Bio
Michael Urie is an American actor, producer and director best known for his starring role as Marc St. James on the comedy-drama television series Ugly Betty, from 2006-2010.
He also starred as Louis in the television sitcom Partners.
Urie went to high school in Plano, Texas at Plano Senior High School.
In 1998, he won a Dramatic Interpretation award with Confessions of a Nightingale by Charlotte Chandler at the National Forensic League National Tournament in St. Louis, Missouri.
Urie graduated from the Juilliard School, class of 2003.
While still a student at Juilliard, Urie performed in the world premiere of Love and Happiness (2001) at the Consolati Performing Arts Center, starring him as a sixteen-year-old, trying to get rid of his mother's boyfriend.
In addition to this, he appeared in student productions of Sylvia (1998) and Locked Away (1999) at Quad C Theatre.
Urie played the central character, in the stage play WTC View as well as the film adaptation. He is currently finishing a short documentary film, Two Down that he has made on the subject of High School Speech and Debate Tournaments, for Frontal Lobe Productions.
He is on the board of Plum Productions, for whom he also serves as casting director. With the same company he has produced and appeared in Prachtoberfest and Lowbrow (and a Little Bit Tacky).
As a freelance producer, he has worked on Like The Mountains and The Fantasticks (Four Players Theatre). He also directed the latter.
When Urie landed the role of Marc in Ugly Betty, his character was supposed to be a recurring regular and Urie was billed as guest starring in the credits, which was due to contractual disputes. After they were resolved, Urie was made a full time regular.
He also appeared in the uncredited role of Pig Walker in the 2003 feature film Uptown Girls, and in the 2004 made-for-TV movie Kat Plus One.
He made his screen acting debut in the 2002 episode of MTV's Undressed entitled "Tangled Beards" (Season 6, Episode 20).
In a December 2006 issue of dot glbt news magazine, it was reported that Urie is openly gay, though in an article for USA Today he said that even though he is single he did not want to divulge any information on his sexual orientation or his love life: "It's not black and white; I'm still young, still figuring my life out," he said. "I love the mystery. I'm not going to lie, but I'm not going to talk about it."
Later, the website OutinHollywood.com had an awkward interview with Urie discussing his sexuality. When asked if he was "out", Urie said "no" and "handled [the conversation] gracefully" by explaining that he wasn't, referencing the dot glbt news magazine which had retracted an apparent outing.
This does not explicitly state the sexual orientation which Urie identifies as, only that he does not wish to identify with it publicly.