Compton was best known as a character actor in films and television, such as Life, Nixon, Nell, Primary Colors, Deep Impact, Seinfeld and Big Eden.

Compton was commissioned by Jerry Seinfeld to create a series of his "slow speed" natural light portraits of the cast and crew in the last year of his show.

He lived in New York, Los Angeles, Buenos Aires, São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and Florianópolis, Brazil.

Compton moved into a new home in western Sumter County, Florida, a cypress house on 9 acres (3.6 ha), with a saltwater pool and a private pond.

[citation needed] On February 18, 2019, he died at the Dorn Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Columbia, South Carolina.