Stephen Furst

Stephen Furst was born Stephen Nelson Feuerstein on May 8, 1954, in Norfolk, VA. After graduating from Virginia Commonwealth University, Furst took a job as a Los Angeles-based pizza delivery boy during the 1970s, distributing his headshot to movie industry-adjacent customers along with their orders. Although Furst's big screen debut came with a small part in the film "American Raspberry" (1977), his big break came one year later when he starred as Kent "Flounder" Dorfman in the wildly popular comedy movie "Animal House" (1978). The following year, Furst reprised his role as Flounder for the short-lived "Animal House" spin-off TV series, "Delta House" (ABC 1979), redirecting his energies toward the big screen following the show's cancelation. Furst appeared in early '80s pictures like "The Unseen" (1980), "Getting Wasted" (1980), "Silent Rage" (1982), and "Class Reunion" (1982), before landing a costarring part on the hit TV drama "St. Elsewhere" (NBC 1982-88) as Dr. Elliot Axelrod. Following the series' run, Furst began experimenting with writing and directing, kicking off this new chapter of his career with the family comedy "Magic Kid II" (1994), in which he also starred. Around the same time, Furst joined the cast of the sci-fi drama series "Babylon 5" (The WB 1994-98), playing the Centauri character Vir Cotto. After accruing several smaller parts in the years to follow, Furst retired from acting in 2006, at which point he repositioned himself as a producer, yielding such titles as "My Sister's Keeper" (2009) and "Cold Moon" (2016). Also around this time, Furst began devoting himself to philanthropic causes. Included were the Renal Support Network, the American Diabetes Association, and the American Heart Association. On June 16, 2017, Furst died at age 63 of diabetes-related complications.