Jon Tenney

Actor whose rapid rise on Broadway interrupted his Juilliard studies, and who has since moved to Hollywood where he offered TV viewers steamy love scenes opposite Sarah Jessica Parker on "Equal Justice" (ABC, 1990-91), and was Will, the ad agency team member who could get into a snit on "Good Company" (CBS, 1996). Jon Tenney left Juilliard when Mike Nichols cast him in the road company of "The Real Thing" and then returned to New York and appeared in the cast of Neil Simon's "Brighton Beach Memoirs" and "Biloxi Blues." He was also in "Sweet Sue," a short-lived play starring Mary Tyler Moore and Lynn Redgrave. Tenney began working in TV in small roles in the ABC daytime drama "Ryan's Hope" and guesting on "Spencer: For Hire."

His first series was the short-lived Fox effort, "The Dirty Dozen" (1988). But it was a 1989 episode of "Murphy Brown" that won Tenney real notice among Hollywood casting directors: he was Miles Silverberg's brother who has a fling with Murphy. This led to Tenney's role as Peter Bauer on "Equal Justice," in which he was romancing Sarah Jessica Parker but was unable to tell anyone. It was announced that he would make three appearances as a villain on "Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman" opposite Teri Hatcher (whom he married in 1994), during the 1996-97 season.

In 1988, he made his first significant TV-movie "Alone in the Neon Jungle," in which he lent support to police chief Suzanne Pleshette. Tenney's feature film work has yet to reap leads. He had small roles in "Guilty By Suspicion" and "Tombstone" (both 1993), was one of the cops made to look foolish by Eddie Murphy in "Beverly Hills Cop III" and was the father of the boy "Lassie" (both 1994) befriends in the update of the collie's adventures. Tenney also played a reporter seen briefly in "Nixon" (1995) and was seen as the playboy vying for the affection of Kristy Swanson in "The Phantom" (1996).