Michael Tolan Mary's night-school teacher & boyfriend. He also made guest appearances on such television series as "Mannix", "Kojak", "Nichols", "The Outer Limits", "McMillan and Wife", and "Law & Order". His last known television appearance was on an episode of "Murder, She Wrote" in 1994. Tolan appeared in the Bob Fosse film "All That Jazz" (1979) as lead character Joe Gideon's cardiologist, Dr. Ballinger. Tolan also helped found the American Place Theatre, of which he wrote: “We wanted to attract some of the writers who wrote fine, intelligent, deep material about American life, and see if we could interest them in writing
All That Jazz (film) Stanley Kubrick, who is mentioned in the movie, reportedly called it "[the] best film I think I have ever seen". In 2001, "All That Jazz" was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry. It was also preserved by the Academy Film Archive in the same year. In 2006, the film was ranked #14 by the American Film Institute on its list of the Greatest Movie Musicals. The film would be the last musical nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture until Disney's "Beauty and the Beast"