From Chicago Theater Roots to Days of Our Lives: Actor Richard Wharton on Grit, Growth and the Power of Performance
“While we were doing it, there was a young person… in a wheelchair. She was squirming and making all this noise… At the end of the performance, a nun rolled that child up and said it was amazing; she’d been there a month or so and had not made any sounds or communicated at all. It showed the power of theater to communicate on a very basic level with people. The good feeling that I got from that propelled me forward.”
I had the pleasure of talking with Richard Wharton, and if you’ve spent any time watching television over the past two decades, you’ve probably seen his face. He’s one of those actors who feels familiar, a journeyman who has popped up in everything from The Drew Carey Show to The Pitt, a character actor who brings a quiet gravity to the screen. But the roles you see are just the final stop on a long, winding road that started in the suburbs of Chicago and was paved not with glamour, but with grit, side jobs, and an unshakable belief in the simple power of performance.
Wharton’s origin story doesn’t have the crisp, clean arc of a Hollywood script. It’s more real than that. “My parents got married very young, and they divorced when I was very young,” he says, his voice reflecting the matter-of-fact way he views his past. Raised for a time by a single mom in Chicago, life was “a little rough.” The family eventually moved to the suburbs, to Lake Zurich, Illinois, and it was there, in the unassuming world of high school, that Wharton found his calling. He joined the theater club, not for the spotlight, but for something more fundamental. “I really enjoyed the camaraderie of theater, which is a big draw to it,” he recalls.
That draw pulled him to Western Illinois University, a school he landed at after a scholarship to his first choice didn’t pan out. He started as an accounting major, a practical choice, but the stage kept calling. He tried to juggle it all — choir, theater, track — but college was a different beast than high school. Something had to give. “I did end up doing theater, and eventually, I ended up doing more theater than my accounting homework,” he says with a slight chuckle. By the end of his sophomore year, he broke the news to his parents: he was switching majors. After finishing his undergrad, the university called him back to join their new MFA program. He had found his path.
For the next 18 years, Chicago was his stage. He worked with the Free Street Theater, a grassroots group that took shows directly into neighborhoods. It was here he honed his belief in the connection between actor and audience. Before shows, the actors would do something called “Mix and Mingle.” Wharton’s bit was juggling. “I would juggle and throw one of the balls to somebody while I was juggling, get them to throw it back, and I would keep juggling,” he says. “It was just crazy, but it was a way to interact with people. Interaction has been a big thing for me in terms of theater.”
It was an experience from high school, however, that truly cemented his purpose. His theater group toured a children’s play, performing at a home for children with disabilities. During the show, a young girl in a wheelchair was making a lot of noise and squirming in her seat. After the show, a nun approached the cast. The girl, she explained, had been at the home for a month without making a sound or communicating at all until that performance. The memory is still vivid for Wharton. “It showed the power of theater to communicate on a very basic level with people,” he says. “The good feeling that I got from that propelled me forward.”
That feeling was a necessary anchor in a profession defined by rejection. Early on, a dinner theater director in Missouri bluntly told him, “Ah, you’re not going to work till you’re 40 or 50.” For Wharton, it wasn’t a rejection; it was a challenge. “I thought, ‘Okay, I’m going to work against that.’” He learned that the only thing an actor can control is the work itself. “The thing I’ve learned is that you have to do the audition as a mini-performance and get enjoyment out of that,” he explains. “You have to find a way to make it about doing as good a job as you can, being proud of that, and knowing that whatever happens after is not up to you.”
In 1998, life took another turn. His wife “wanted mountains, desert, and ocean,” so they packed up and moved to Los Angeles. Wharton began the slow, arduous process of building a career in film and television, “plugging away trying to get different bit parts.” His theater background gave him a unique fortitude, particularly for challenging roles like playing a Howard Hughes-inspired character in Sam Shepard’s Seduced. “You’re basically on stage the whole play,” he remembers. “You spend most of the play in a barber’s chair, in boxer shorts and nothing else.”
In a surprising turn, he recently found a home in the fast-paced world of daytime television, taking over the role of the villainous Dr. Wilhelm Rolf on Days of Our Lives in 2022. He has now appeared in over 60 episodes, unknowingly stepping into the shoes of a character played for decades by another actor. It’s another unexpected stop on a long journey, one he approaches with the same workmanlike attitude he’s had his entire career.
Looking back, Wharton has amassed a wealth of practical wisdom. He advises young actors to find a flexible side job they enjoy, to learn to cook, and to work out. But his core philosophy is simpler and more profound. When asked what idea he’d like to spread, his answer is immediate: “Don’t rush to judgment. I feel like people have immediate reactions to something somebody says or something they see… People need to have more patience with each other.” It’s a lesson learned from a lifetime of observing, of interacting, and of understanding that the most compelling stories are rarely black and white.
Yitzi: Richard Wharton, it’s an honor to meet you. Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn about Richard Wharton’s personal origin story. Can you share with us a story of your childhood, how you grew up, and the seeds for all the amazing work that has come since then?
Richard Wharton: Thank you, an honor to meet you, too. My parents got married very young, and they divorced when I was very young. My mom was a single mom for a while. She lived with her parents, then she ended up in an apartment in Chicago. Later my grandfather moved into the same building, so I always had him close by. She got married again when I must have been about eight. But up until then, she was handling it on her own. It was a little rough. We moved out of Chicago when I graduated from grade school and moved out to the suburbs, Lake Zurich, Illinois. I went to high school there and had a great high school education and social life. That’s where I actually started; I joined the theater club and did plays there and really enjoyed the camaraderie of theater, which is a big draw to it.
Eventually, I ended up at Western Illinois University. When I was graduating high school, I got a scholarship from Kemper Insurance, but they did it based on need. They decided since I had two sets of parents, I didn’t really need their scholarship, so they gave me a token amount, a couple hundred dollars per semester, which wasn’t enough to send me to Drake where they wanted me to go. I ended up at Western Illinois University, which was a fine education out in the middle of cornfields. I started out in accounting, but one of the reasons I chose Western was because it had everything I did in high school. It had choir, theater, track and cross country, and just everything I could think of. I tried to do everything the way I did in high school, but you couldn’t because college was much more demanding, and everything was much more time-consuming. I did end up doing theater, and eventually, I ended up doing more theater than my accounting homework. About the end of my sophomore year, I told my parents that I was switching majors. I went there for four years, and then I went away, not knowing where I was going to end up. Over the summer, they called me and asked me to come back for their new MFA program, so I jumped back, and I was there another two years. Eventually, I moved to Chicago and did theater there for about 18 years. Then I got married late in life, and my wife wanted mountains, desert, and ocean, so we moved to LA in 1998 and have been plugging away trying to get different parts in tv and film ever since.
Yitzi: You probably have some great stories from other parts of your career. Maybe this is hard to boil down, but can you share one or two stories that most stand out in your mind from your professional life?
Richard Wharton: I’m going to jump back to my non-professional life. When I was in high school, one of the things we did was a children’s play every year, and we would tour it to the grade schools. One of the places we went to, I think was called St. Joseph, was a home and school for children with disabilities. We were doing this play called Sunshine for the Queen. While we were doing it, there was a young person, I think a girl, towards the back of the audience in a wheelchair. She was squirming and making all this noise, and it was kind of distracting, but it was okay. We didn’t really understand what was going on, but at the end of the performance, a nun rolled that child up and said it was amazing; she’d been there a month or so and had not made any sounds or communicated at all. It showed the power of theater to communicate on a very basic level with people. The good feeling that I got from that propelled me forward. You get that from audiences, especially in live theater; you get immediate feedback, and people come up to you and talk to you afterward. That’s always been a great motivator.
In professional life, my life has been full of pushes forward and pushes back. I once auditioned for a guy at some dinner theater in Missouri, and he said, “Ah, you’re not going to work till you’re 40 or 50.” And I thought, “Okay, I’m going to work against that.” I worked in a group called the Free Street Theater when I first got to Chicago, and they were a very grassroots theater organization. They went into neighborhoods, set up a showmobile, and would stay the whole day, interacting with the people and doing three shows throughout the day, each one gradually getting longer. They incorporated “Mix and Mingle,” which was before the performance; the band’s playing, and the actors are going out and mingling with the crowd. My bit was, I would juggle and throw one of the balls to somebody while I was juggling, get them to throw it back, and I would keep juggling. I would drop them. It was just crazy, but it was a way to interact with people. Interaction has been a big thing for me in terms of theater.
Something that happened to me along the way was, Liz Hanley auditioned for Free Street while I was there — I was there for about five years — she went off and became part of a small theater company called The Immediate Theater Company. At some point, she invited me to audition for their company, and I ended up becoming a member. Then, the artistic director of The Immediate wanted to retire because he needed to make money, and he thought that was going to take the theater down. But I and another person, Jeff Ginsburg, my artistic partner, ended up stepping up and becoming the co-artistic directors. That journey of meeting Liz, being invited to do a show, becoming a company member, and then becoming co-artistic director was pretty awesome. We produced a few great seasons of theater, and then eventually we couldn’t make it either, but we did have a great time and produced some wonderful shows. BTW, That journey is not over, Liz is also in LA and she’s my agent!
Yitzi: It’s been said that sometimes our mistakes can be our greatest teachers. Do you have a story about a funny mistake that you made when you were first starting your career and the lesson that you learned from it?
Richard Wharton: I don’t know that I have one from my professional career. When I was in college, we were doing Jesus Christ Superstar. I was backstage, and I was always very conscious of trying to do everything right. Somehow I got engaged in a conversation or something, but I missed an entrance. It was a rehearsal, and they stopped the production. They’re like, “Wharton!” I ran out there like a deer in the headlights. I was so embarrassed and shocked. I’ve never missed an entrance since. Letting everyone down is a big thing for me; I don’t want to let people down.
Yitzi: There’s a saying that ‘no’ is redirection, not rejection. Do you have a story where a ‘no’ led to some unexpected success, opportunity, or discovery?
Richard Wharton: That’s a tough one. As an actor, you’re told ‘no’ all the time, so you’re always trying to deal with that. With auditions, you do them and you don’t hear anything. That’s really crippling sometimes, but I’ve gotten used to it. In terms of auditions, the thing I’ve learned is that you have to do the audition as a mini-performance and get enjoyment out of that. You have to find a way to make it about doing as good a job as you can, being proud of that, and knowing that whatever happens after is not up to you. Sometimes it’s because somebody else has black hair instead of silver hair or whatever. It’s totally out of your control. You have to do what you can control, which is prepare and try to make good choices.
Yitzi: Richard, you have so much impressive work. Can you share with our readers any exciting new projects you’re working on now and what you hope to be working on in the near future?
Richard Wharton: I’ve done a lot of Days of Our Lives this year, which you’ll be seeing over the next year, and I love doing that. I’ve been doing it for four years. When I first got the job, I was a temporary replacement for William Utay, who had done over 800 episodes. He didn’t come back. That was during COVID, and I assumed he didn’t want to work because of the risk for people our age. But he never came back, so it’s been great and exciting for me to be a part of that show. I recently worked on Bad Monkey. I just had a day on it, but I had a fun little bit as a confused senior citizen, which I look forward to seeing.
In terms of the future, Hollywood is slow right now, so auditions are few and far between. It does seem like it’s picking up, so I’m looking forward to whatever comes down the pipeline. I don’t really have control of that either, although, as I’m sure many people will tell you, sometimes it’s best to take control and try to produce something yourself. I’ve been considering that. Anytime I’ve tried to write something, I’ve always thrown it away. I make a big deal out of telling people that I failed playwriting in college, partly because I tried to play the system, and that’s not always a good idea. I had a playwriting class, I wrote a play, and the teacher was like, “This doesn’t make sense. Go rewrite it.” I postponed and procrastinated. I had borrowed a play from the teacher that somebody else had written because I thought about directing it. He said, “Well, if you don’t return that, I’m going to give you an incomplete.” So I thought, “Aha, I’ll get an incomplete. I don’t have to worry about turning in my play because I’m going for the incomplete.” I was shocked when my grades came in and I got a fail instead of an incomplete. He said, “Well, you never turned anything in.” He was right, and that’s when I decided writing was not my strong suit. Anyway, to answer your question, I have no idea what’s in the future. I just keep trying to audition and see what happens.
Yitzi: What’s been the most challenging project or role you’ve taken on so far and why?
Richard Wharton: Most of my challenges have been in theater. In film and TV, I’m mostly cast in things that I’d be a type for. At The Immediate Theater we did Seduced by Sam Shepard, directed by my friend Jeff Ginsberg who talked me into taking on the role of Henry Hackamore, which is based on Howard Hughes. You’re basically on stage the whole play. It was kind of a trip. You spend most of the play in a barber’s chair, in boxer shorts and nothing else. I had long hair, and I had fake fingernails on that were very long, and fake toenails, just imitating this image of Howard Hughes in a hotel room in Vegas, controlling everything from there and not letting anybody in. He was a germaphobe. There was a great book called I Caught Flies for Howard Hughes, written by one of his attendants. One of the stories is that Howard Hughes would call him in every once in a while and say, “There’s a fly in the room. Catch it.” The guy would have to go around and try and find the fly. One time he was in there and he could not find a fly and he wanted to get out of that room so he pretended to catch it. He said, “I got it.” And Howard Hughes, knowing there was no fly in the room because he was screwing around with him, said, “Show me.” That became the basis of my character.
Yitzi: Looking back to when you first started, you must have learned a lot from your experiences. Can you share five things that you’ve learned over the years that would have been really nice to know when you first started acting?
Richard Wharton:
- When I was in college, I assumed I was going to get out, get work, and be a working actor, and that’s all I was going to do. I quickly learned that you needed to have a side job, preferably one you enjoy. So, first, find a side job you can do that is flexible and gives you purpose and joy.
- Second, find time in your life to do things other than what you’re pursuing. If all you do is try to be an actor, you need to find things that bring you joy outside of that, like a volleyball club or ceramics or anything to make you a more whole person and give you more relationships.
- Third, learn to cook because you’ll probably be on a budget.
- Fourth, work out. That’s an important thing for me. Working out can be at the gym, swimming, playing volleyball, hiking, anything, but just constantly work out. As I’m older now, I find that I try to do something every day.
- And fifth, along with that side job, learn to type. It comes in really handy, and a lot of people today don’t get it. It’s not a requirement, but I think it’s something really valuable.
Yitzi: Richard, because of your great work and the platform that you’ve built, you’re a person of great influence. If you could spread an idea or inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be?
Richard Wharton: Don’t rush to judgment. I feel like people have immediate reactions to something somebody says or something they see. Some people get inflamed, and sometimes if you just hear it, absorb it, and think about it — and maybe even step away and think about it for a day — you might not have the same opinion as your snap judgment. People need to have more patience with each other.
Yitzi: Richard, how can our readers continue to follow your work? How could they watch your TV shows or support your work in any possible way?
Richard Wharton: Well, if they want to see everything I’ve done, they can go to IMDb, the Internet Movie Database. You can see things and then just look them up and find out where they’re showing. That’s pretty much it. I have a website, richardwhartonactor.com but I don’t really do a lot of postings on that about what’s coming up, but maybe I should. I’m also on instagram, #richardwharton.la
Yitzi: Richard, it’s been so nice to meet you. I wish you continued success, good health, and blessings. I’d love to do this again next year.
Richard Wharton: Thank you. And to you, too. You bet.
From Chicago Theater Roots to Days of Our Lives: Actor Richard Wharton on Grit, Growth and the… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.