Theatre

Two of his three one-man-shows, Jails, Hospitals & Hip-Hop and Some People, were published together in 1998. In both pieces he explores the multi-cultural (and multi-lingual) New York he grew up in, providing adept monologues in the languages of the people, Cuban Spanish, Bronx Dominican Spanish or Nuyorican, Jamaican Patois or Trinidadian English.

A prevailing theme in Hoch's work, within its spectrum of unification and deep similarities under superficial differences, is the power of hip hop. Naive or street-wise white youth believing or dreaming that they are black, African-American kids dreaming of making it as a rapper, a Cuban street vendor's love of Snoop Dogg.

Some People followed his first endeavor, Pot Melting, and was broadcast on HBO in the mid-90's, which granted Hoch more national exposure, allowing him to tour more cities to greater crowds. Hoch founded the Hip-Hop Theater Festival in 2000. Together, his three plays have won many awards, including two Obie Awards, a Sundance Writers Fellowship and the CalArts' Alpert Awards in the Arts in Theatre. In 2010 he won a Fellow award granted by United States Artists.

In 2008 Hoch's solo show Taking Over addresses the issue of social imbalance as viewed by people who are pushed out by gentrification in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

In late 2011 to early 2012, Hoch appeared in Ethan Coen's one-act play "Talking Cure" presented as part of Relatively Speaking.

Appearances in other media

Like the subject of most of Hoch's monologues, his writings often examine topics in hip hop, race and class and he has been published in The Village Voice, The New York Times, Harper's, and The Nation.

He has been featured on HBO's Def Poetry Jam, in addition to his Some People being broadcast on that station. The film version of Hoch's Jails, Hospitals & Hip-Hop was released in 2000.

Hoch was cast in a guest role on a 1995 episode of Seinfeld, (season seven, "The Pool Guy"), but he objected to what he felt was ethnic stereotyping in the way his Hispanic character was written and tried to convince Jerry Seinfeld to change things. Hoch was eventually re-cast with another actor.

He is also known for writing Whiteboyz, a limited-released 1999 film directed by Marc Levin in which Hoch also stars with Mark Webber and Dash Mihok as three white Iowa teenagers who long for a gangsta rap life. The film also stars Piper Perabo and Eugene Byrd and rappers as luminous as Snoop Doggy Dogg, Big Pun, Fat Joe, dead prez, Slick Rick and Doug E. Fresh.

Danny Hoch was part of Robert Small's MTV Unplugged spoken word series.

Filmography

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1996	Sureshot
1997	Subway Stories	Edward (segment "Honey-Getter")	Made-for-television movie
1997	His and Hers	Lenny
1998	The Thin Red Line	Pvt. Carni	Directed by Terrence Malick
1999	Whiteboyz	Flip	Also writer
2000	Jails, Hospitals, & Hip-Hop		Writer, Director
2000	Bamboozled	Timmi Hillnigger	Directed by Spike Lee
2001	Black Hawk Down	Spc. Dominick Pilla	Directed by Ridley Scott
2001	Prison Song	Harris
2001	3 A.M.	Father
2003	American Splendor	Marty	Also starring Paul Giamatti
2003	Law & Order: Special Victims Unit	Kracker	Television series; episode Soulless
2003	The Other Shoe	Abraham
2003	Washington Heights	Mickey	Award-winning independent film
2005	War of the Worlds	Cop	Directed by Steven Spielberg
2006	Wyclef Jean in America		Television series; writer
2007	We Own the Night	Jumbo Falsetti
2007	Lucky You	Bobby Basketball
2007	Blackbird	Pinchback
2007	Bam Bam and Celeste	Neo-Nazi
2009	Taking Chance	TSA Agent
2010	Blue Bloods	Billy Leo	Television series; episode Officer Down
2010	Henry's Crime	Joe
2011	Violet & Daisy	Man #4
2011	Nurse Jackie	Mr. Digby	Television series; episode ...Deaf Blind Tumor Pee-Test
2012	Safe	Julius Barkow
2014	The Knick	Bunky Collier	Television series; one episode
2016	Gotham	Pharmacist	Television series; one episode Wrath of the Villains: Mr. Freeze

[ Source: Wikipedia ]