Louis Mandylor has lived a full life filled and has navigated sport to acting – from football and boxing first Mandylor then settled into the world of acting and directing in America – a career that he feels he has only just gotten started in.
The Greek Australian actor’s (b. Louis Theodospoulous) career spans over three decades, he has appeared in countless films and television shows.
To the Greek Diaspora, he is most known for starring as Nikos “Nick” Portokalos in the “My Big Fat Greek Wedding” franchise. However, that all came to him after a bright football and boxing career.
The promising athlete
The Melbourne-born Mandylor broke through in the sporting world, in Victoria’s football system, back in the mid-1980s.
His first major accolade came with the now defunct Melbourne Hungaria, winning the Victorian Division 1 (the second tier of the state at the time) in 1985, which he still regards as one of his proudest achievements.
The Greek Australian eventually moved on to play for Heidelberg United (Μέγας Αλέξανδρος) and contributed to their State League triumph in 1988 to help them gain promotion to the National Soccer League.
“I scored some winning goals that season which got us promotion and I think that is the highlight of my football career,” Mandylor told Neos Kosmos.
He admitted that part of his success in football came from the anger he felt, which he used to fuel him during matches.
“I was full-on. I loved it and I was proud. I got into some fights when I was with Heidelberg and a few other teams because of this whole English clique thing,” the actor said.
“There was this Greek thing going on where we were getting stood over all the time and my brother Costas and I didn’t stand for it.”

Mandylor eventually lost interest in football, which he says was very bureaucratic and political, so he went on to pursue boxing.
“That was strange too,” the actor said, explaining that a friend introduced him to it.
“I just started training because I enjoyed it. I realised I was really good at it, and it was a good way to take our frustrations of life as a young teenager.”
The Melbournian ended up having over 15 competitive, sanctioned fights in his home city before moving to Los Angeles (where his brother was) to advance that career.
“I still cannot believe I did it because it is such a rough sport. It is brutal. How can you say you fall in love with painting, acting, football or whatever it is? At that point in time, however, I was obsessed with boxing,” he said.
Transitioning to United States and a change of career
Mandylor left for the U.S. in 1989 in hopes of continuing his boxing, joining his brother who was trying his luck as an actor at the time.
“My brother started working in Los Angeles as an actor so I figured I would go over there and kind of try both at the same time, but I was really focused on the fight game,” he said.
The transition proved difficult for Mandylor with him revealing that he came back to Australia after one year, ready to give up the gloves, then a dream sparked him to return to LA.
“It was rough. It was a new country with no work papers. My brother was busy at the time as a working actor. It was rough and then slowly but surely, I got into a routine,” the Greek Australian said.

He soon settled into life in America, meeting people at the acting class he went to with his brother, making friends and he eventually fell into love with the same industry as his brother.
“From then, I started extending myself in that arena. I gave it a shot, took some meetings, got an agent, and slowly things happened,” the actor said.
Mandylor cited Robert De Niro and ‘Raging Bull’ (a film based on boxer Jake Lamotta) as a big influence on him from an acting point of view, which is quite fitting given his promise as both an actor and a boxer.
Ironically, his first film was a sports comedy called ‘Necessary Roughness’ wherein he played an American footballer.
It was that film that truly cemented a change of career.
“Once I got a bit of a break, I actually started studying and learning the craft of acting but never really thought I would do it. It was one of those twist of fates at the crossroads of my life and I went with it.”
“I actually got a fight contract and my first big movie offer for ‘Necessary Roughness’ on the same day. I decided to go for the movie business on that day.”

The first “Joey” on ‘Friends’
Among Mandylor’s screen credits is his one episode on the iconic sitcom ‘Friends’, playing Joey’s “twin” Carl.
Unbeknownst to him at the time, the role of Joey was originally his, which he only found after the ‘Friends’ Reunion show in 2023.
“I think Kevin Bright (one of the producers) made it clear to the world that I actually had the role before Matt Le Blanc, so I got booked and I didn’t know it until decades later.
The actor was aware he was among the actors being seriously considered, and it was only after an unbelievable audition from Le Blanc that the role was given to him instead.
“The next day Matt came in because he missed his audition as a result of falling and hitting his head at a bar and getting a black eye,” Mandylor said.
“He spent a couple of hours in there with them and made them laugh, and they just thought ‘that was Joey’. He got the role and they were right. He was perfect for it and the ‘Friends’ cast was perfect the way it is.”
Mandylor would go on to suffer another setback from the show as his original seven-episode deal as Carl would get reduced to one after a blockbuster A-list star was able to appear.
“I remember being so excited to do the seven episodes, but then on a Monday they said ‘Sorry, Louis. Bruce Willis made himself available. We have been asking him to be on the show for years’,” the actor revealed.
He harboured no ill will about it, finding the situation quite funny and stressing he loved the time he did have on the show, praising the crew and particularly Jennifer Aniston and Le Blanc (whom he knew from before ‘Friends’) for being great to him.
The actor remarked that he is still stopped by fans to this day who recognise him from the show.
“I was downtown the other day at a restaurant and this couple said, ‘Don’t tell me you’re Carl, bro’ and I just started laughing and I said ‘Yeah’. ‘Friends’ fans are loyal. I get stopped for ‘Friends’ just as much as I do for ‘My Big Fat Greek Wedding’ and I only did one episode.”

Taking on the Director’s chair
Mandylor said he has many highlights when reflecting on his career thus far, such as working on ‘The Offer’ (the show about the making of the Godfather), though he has taken on a whole new challenge in recent years by stepping into the world of directing.
“Acting is a completely different world to directing. Directing does not stop from two months before you start to a year after you finish. You are the commander-in-chief, and you are helming the crew and responsible for delivering the motion picture to the studio,” he said.
The filmmaker has undergone a whole new evolution as an artist in the last ten years, really engrossing himself into cinema.
“I am extremely passionate and there are levels to the game, and I aspire to be like the greats, whether I am in front of the camera or behind it,” he said.

“My preparation is intense. I live it and breathe it, and my plan is to excel and I feel like I am just getting started.”
He has directed numerous projects with an upcoming one being ‘Death March’ which stars his ‘Debt Collectors’ co-star Scott Adkins, which was made through his production company that he has with his partner, Marc Clebanoff, Odyssey Motion Pictures.
“We are going to be doing post-production completion in the next month and soon it will be hitting the market, and I cannot wait for everyone to see it.”
It has been a wild ride for the Melburnian, who is among a small group of Australians that have broken through into America, and he is extremely grateful for the journey he has been on.
“For what it is worth, I am happy to be an Aussie guy who did pretty well in Hollywood. It makes me real proud.”