Anthony Charles Edwards (born July 19, 1962) is an American actor and director. He is known for his role as Dr. Mark Greene on the first eight seasons of ER, for which he received a Golden Globe award and six Screen Actors Guild Awards, and was nominated for four consecutive Primetime Emmy Awards. He has appeared in various films and television series, including Top Gun, Zodiac, Gotcha!, Miracle Mile, Revenge of the Nerds, Planes, Northern Exposure and Designated Survivor.

Early life :

Edwards was born in Santa Barbara, California, the son of Erika Kem Edwards Plack (née Weber), an artist/landscape painter, and Peter Edwards, an architect to whom he was one of five children His maternal grandfather was designer Kem Weber. He is partly of German and Irish descent. He graduated from San Marcos High School in 1980. Edwards was encouraged by his parents to attend college before pursuing his interest in acting, which grew from the area's theater community. He received a scholarship to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts in England and studied theatre at the University of Southern California; but by the age of nineteen was being offered enough acting work to enable him to leave college.