Background and career
Louis Diamond Phillips (né Upchurch; born February 17, 1962) is an American actor, director, and writer. His breakthrough came when he starred as Ritchie Valens in the biographical drama film La Bamba (1987). For his performance as Angel David Guzman in Stand and Deliver (1988), he was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture and won an Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Male. Phillips made his Broadway debut with the 1996 revival of The King and I, earning a Tony Award nomination for his portrayal of King Mongkut of Siam. Phillips's other notable films include Young Guns (1988), Young Guns II (1990), Courage Under Fire (1996), The Big Hit (1998), Brokedown Palace (1999), Che (2008), and The 33 (2015). In the A&E/Netflix television series Longmire, he played a main character named Henry Standing Bear. He played New York City Police Lieutenant Gil Arroyo on Prodigal Son on FOX from 2019 to 2021.
Born Louis Diamond Upchurch on February 17, 1962, at the U.S. Naval Base Subic Bay, Olongapo City in the Philippines, he is the son of Lucita Umayam Aranas and Gerald Amon Upchurch, a Marine KC-130 crew chief. His mother was Filipina, while his father is described as an American of Scots-Irish and Cherokee descent. Phillips has claimed to have one-eighth Cherokee ancestry, which was disputed by skeptics, and later claimed "a drop" of Native American ancestry. Bonnie Paradise of the American Indian Registry said Phillips did not provide requested documentation of Native American descent. Phillips was named after U.S. Marine Lou Diamond. Phillips's father died when he was a year old, after which his mother remarried and adopted the Phillips surname. Phillips was raised in Texas. He graduated from Flour Bluff High School in Corpus Christi in 1980 and from the University of Texas at Arlington with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Drama.
Phillips's big break came with the starring role in La Bamba (1987) in which he played early rocker Ritchie Valens. Prior to his cinematic breakthrough, he starred in the Miami Vice episode "Red Tape" (March 13, 1987), portraying detective Bobby Diaz. In 1988, Phillips co-starred with Edward James Olmos in the inner-city high school drama Stand and Deliver, in a role for which he won the Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Male and was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture. He plays Angel David Guzman, a cholo gangster who is inspired by his math teacher, Jaime Escalante, to excel at calculus. Working to master the subject, he develops a friendship with his teacher. Stand and Deliver was filmed before La Bamba, but it was released a year later.
In 1988 Phillips co-starred with Emilio Estevez and Kiefer Sutherland in the Western film Young Guns, in which he plays José Chávez y Chávez, a historical Old West outlaw.
In 1990, Phillips revisited the role of José Chávez y Chávez in Young Guns II. He suffered a severe injury during the filming. Gunshots spooked the horse he was riding, resulting in Phillips being bucked off and dragged for 100 feet as his leg was caught in a stirrup. Phillips was emergency airlifted via helicopter to have surgery to repair his right arm which was broken in four places. In the mid-1990s, Phillips was a vocalist with the Los Angeles-based rock group The Pipefitters. In 1993, Phillips was among the guests on the Randy Travis television special Wind in the Wire. In 1996, Phillips made his Broadway debut as the King in Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II's The King and I. Phillips won a Theatre World Award, and was nominated for both a Tony Award and a Drama Desk Award for his performance. In 1998, he starred as Cisco, the counterpart of the main character Melvin Smiley (played by Mark Wahlberg) in the comedy-action film The Big Hit.
Phillips later had a minor role in the TV sitcom George Lopez (2002–2004) as George Lopez's half-brother. He also played a role in the first season of the TV series 24 as secret government agent Mark DeSalvo, opposite former Young Guns star Kiefer Sutherland. In 2003, he starred in a cameo role with Harrison Ford and Josh Hartnett in the action-comedy film Hollywood Homicide. Phillips played the recurring role of FBI agent Ian Edgerton in the television series Numbers. Edgerton is an FBI tracker and sniper who works as an instructor at Quantico FBI Academy when he is not working a case in the field. Phillips won the second season of the NBC reality series, I'm a Celebrity...Get Me Out of Here!, over pro wrestler Torrie Wilson. On September 11, 2007, Phillips joined the touring troupe for Lerner and Loewe's Camelot in the role of King Arthur. Phillips had a recurring role as Colonel Telford in the Stargate Universe television series during its two-season run on the Syfy channel 2009–2011. He played the would-be commander of the Destiny expedition, who is left behind when an accident launches an unsuspecting crew into deep space. The commander works from Earth to bring the crew home, often coming into conflict with the shipborne command characters.
