such as L.A. Law, Murder She Wrote, Hotel, Throb, Mancuso FBI, The Sentinel, Beverly Hills 90210, and the pilot Circus. He has played the starring role in a telefilm, Lying Eyes, the story of a man whose insatiable desires lead him to live a double life of lies. This movie is played quite often on cable’s Lifetime station. During his time in Los Angeles, Vincent tried his hand at west coast daytime taking on the role of good guy Dr. Scott Clark. A macho and stubborn character on Santa Barbara. After a brief but unsatisfying story-line, Vincent was moved into a triangle with Jane Rogers and Signy Coleman which proved successful. In 1990 he won critical acclaim in the lead role of Gino Santangelo in the Jackie Collins Miniseries Lucky Chances, where he portrayed forty years of a man's life. In feature movies, Vincent played Sissy Spacek's abusive husband in Marie--a True Story and starred in Clint Eastwood's Heartbreak Ridge. In 1992 Vincent returned to New York and The Guiding Light in the newly created role of Nick McHenry (Lujack's unknown twin) a tough but tender, investigative reporter. He continued in this role until 1996. In November 1997, he joined the cast of All My Children in what was supposed to be a short-term contact role as the evil and manipulative Dr. David Hayward. Dr. Hayward turned out to be not only incredibly evil but also immensely popular, and Vincent returned to Pine Valley in 1998 where he has resided ever since. He plays his evil parts so well that he won the Soap Opera Digest Awards for Outstanding Villain in 1999. Beside acting, Vincent returned to developing his voice to the level of legit tenor. After studying with premier voice coach, Tad Motyka, he realized a dream by performing as a soloist with the Orchestre de Lyon, France and recently performed for the Red Cross benefit at Carnegie Hall. Vincent's kindness and support of charitable institutions has touch the hearts of many and from this has come his official fan club, Friends Of Vincent Irizarry (FOVI). A group of people who share and appreciation not only Vincent’s artistic work but also the love he has to share with people everywhere. The true basis of this fan club is to do charity work for charities which are close to Vincent’s heart. (For more information about FOVI, see this website’s Membership section.) Vincent resides in New Jersey with his family. His oldest daughter Siena, by Signy Coleman and his daughter Aria and son Elias, by his current wife, Avalon. Vincent left All My Children in 2006 and went to work on The Young and the Restless. He was supposed to have a 3 month contract but ended up being there for over 20 months. He will be going back to AMC very soon. Revised 8/18/08
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