Misha Collins

Dmitri "Misha" Collins[1] (born Dmitri Tippens Krushnic;[2] August 20, 1974) is an American actor, author, producer and director best known for his role as the angel Castiel on the CW television series Supernatural (2008–2020).[3]

Misha Collins
Collins at the 2017 Comic Con in San Diego
Born	Dmitri Tippens Krushnic August 20, 1974 Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.
Alma mater	Northfield Mount Hermon School University of Chicago
Occupation	Actor author producer director writer
Years active	1998–present
Spouse(s)	Victoria Vantoch ​ (m. 2001)​
Children	2

Early life

Misha Collins was born in Boston, Massachusetts, to Richard Krushnic and Rebecca Tippens.[4] He was raised in an irreligious family.[5] Growing up, his family was poor and often homeless.[6][7] He has said that his surname, Krushnic, "goes back six generations in Canada, and we're not sure where they came from."[2] His stage name, Collins, is his great-grandmother's maiden name. He is of partial Jewish descent.[8]

Collins attended Greenfield Center School, Northfield Mount Hermon School and the University of Chicago, where he studied social theory.[9][10]

Career

Interning

Before acting, he interned for four months at the White House during the Clinton Administration in the Office of Presidential Personnel.[3][11]

Acting

His film work includes an uncredited appearance in the 1999 movie Liberty Heights, as well as roles in Girl, Interrupted, Finding Home, Karla and Loot (on which he also served as Associate Producer).

As well as his work as the angel Castiel on the CW television series Supernatural, other television shows includes Legacy, Charmed, NYPD Blue, 24, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, ER, Monk, and Timeless.

Writing

Collins is a published poet. His poems, including "Baby Pants" and "Old Bones", can be found in the 2008 edition of Columbia Poetry Review #21.

Collins has also co-written a cookbook with wife, Vicki Collins. It is reported that much of the book's sales will go to charitable organizations who specialize in food nutrition.[12]

Collins and Kathryn Leonard, together with several other collaborators, are authors of "The 2D Shape Structure Dataset", an academic research paper on a crowd-sourced database on the structure of shapes.[13]

Charity work

Collins is the co-founder and board president of Random Acts,[14] a non-profit organization dedicated to funding and inspiring acts of kindness around the world.[15] Collins founded the Greatest International Scavenger Hunt the World Has Ever Seen (GISHWHES) in 2011.[16] Entrance fees for the international competition go towards Random Acts, and in 2012, GISHWHES broke the world record for most pledges to perform an act of kindness.[17]

Personal life

On October 6, 2001, Collins married Victoria Vantoch in Maine. They have a son, West Anaximander Collins (born September 23, 2010), and a daughter, Maison Marie Collins (born September 25, 2012).[18][19]

Filmography

Film

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1999	Liberty Heights	Guy	Uncredited
	Girl, Interrupted	Tony
2002	Par 6	Al Hegelman
2003	Moving Alan	Tony Derrick
	Finding Home	Dave
2004	The Crux	Man Hanging from the Rope	Short film
2006	Karla	Paul Bernardo
2008	Over Her Dead Body	Brian
	The Grift	Buster
2013	TSA America: Just Relax	Officer Franklin	Short film; also Producer, director and writer
2014	TSA America: Suspicious Bulge	Officer Franklin	Short film; also Producer, director and writer
	TSA America: Yeah, But Is It Ticking?	Officer Franklin	Short film; also Producer, director and writer
TBA	Invasion	Dylan	Post-production

Television

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1998	Legacy	Andrew	Episode: "The Big Fix"
1999	Charmed	Eric Bragg	Episode: "They're Everywhere"
2000	NYPD Blue	Blake DeWitt	Episode: "Welcome to New York"
2001	Seven Days	Sergei Chubais	Episode: "Born in the USSR"
2002	24	Alexis Drazen	Recurring role; 7 episodes
2005	CSI: Crime Scene Investigation	Vlad	Episode: "Nesting Dolls"
	20 Things to Do Before You're 30	Unknown role	Unaired television series
2005–2006	ER	Bret	Recurring role; 3 episodes
2006	NCIS	Justin Farris	Episode: "Singled Out"
	Monk	Michael Karapov	Episode: "Mr. Monk and the Captain's Marriage"
	Close to Home	Todd Monroe	Episode: "There's Something About Martha"
2007	Without a Trace	Chester Lake	Episode: "Run"
	CSI: NY	Morton Brite	Episode: "Can You Hear Me Now?"
	Reinventing the Wheelers	Joey Wheeler	Unaired television pilot
2008–2020	Supernatural	Castiel / Jimmy Novak / Himself / Leviathan / Lucifer / Cosmic Entity	Recurring role; (Seasons 4 and 8) Main role; (Seasons 5–6, 9–15) Guest role; (Season 7 and 8); 147 episodes also Director: Season 9, episode 17 People's Choice Award for Favorite Sci-Fi/Fantasy TV Actor (2015)
2009	Nip/Tuck	Manny Skerritt	Episode: "Manny Skerritt"
2010	Stonehenge Apocalypse	Jacob	Television film
2012	Ringer	Dylan	Episode: "Whores Don't Make That Much"
2014	Whose Line Is It Anyway?	Himself	Episode: "Misha Collins"
2015	Kittens in a Cage	Porn Director	Episode: "Punch and Lemon Squares"
2015–2018	The Hillywood Show	Ghostbusters Receptionist / Dancer	Guest role; 2 episodes
2016	The Venture Bros.	Prisoner 2 / Maestro Wave	Episode: "Red Means Stop"; voice role
2017	Kings of Con	Doug Walderman	Episode: "Arlington, VA"
	Timeless	Eliot Ness	Episode: "Public Enemy No. 1"

Web

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2011	Ghostfacers	Castiel	Episode: "Ghostfacers Meet Castiel"
	Divine: The Series	Father Christopher	Also producer and writer[20]

Producer

Year	Title	Notes
2008	Loot	Documentary film; also associate producer[21]

Director

Year	Title	Notes
2010	Stranger Danger	Short film; also writer

Awards and nominations

Year	Award	Category	Work	Result
2014	People's Choice Awards	Favorite TV Bromance (shared with Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles)	Supernatural	Won[22][23]
2015		Favorite Sci-Fi/Fantasy TV Actor
2016				Nominated[24]

References

1. "Misha Collins in LA 09: On his name". YouTube. "My mom went to Russia when she was in college, and […] she had a boyfriend whose name was Mitya, which she thought was the same as Misha, which it's not. And his real name was Dmitri, so my real name, actually—my birth certificate says Dmitri. But she always calls me Misha, so I have the wrong nickname. But, you know, too late to change it now."
2. "Misha Collins Answers Our Top 3 Q's – EveryJoe". EveryJoe. Archived from the original on December 30, 2013. Retrieved September 24, 2013. "My mother went to Russia when she was in college. She had a boyfriend named Misha, and much to my father's chagrin she named me after him. And the last name, Krushnic, goes back six generations in Canada, and we're not sure where they came from—could be Russian or Ukrainian or Polish."
3. "Supernatural Cast Bios Misha Collins". The CW. Retrieved May 5, 2011.
4. "Misha Collins". TV Guide. CBS Interactive. Retrieved July 11, 2014.
5. O'Hare, Kate (November 18, 2008). "Misha Collins is Supernatural's Dark Angel". Screener. Retrieved January 17, 2018.
6. Rossow, Andrew (March 5, 2018). "Behind The Cape: Supernatural's Misha Collins, Advocates Against Cyberbullying Through 'Random Acts'". Forbes. Retrieved September 19, 2018.
7. Molloy, Parker. "Inspired by his family, Misha Collins is fighting homelessness for a very personal reason". Upworthy (22 November 2017). Retrieved September 19, 2018.
8. "Jewish comics stump against Trump".
9. "Just try to find a stranger scavenger hunt than this". The Recorder. August 16, 2013. Retrieved July 11, 2014. GISHWHES was created by American actor Misha Collins, who attended Greenfield Center School and graduated from Northfield Mount Hermon School in 1992.
10. Hale, Mike (April 18, 2014). "Eternal Life, Thanks to Angels and Abs". The New York Times. Retrieved July 11, 2014.
11. Krushnic, Dmitri (January 29, 1998). "Lewinsky wasn't the only infatuated intern". Baltimore Sun. Retrieved July 11, 2014.
12. "Cover Released for Misha and Vicki Collins' Cookbook". Nerds and Beyond. June 25, 2019. Retrieved October 28, 2019.
13. Carlier, Axel; Leonard, Kathryn; Hahmann, Stefanie; Morin, Geraldine; Collins, Misha (August 2016). "The 2D shape structure dataset: A user annotated open access database". Computers & Graphics. 58: 23–30. doi:10.1016/j.cag.2016.05.009.
14. "Random Acts – Our Staff". Random Acts.
15. "Random Acts – Non-profit dedicated to acts of kindness worldwide". Random Acts. Archived from the original on February 27, 2015.
16. Mandy, Chaos (October 11, 2012). "GISHWHES – International Scavenger Hunt". Wired. Retrieved October 22, 2013.
17. Hayes, Molly (August 14, 2013). "Wanted: Rooster costume and Russian colonel". The Hamilton Spectator. Retrieved October 22, 2013.
18. Raftery, Liz (September 28, 2012). "Supernatural's Misha Collins, Wife Have a Baby". TV GUIDE. Retrieved October 5, 2012.
19. "We got this on tuesday. No..." September 28, 2012. Retrieved October 5, 2012.
20. Divine the Series Cast Archived September 25, 2011, at the Wayback Machine Retrieved on May 16, 2011.
21. Loot: Home. HBO. Retrieved on March 1, 2011.
22. "People's Choice Awards: Fan Favorites in Movies, Music & TV - PeoplesChoice.com". www.peopleschoice.com. Retrieved November 5, 2016.
23. "People's Choice Awards: Fan Favorites in Movies, Music & TV - PeoplesChoice.com". www.peopleschoice.com. Retrieved November 5, 2016.
24. "People's Choice Awards: Fan Favorites in Movies, Music & TV - PeoplesChoice.com". www.peopleschoice.com. Retrieved November 5, 2016.

External links

• Misha Collins at IMDb
• Misha Collins on Twitter
• Misha Collins's channel on YouTube