Solid, reliable character actor who's played cops, thugs, army officers, and district attorneys. After attending college on a football scholarship and doing a tour of duty in the Navy, Tolkan moved to New York, where he studied with Stella Adler and then Lee Strasberg, at the Actors' Studio. He replaced Robert Duvall in the Broadway productions of "A View From the Bridge" and "Wait Until Dark" in the 1960s, and continued to work on stage even after establishing himself in films, notably in David Mamet's Broadway hit "Glengarry Glen Ross" in 1984.

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Tolkan made his film debut in a small role in Stiletto (1969); among his screen credits are They Might Be Giants (1971), Love and Death (1975, as Napoleon), The Amityville Horror (1979), and Wolfen (1981). He became even more active in movies during the 1980s, winning a showy part as a hard-nosed district attorney in Sidney Lumet's Prince of the City (1981). It was followed by Author! Author! (1982), WarGames (1983), The River (1984), Turk 182! (1985), and Dick Tracy (1990, as Numbers). He was conspicuously featured in a pair of mid-1980s box office champs: Back to the Future (1985, as the sour high school principal, replaying the role in the 1989 and 1990 sequels) and Top Gun (1986, as a naval officer).