Peter Scolari, Bosom Buddies And Gotham Actor, Dies At 66

Prolific television actor Peter Scolari sadly passed away on Friday morning. The Emmy-winning star of Bosom Buddies, Newhart, and Gotham died on Friday at the age of 66, following a two-year battle with cancer. Ellen Lubin Sanitsky at Wright Entertainment broke the news of Scolari's passing. Scolari had a wonderful career on both stage and screen that spanned more than four decades.

While not his first role on television, Scolari became well-known for his starring turn in the 1980 sitcom Bosom Buddies. Scolari starred alongside screen icon Tom Hanks as two single men who pretended to be women in order to live in an apartment they could afford. The series lasted just two seasons but it helped launch the careers of both Scolari and Hanks, and the two formed a lifelong friendship.

Scolari went on to lock down a substantial role in Newhart in 1983. He was cast as Michael Harris, the producer and boss of Bob Newhart's character Dick Loudon. While just a recurring cast member in the first season, Scolari was promoted to a series regular for the rest of the series, which ran until 1990. Scolari earned a total of three Emmy nominations for his turn on Newhart.

Most comic or genre fans probably know Scolari for his villainous turn as Commissioner Loeb in the first season of Gotham, the Batman origin story on FOX. Scolari's Loeb was the corrupt police commissioner of Gotham City when Jim Gordon was first coming into his own as a detective. By the beginning of the second season, Loeb was removed as commissioner thanks to the work of Jim Gordon.

Though Scolari was nominated for multiple Emmys for his work on Newhart, his first win didn't come until 2016. Scolari landed the role of Tad Horvath on HBO's acclaimed dramedy Girls. Tad was the father of creator and star Lena Dunham's Hannah Horvath. While he had been around throughout the entire show, Scolari earned his Emmy for the fourth season of Girls, which featured a storyline that saw Tad come out as gay and move to New York City in the hopes of starting a new life. 

Scoarli's most recent role came in the CBS-turned-Paramount+ TV series Evil. The actor played the character of Bishop Thomas Marx for a total of nine episodes across multiple seasons.

Scolari is survived by his wife and four children.