What Happened To The Cast Of Backdraft?

We like to make movies about the people who save our lives. There are plenty of films romanticizing the work of police officers, soldiers, and even doctors. But few movies honor the sacrifice and heroism of firefighters. One of those rare films is the 1991 action thriller Backdraft. 

Directed by Ron Howard, it tells the story of a group of firefighters hunting a serial arsonist while battling political corruption, and it also focuses on two feuding brothers struggling to find redemption with each other. Receiving three Oscar nominations for visual and audio effects and remaining one of the only critically and commercially successful movies about firefighting, Backdraft is a classic, and talking about firefighters in movies without mentioning it would make you sound silly. 

One reason the movie works so well is thanks to its ensemble cast of top-tier Hollywood talent. Most of the first-billed actors among Backdraft's cast are still celebrated movie stars today. Some have seen their star fall, some have kept working in the business but with mostly smaller roles, and some are sadly no longer with us, but they all helped make this film a beloved '90s gem. To learn about all those actors and more, keep reading to discover what happened to the cast of Backdraft.

(Warning — there are spoilers below.)

While most of the story may be told through Brian McCaffrey's eyes, it's not unfair to say the true star of Backdraft is Kurt Russell, who plays both Brian's older brother, Stephen, and — in the film's opening scene — their father, Dennis. At turns, you love and hate Stephen. He's fiercely dedicated to his job, infectiously courageous in the face of danger, and would gladly lay down his life for his men. But while his overprotectiveness toward his brother mostly comes from a place of love and a sense of responsibility, he is at times just a little too cruel and enjoys lording it over Brian just a little bit too much. 

Russell has never truly left the spotlight but rather just wandered in and out of it at his leisure. In more recent years, he's become one of director Quentin Tarantino's regulars, playing the killer Stuntman Mike in Deathproof, bounty hunter John Ruth in 2015's The Hateful Eight, and both a stunt coordinator in 2019's Once Upon a Time in... Hollywood and the film's narrator. He has a recurring role as the enigmatic Mr. Nobody in the Fast and Furious films, and he officially became both a Marvel supervillain and Star-Lord's deadbeat dad in 2017's Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. He's also the official Santa Claus of Netflix, appearing as the Christmas icon in the Netflix original Christmas Chronicles film series.

Playing Brian McCaffrey's ex-girlfriend in Backdraft is Jennifer Jason Leigh, a star anyone watching movies in the '80s and the early '90s was destined to come across. As Backdraft's Jennifer Vaitkus, she rekindles her romance with Brian, but her loyalties are torn because of her job. While she wants to be with Brian, she works as an assistant to J.T. Walsh's crooked Alderman Swayzak, who's persona non grata to just about any firefighter in Chicago.

Leigh's part in 1991's Backdraft was one of a number of high-profile roles that she enjoyed around that time. She made big splashes in the years preceding the film with the 1989 drama Last Exit to Brooklyn and the 1990 black comedy Miami Blues. The year after Backdraft, she starred in one of her most disturbing roles as the obsessed roommate Hedy in Single White Female. 

While her place in the Hollywood hierarchy seemed to dip after the early '90s, she never stopped working, and she's enjoyed a wonderful bump in exposure and critical acclaim since the mid-2010s. She played Backdraft co-star Kurt Russell's captive in Quentin Tarantino's 2015 Western The Hateful Eight, and that same year, she was the voice of Lisa in Charlie Kaufman's stop-motion drama Anomalisa. She also played the government psychologist Dr. Ventress in the 2018 sci-fi horror film Annihilation. She's found more recent success in television, appearing in the 2017 revival of Twin Peaks and starring as an overprotective mother in Netflix's dramedy series Atypical.

Scott Glenn was at the peak of his career when he played veteran firefighter John "Axe" Adcox in Backdraft. We eventually learn it's the vengeful Axe who's been setting the fires, specifically to target the associates of Alderman Swayzak. In spite of Axe's guilt, Stephen McCaffrey tries and fails to save the older firefighter during a blaze, and he's mortally wounded in the attempt. 

Backdraft was released around the same time as many of Glenn's most memorable film roles. The year before, he played Bart Mancuso in The Hunt for Red October, the skipper of the American sub shadowing Sean Connery's rogue Soviet counterpart. The same year as Backdraft, audiences saw Glenn portray Jack Crawford — the agent in charge of the FBI's Behavioral Science Unit who sends Jodie Foster's Clarice Starling on her fateful interview with Hannibal Lecter — in The Silence of the Lambs. 

In more recent years, Glenn's done a lot of great work on television. He plays father to Justin Theroux's Kevin Garvey on the supernatural drama The Leftovers and retired sheriff Alan Pangborn in the psychological horror series Castle Rock. He's also made sure Marvel fans will forever remember him as Stick, the unforgiving mentor to Charlie Cox's blind vigilante Matt Murdock on Netflix's Daredevil and The Defenders. Nor has he left behind the big screen completely. Along with other film appearances over the years, he played father to Morena Baccarin's Allison in the 2020 disaster film Greenland.

While he doesn't set any of the fires, J.T. Walsh's Alderman Swayzak has a lot to answer for by the end of Backdraft. Among other things, it's discovered that Swayzak paid for a fake study on manpower that justified budget cuts, eventually leading to the deaths of a number of firefighters, including some of the film's most visible characters. Towards the end of the movie, Shadow and Brian crash Swayzak's press conference to deliver the evidence to journalists and end the alderman's hopes for mayoral office.

Unfortunately, J.T. Walsh passed away seven years after he starred in Backdraft. He died of a heart attack on February 27, 1998 in La Mesa, California. He was 54 years old. 

Before his passing, Walsh was one of the most recognizable character actors working in film and TV in the '80s and '90s. His role as Alderman Swayzak in Backdraft was characteristic of what he was often cast as — an unlikable politician or bureaucrat and often a villain. He plays a district attorney in the 1994 legal thriller The Client, a domineering presidential chief of staff in 1995's Outbreak, and a senator in 1996's Executive Decision. In spite of the kinds of characters he usually played, one of his most memorable roles was a lot more sympathetic. He plays Lt. Col. Matthew Andrew Markinson — the sole voice of conscience in Gitmo's Marine leadership — in the 1992 legal drama A Few Good Men.

In Backdraft, Cedric Young's firefighter, Grindle, doesn't have a lot of lines, but he has some of the best. On his first day on the job, Brian McCaffrey offers his hand to Grindle and says, "I'm Brian." Smiling, Grindle takes McCaffrey's hand and answers with the simple but effective burn, "I'm sorry." As one of the biggest firefighters on the crew, he's also one of the most visible even when he isn't saying anything.

Backdraft was one of Young's first appearances in a movie, and he's worked steadily over the years, mostly in smaller roles in film and TV. For example, he plays a cop in Central Park in 1992's Home Alone 2: Lost in New York and a liquor store owner in 2005's Batman Begins. He has a long list of recurring roles and one-offs including series like Prison Break, Leverage, Empire, and Sense8.

Most recently, he scored the recurring role of Sonny — boss of one of the main characters — on Showtime's The Chi. He also plays the gas station attendant Willy in "East/West" — the black and white episode of Fargo's fourth season.