An English major in college, Ed Lauter worked as a stand-up comic before entering films in 1971. The tall, menacing Lauter has generally been typecast as humorless, easily corruptible authority figures. He was at his meanest as the vindictive Captain Knaur in Robert Aldrich's The Longest Yard.
His TV credits include such roles as Sheriff Cain in BJ and the Bear (1979-80) and General Louis Crewes in Stephen King's The Golden Years (1991). In 1976, Ed Lauter was afforded a rare leading role--and a sympathetic one to boot--in the made-for-TV murder mystery Last Hours Before Morning (1976). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide. 