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John Barrowman (born 11 March 1967 in Glasgow) is an actor who has lived and worked both in Britain and the United States.
Barrowman was raised in Joliet, Illinois, and graduated from Joliet West High School in 1985. He is the son of a plant manager of the former Caterpillar Inc. tractor factory in Joliet. While still in high school, between 1983 and 1985 he particpated in several musical productions, including Hello, Dolly!, Oliver!, Camelot, L'il Abner and Anything Goes.
He attended university in San Diego, and returned to the United Kingdom in 1990. He has appeared in several West End musicals, including Anything Goes, Miss Saigon, Beauty and the Beast, Matador, Hair, Grease! and The Phantom of the Opera. He has also appeared in the West End in non-musical dramas, such as Rope and A Few Good Men (currently in previews), in which Barrowman stars opposite Rob Lowe.
He has played the role of Joe Gillis in Sunset Boulevard in the West End and, briefly, on Broadway. His only other Broadway credit is the Stephen Sondheim revue Putting It Together (1999–2000).
Barrowman appeared in the first run of the BBC children's variety show Live & Kicking in 1993-1994, co-hosting the show with Andi Peters and Emma Forbes, before moving on to The Movie Game, a television game show.
He is probably best known in the United States for starring roles in several short-lived prime-time soap operas such as Titans and Central Park West.
He appeared in five episodes of the BBC science fiction television series Doctor Who (2005) as the bisexual character Captain Jack Harkness, beginning in The Empty Child. He is scheduled to return to the series in 2007.
Barrowman's musical abilities have been featured in film: he had a duet with Kevin Kline in the Noel Coward biopic De-Lovely, and will be seen singing "Springtime for Hitler" in the upcoming film remake of Mel Brooks' The Producers.
Barrowman, who is openly gay, has been with his partner, architect Scott Gill, for fourteen years. Despite this long-standing relationship, Barrowman told The Herald of Glasgow that he had no plans to marry, saying, "Why would I want a 'marriage' from a belief system that hates me?"