Can you guess the villain?

Before he got into the roles of some of history's most notorious villains, both fictional and non-fictional, he was a simple literary professor in Quiz Show, looking to please his father. He also had a cameo in the award-winning film The Hurt Locker. A little too vague? He is often mistaken for Liam Neeson, with whom he worked during Neeson's Oscar-nominated role in 1994.