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Bio
Antonie Knoppers was born
in Washington, D.C. and moved to Amsterdam when he was four. He has since
been traveling to both countries, becoming bi-continental. His father is
from Amsterdam, his mother from New York; thus he has dual citizenship.
Antonie now resides in Los Angeles. Antonie has been involved in the
performing arts from a very early age. He was surrounded by artists while
he was growing up. His mother is a famous belly dancer and magician in the
Netherlands. A story about Antonie at the age of four illustrates his
connection to the stage: while his father was pacing backstage at his
mother's show holding a crying Antonie in his arms, he had the idea to put
Antonie onstage as a solution to stop his crying. The story goes that
Antonie promptly stopped crying and was mesmerized by being onstage. He
studied acting as a young boy in Amsterdam, and performed skits with his
friends at bar and bat mitzvahs. His first stage production came at the
age of 17 when he was a first year student at Brandeis University in
Boston, MA.
He went on to graduate
from Brandeis with a Masters in International Economics and Finance. After
completing his M.A. studies in 1995 with summa cum laude and Phi Beta
Kappa honors, he became a professional actor.
Antonie
got his first paid acting job as Bo in Bus Stop at a regional
theater in upstate New York. He spent the next three years performing
Off-Broadway at the HERE Theater as well as in various regional theaters,
such as the George Street Playhouse, Bristol Riverside Theater and the
Sacramento Theater Company. In 1997 Antonie appeared in various
commercials and in a series as a principal on a very popular soap series
in Holland.
In 2000
Antonie attended the Old Globe/University of San Diego. In a class of only
seven, he received plenty of attention honing his skills in Shakespeare,
speech and voice, acting, singing, and movement classes. Antonie earned a
second Masters Degree in 2003 at the Old Globe/University of San Diego.
Returning to New York in 2004, Antonie signed with Schiowitz, Clay, Rose
(now Schiowitz, Ankrum, Conner & Wolf), a theatrical agent, and started
auditioning. His first job in New York was in Jeff Baron's Visiting Mr.
Green at Syracuse Stage in 2005. That same year, he played Antony
Wilding in Enchanted April and Stephen Hoffman in Old Wicked
Songs. He also had the wonderful opportunity to appear in his first
feature film playing Frederick van Pallandt opposite Julie Delpy in the
movie The Hoax, which was directed by Lasse Hallstrom and starred
Richard Gere and Alfred Molina. |