This tall, sleepy-eyed character actor and leading man from the Broadway musical stage who, whether sinister or sympathetic, often was cast in roles that connoted a slightly seedy "New Yorkness," eventually finding widespread recognition on television as a cynical police detective on the long-running crime series "Law & Order."

Although Jerry Orbach made his first film in 1958 (a B flick called "Cop Hater"), film roles were sporadic during the 1960s and 70s while he appeared onstage in such efforts as "6 Rms Riv Vu", "Scuba Duba" and the original cast of the long-running Off-Broadway sensation