"David is a personal friend of mine, and I wanted to write a superhero role for him because he is a haunted guy. He's a very joyful guy with a wonderful family, but he looks haunted. And he's scary."
David Dastmalchian (born July 21, 1975 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) is an American film, television and theatre actor of Iranian, French and British descent.
He is perhaps best known for his roles as Thomas Schiff in The Dark Knight, Kurt in Ant-Man and its sequel, and Abner Krill/Polka-Dot Man in The Suicide Squad.
He is also a writer, having written and starred in two independent films called Animals and All Creatures Here Below, and penning Count Crowley, a series of Horror Comic Books for Dark Horse Comics.
Selected filmography:
Films
- The Dark Knight (2008) as Thomas Schiff
- Prisoners (2013) as Bob Taylor
- Angry Video Game Nerd: The Movie (2014) as Sergeant L. J. Ng (cameo)
- Marvel Cinematic Universe:
- Ant-Man (2015) as Kurt Goreshter
- Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018) as Kurt Goreshter
- What If...? (2021) as Kurt Goreshter
- Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023) as Veb
- The Belko Experiment (2017) as Lonny
- Blade Runner 2049 (2017) as Coco
- Bird Box (2018) as Whistling Marauder
- Batman: The Long Halloween (2021) as Calendar Man (voice role)
- The Suicide Squad (2021) as Abner Krill / Polka-Dot Man
- Dune (2021) as Piter De Vries
- Weird: The Al Yankovic Story (2022) as John Deacon
- The Boogeyman (2023) as Lester Billings
- Batman: The Doom That Came to Gotham (2023) as Grendon (voice role)
- Oppenheimer (2023) as William L. Borden
- The Last Voyage of the Demeter (2023) as Wojchek
- Justice League × RWBY: Super Heroes & Huntsmen: Part Two (2023) as Barry Allen/The Flash
- Late Night with the Devil (2024) as Jack Delroy
Live Action TV
- ER (2008) as the young man (episode "Heal Thyself")
- The League (2009) as the morgue worker
- Almost Human (2014) as Simon
- The Flash (2014) as Abra Kadabra
- Intruders (2014) as Oz Turner
- CSI (2014) as Lee Crosby
- CSI: Cyber (2015) as Logan Reeves
- 12 Monkeys (2016) as Kyle Slade
- MacGyver (2016) as Murdoc
- Gotham (2017) as Dwight Pollard
- Twin Peaks: The Return (2017) as Pit Boss Warrack
Tropes in his works:
- Looks Like Cesare: He tends to be typecast as villains or mentally disturbed characters (or mentally disturbed villains), partially because of his pale complexion (in part due to vitiligo in his youth), large dark eyes, and jet-black hair. He and his fans have even acknowledged how much he resembles this trope.
- Promoted Fanboy: He grew up collecting comic books, and he's appeared in several DC Comics and Marvel Comics-based films and series.