Role Of His Life

Actor CLARK MIDDLETON has spent a lifetime defying limits and arthritis.

- Bryan D. Vargo And Claire Villines

Art imitates life imitates art. Actor Clark Middleton, of NBC’s The Blacklist and Hulu’s The Path, is keenly aware of the parallels between his on-camera and off-camera lives. “Acting is dealing with obstacles and problems, and I think I’ve learned how to be creative that way,” says Clark, 60. The New York City-based character actor, known for eccentric supporting roles in films from Birdman to Kill Bill: Vol. II (in a role Quentin Tarantino wrote specifically for him), earned his resilience and acting chops by living with juvenile arthritis since age 4.

CHILDHOOD JOURNEY

In 1961, the Middletons of Louisville, Kentucky, learned that their 4-year-old son had juvenile rheumatoid arthritis (now called juvenile idiopathic arthritis). The doctor told Clark’s dad, Mel, that his son most likely wouldn’t survive another Kentucky winter. So Mel quit his job and moved the family to Tucson, Arizona.

“I will never forget riding in that ’55 station wagon on our voyage to Arizona,” Clark says. “My joints were so swollen that my dad created a bed in the back for me to lie down. He would brake very slowly at the hundreds of stoplights along Route 66 to avoid [causing] me pain.”