Background
Donovan was born Martin Paul Smith in Reseda, California, to Roman Catholic middle-class parents, Gayne Paul Smith and Agnes Mary Regan.
Actor screenwriter film producer
Donovan was born Martin Paul Smith in Reseda, California, to Roman Catholic middle-class parents, Gayne Paul Smith and Agnes Mary Regan.
He graduated from Crespi Carmelite High School and attended Pierce College for two years. He attended American Theater Arts, a combined conservatory and theater company in Los Angeles, where he appeared in the plays Richard"s Cork Legal by Brendan Behan and Private Life of the Master Race by Bertold Brecht.
He has had a long collaboration with director Hal Hartley and appeared in many of Hartley"s films, such as Trust (1990), Surviving Desire (1991), Simple Men (1992), Flirt (1993), Amateur (1994), and The Book of Life (1998. In which he played Jesus). Donovan also played Peter Scottson on Showtime"s cable series Weeds.
He made his writing/directorial debut with the film Collaborator (2011).
He joined the off-off-Broadway Cucaracha Theater on Greenwich Street. Donovan has appeared in fourteen episodes of the Showtime television series Weeds, which stars Mary-Louise Parker, for which he was nominated for a Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by An Ensemble in a Comedy Series.
He has also acted with Parker in Saved!, Pipe Dream and The Portrait of A Lady. In 2009, he starred opposite Virginia Madsen in The Haunting in Connecticut.
Recently he was seen in The Sentinel with Kiefer Sutherland and Michael Douglas as well as The Quiet with Edie Falco.
In 2007 he appeared in the suspense horror film Wind Chill. Other recent film appearances include The United States of Leland, The Opposite of Sex, Living Out Loud, In a Savage Land, Hollow Reed, Onegin, and Nadja. Donovan had a long association with celebrated director Hal Hartley, starring in several of his films including Amateur which was selected for both the Cannes and New York Film Festivals.
Donovan starred in Shadows and Lies.
Donovan made his television series début in Peter Berg"s Wonderland. His recent television credits include Masters of Horror (episode "Right to Die").
The Forex telefilm Robert F. Kennedy and the Fox series Pasadena. Other television credits are The Great Gatsby, and Home Box Office"s When Trumpets Fade.
In 2011 he took a major role in the Starz original drama series Boss.
In 2014 he starred in the Lifetime post-apocalyptic series The Lottery. In 2010, Donovan wrote, directed and starred in Collaborator, portraying a once-successful playwright who is taken hostage while visiting his mother and childhood home.
