Biography
James Norman "Jim" Beaver, Jr. (born August 12, 1950) is an American stage, film, and television actor, playwright, screenwriter, and film historian. He is perhaps most familiar to worldwide audiences as the gruff but tenderhearted prospector Whitney Ellsworth on the HBO Western drama series Deadwood, a starring role which brought him acclaim and a Screen Actors Guild Awards nomination for Ensemble Acting after three decades of supporting work in films and TV. He currently portrays Bobby Singer ...
Known For
Complete Filmography

No More Time
2022
as Radio Host
A couple seeks refuge in a remote mountain town to escape a mysterious viral disease that makes people disappear or turn into murderers. As messengers...

Nightmare Alley
2021
as Sheriff Jedediah Judd
An ambitious carnival man with a talent for manipulating people with a few well-chosen words hooks up with a female psychologist who is even more dang...

Blindfire
2020
as Sergeant Ward
A police officer who while responding to a violent hostage call, kills the African American suspect only to later learn of his innocence. Sensing this...

Mama Bear
2019
as Doctor
When an accident leaves her dying son with 24 hours to get a new liver, a seemingly average soccer mom must reveal her hidden past and hunt down the o...

Deadwood: The Movie
2019
as Whitney Ellsworth (archive footage)
Follow the 10-year reunion of the Deadwood camp to celebrate South Dakota's statehood. Former rivalries are reignited, alliances are tested and old wo...

Hospitality
2018
as The Boss
A woman with a checkered past must protect her son when a man brings trouble to her isolated bed and breakfast.

Billy Boy
2018
as Crabtree
When an angry teenager discovers a close friend has been killed, grief jeopardizes his future and he finds himself engulfed in danger.

The Frontier
2016
as Lee
A desperate young woman, on the run from the law, takes a job at a remote desert motel. She quickly discovers the motel's patrons are rendezvousing af...

Crimson Peak
2015
as Carter Cushing
In the aftermath of a family tragedy, an aspiring author is torn between love for her childhood friend and the temptation of a mysterious outsider. Tr...

The Adventures of Biffle and Shooster
2015
as The Captain
Feature compilation of four Biffle and Shooster comedy shorts--"The Biffle Murder Case," "Imitation of Wife," "Schmo Boat" and "Bride of Finklestein"-...

Remember the Sultana
2015
as Joseph Taylor Elliott / First Engineering Officer Nathaniel Wintringer (voice)
Over 2000 Union soldiers, passengers and crew were crammed aboard the steamboat Sultana, licensed to carry 376. Graft, greed, overcrowding, a poorly m...
Night Riders
2013
Writer, Director, Screenplay
Rick and Ron Muldoon, two brothers, drive across the open prairie late one night. As they travel, they try to make sense of a recent event and attempt...

The Legend of Hell's Gate: An American Conspiracy
2011
as J. Wright Mooar
In 1870s Texas, a ruthless bounty hunter and an Irish desperado flee the law with a young criminal claiming to possess a treasure more valuable than g...

Dark and Stormy Night
2009
as Jack Tugdon
In the 1930s the family of old Sinas Cavinder, gathered for the reading of his will, find themselves being murdered by a mysterious phantom while two ...

Reflections
2008
as Franck
When Carol looks into a mirror -- any mirror -- she sees images that horrify and repulse her. She's not a Medium, she's not a Ghost Whisperer, she's a...

Next
2007
as Wisdom
Las Vegas showroom magician Cris Johnson has a secret which torments him: he can see a few minutes into the future. Sick of the examinations he underw...

Care Bears: Big Wish Movie
2005
Music Coordinator
Feeling sad that her fellow Care Bears don't seem to appreciate her wishes, Wish Bear uses her wish star, Twinkers, to find some bears who love wishin...

Wheelmen
2005
as Agent Hammond
Two limo drivers hope to make money by escorting an executive around Los Angeles. Things go awry when they get caught up in a sabotage plot to assassi...

The Life of David Gale
2003
as Duke Grover
A man against capital punishment is accused of murdering a fellow activist and is sent to death row.

Adaptation.
2002
as Ranger Tony
Charlie Kaufman is a confused L.A. screenwriter overwhelmed by feelings of inadequacy, sexual frustration, self-loathing, and by the screenwriting amb...

Joy Ride
2001
as Sheriff Ritter
Three young people on a road trip from Colorado to New Jersey talk to a trucker on their CB radio, then must escape when he turns out to be a psychoti...

Warden of Red Rock
2001
as Jefferson Bent
In 1910, John Flinders is warden of Red Rock Territorial Prison, in Arizona. When a condemned man's last request brings Flinders into contact with the...

Magnolia
1999
as Smiling Peanut Patron #1
On one random day in the San Fernando Valley, a dying father, a young wife, a male caretaker, a famous lost son, a police officer in love, a boy geniu...

Mr. Murder
1998
as Agent Jason Reiling
A group of scientists are trying to produce the perfect soldier by cloning. The day the clone is born, Marty Stillwater, a mystery novel writer, feels...

Wounded
1997
as Agent Eric Ashton
After a grizzly-bear poacher named Hanaghan kills her fiance and fellow Fish & Wildlife Deptartment officer, Julie Clayton sets out to track the k...

Divided by Hate
1997
as Danny Leland
When Carol Gibbs becomes involved with religious- and political-cult leader Steve Riordan's anti-government movement, she takes her children and leave...

Bad Girls
1994
as Pinkerton Detective Graves
Four former harlots try to leave the wild west (Colorado, to be exact) and head north to make a better life for themselves. Unfortunately someone from...

Blue Chips
1994
as Ricky's Father
Pete Bell, a college basketball coach is under a lot of pressure. His team isn't winning and he cannot attract new players. The stars of the future ar...

Geronimo: An American Legend
1993
as Proclamation Officer
The Apache Indians have reluctantly agreed to settle on a US Government approved reservation. Not all the Apaches are able to adapt to the life of cor...

Sliver
1993
as Detective Ira
A woman moves into an apartment in Manhattan and learns that the previous tenant's life ended mysteriously after they fell from the balcony.

Gunsmoke: The Long Ride
1993
as Traveling Blacksmith
For thirty years, Marshall Matt Dillon fought to preserve the law in Dodge City… now, he's wanted for murder and fighting to clear his name. Three dep...

Twogether
1992
as Oscar
An artist and an environmentalist go through an up and down relationship over the years. They get married in an early fling, she gets pregnant as they...

Sister Act
1992
as Clarkson
A Reno singer witnesses a mob murder and the cops stash her in a nunnery to protect her from the mob's hitmen. The mother superior does not trust her,...

Gunsmoke: To the Last Man
1992
as Deputy Willie Rudd
Retired marshal Matt Dillon tracks Arizona rustlers and lands in the middle of the 1880s Pleasant Valley War.

The Court-Martial of Jackie Robinson
1990
as Maj. Trimble
A film about the early life of the baseball star in the army, particulary his court-martial for insubordination regarding segragation.

El Diablo
1990
as Spivey Irick
When mild-mannered teacher Billy Ray Smith (Anthony Edwards) vows to bring a student's kidnapper to justice, he needs a bit of help. Lacking any cowbo...

Follow Your Heart
1990
as Craig Hraboy
An ex-marine, in search of some defining life direction, unexpectedly faces a hurdle when his jeep breaks down in a sparsely populated Wyoming town. W...

In Country
1989
as Earl Smith
Samantha Hughes, a teenaged Kentucky girl, never knew her father, who died in Vietnam before her birth. Samantha lives with her uncle Emmett, who also...

Mothers, Daughters and Lovers
1989
as Sheriff Jack Edzard
A single mother struggles to raise two teenage daughters in a small town in America.

Turner & Hooch
1989
as Plant Manager
Detective Scott Turner has three days left in the local police department before he moves to a bigger city to get some 'real' cases—not just misdemean...

Perry Mason: The Case of the Lady in the Lake
1988
as Motel Manager
A woman suddenly disappears after an early morning walk, and her husband is accused of murder.

Defense Play
1988
as FBI Man
Professor Vandemeer works on a secret project for the US-Air-Force called DART: a very small helicopter for scouting and defense. When he gets killed,...

Sweet Revenge
1987
Additional Dialogue
Nancy Allen plays an investigative news reporter Jillian Gray, who, along with her daughter is kidnapped by white slave king Cicero, after getting too...

Girls of the White Orchid
1983
as Pedestrian
In Los Angeles, naive and lonely waitress and aspirant singer Carol finds an advertisement for a job opportunity in Tokyo. Traveling to Japan to work ...

The Seniors
1978
as Client (uncredited)
Four college seniors open a bogus sex clinic, which unexpectedly mushrooms into a multi-million dollar business.

Semi-Tough
1977
as B.E.A.T. Member (uncredited)
A three-way friendship between two free-spirited professional football players and the owner's daughter becomes compromised when two of them become ro...

Injection
N/A
as Pops
When a mysterious serum is delivered to her door, Claudia Fischer enlists the help of her scientist brother to determine its contents. The results bea...