Ray Liotta life and biography

Raymond Allen Liotta,known as Ray Liotta is best known for his portrayal of Henry Hill in the crime-drama Goodfellas, directed by Martin Scorsese and his role as Shoeless Joe Jackson in Field of Dreams.
He has won an Emmy Award and been nominated for a Golden Globe Award.

After graduating from the University of Miami, Liotta moved to New York and landed his first role in a TV commercial while accompanying a friend to a casting agency. He soon found work as Joey Perrini on the daytime drama Another World, and after working in television for a few years, he moved to Los Angeles.

After struggling to find work in Hollywood, Liotta was ready to call it quits when he was cast in the role of a crazed ex-con husband opposite Melanie Griffith in Something Wild. The portrayal won him critical and popular acclaim, and he followed the performance with an entirely different role, as a med student caring for his mentally challenged brother in 1988's Dominick and Eugene.
Though best known for his on-the-edge tough-guy characterizations in films like Martin Scorsese's GoodFellas (1992) and No Escape (1994), Liotta received some of his most positive audience feedback for his likeable portrayal of luckless ballplayer Shoeless Joe Jackson in the 1989 megahit Field of Dreams.

Established as one of the most magnetic character actors in Hollywood, Liotta delivered numerous memorable performances throughout the 1990s, including Unlawful Entry, Corrina, Corrina and the Disney movie Operation Dumbo Drop. Recently, he has opted toward more hard-edged roles in such films as Blow and John Q. Liotta will next star as an ambitious district attorney in the independent thriller Slow Burn.

In addition to his film roles, Liotta portrayed legendary singer Frank Sinatra in the 1998 TV movie The Rat Pack (for which he received a Screen Actors Guild Award nomination) and provided the voice of Tommy Vercetti for the 2002 video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City.

That same year he appeared as Det. Lt. Henry Oak in the Joe Carnahan-directed film Narc, receiving an Independent Spirit Award nomination for Best Supporting Male. He also narrated Inside the Mafia for the National Geographic Channel in 2005.
Liotta had a memorable guest appearance that year on the television drama ER playing Charlie Metcalf in the episode "Time of Death". The role earned him an Emmy for "Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series". Liotta would later spoof himself and his Emmy win in Bee Movie.
He starred in the 2006 CBS television series Smith, which was pulled from the schedule after only three episodes had aired.

He later appeared in Smokin' Aces (reuniting with Narc director Joe Carnahan), portraying an FBI agent named Donald Carruthers in one of the lead roles. He appeared with John Travolta in the movie Wild Hogs and with Johnny Depp in the 2001 film Blow, portraying the father of drug dealer George Jung.

Liotta has appeared in Battle in Seattle as the city's mayor, and in Hero Wanted playing a detective alongside Cuba Gooding Jr..
He was also in Crossing Over, co-starring Harrison Ford. Liotta played Detective Harrison in the 2009 Jody Hill comedy Observe and Report as Seth Rogen's nemesis from the local police. He told ABC's Good Morning America in 2001 that he was offered the role of Tony Soprano by series creator David Chase but turned it down to focus on movies.

Liotta's recent movies include Date Night with Steve Carell, Charlie St. Cloud with Zac Efron, the independent drama Snowmen, and The River Sorrow, which stars Liotta as a detective alongside Christian Slater and Ving Rhames.

Liotta married actress Michelle Grace in February 1997. They met at her ex-husband's (Mark Grace) baseball game; they also co-starred in The Rat Pack, in which Liotta played Frank Sinatra and Grace played Judith Campbell Exner. Their daughter, Karsen, was born in December 1998. The couple divorced in 2004.

On February 17, 2007, Liotta was arrested in the Highlands of Pacific Palisades after crashing his Cadillac Escalade into two parked cars on Palisades Drive, approximately half a mile from his residence. He was charged with a misdemeanor DUI. Liotta was released on $15,000 bail and a court date was set for March 2007. Liotta was alone in his car, and no one was injured in the crash.

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