Dan Ziskie, the character actor known for his recurring roles in prestige TV dramas like “House of Cards” and “Treme,” died Monday, July 21, in New York at the age of 80.
The Detroit native passed away from arteriosclerotic cardiovascular disease, his family announced. He is survived by his wife Cynthia, brother David, his nephews Jesse, Austin and Brett and their six children.
“It is with heavy hearts that our family announces that our beloved Daniel has passed away,” Ziskie’s loved ones wrote Friday on his personal Instagram page. The actor’s family promised to make another post in the future sharing details about a forthcoming memorial service for Ziskie in New York City.
Born on August 13, 1944, in Detroit, Ziskie was a track and field and football star in high school and college. It was during his time at the University of Michigan that he began pursuing his passion for the arts, earning a Bachelor of Arts degree in English, before joining the legendary Second City improv theater troupe in Chicago. In the years that followed, Ziskie turned in memorable performances on both the stage and screen.
On Broadway, he starred in productions of “After the Fall” and “I’m Not Rappaport.” In the mid and late ’80s, he scored some of his first film roles in beloved Hollywood comedies like “Adventures in Babysitting,” “Troop Beverly Hills” and the Robert Altman-directed “O.C. and Stiggs.” He went on to have roles decades later in Charlie Kaufman’s “Synecdoche, New York” and the Will Smith-starring 2015 NFL drama “Concussion.”
Ziskie is, perhaps, best known though for playing C.J. Liguori, a well-connected banker, in HBO’s post-Hurricane Katrina New Orleans drama “Treme” from creators David Simon and Eric Overmyer, which ran for four seasons from 2010 to 2013. He also memorably portrayed Vice President Jim Matthews in the first and fifth seasons of Netflix’s “House of Cards.”
In addition to his work as an actor, Ziskie was also a passionate photographer. In Oct. 2017, he released his first photo book, “Cloud Chamber,” which consisted of photographs he’d captured in the New York City area from 2013 to 2016.
