Randall was born to a Jewish family in Tulsa, Oklahoma, the son of Julia (née Finston) (April 28, 1889 – October 3, 1950) and Moescha Rosenberg (August 6, 1875 – November 16, 1939), an art and antiques dealer.

[5] Randall attended Northwestern University for a year before going to New York City to study at the Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre.

[6] As Anthony Randall, he starred with Jane Cowl in George Bernard Shaw's Candida and Ethel Barrymore in Emlyn Williams's The Corn Is Green.

One of Randall's first acting jobs was as the character Reggie York in the 1949-52 revival of the radio adventure series I Love a Mystery.

Randall's first major role in a Broadway hit was in Inherit the Wind (1955–57), portraying newspaperman E. K. Hornbeck (based on real-life cynic H. L. Mencken), alongside Ed Begley and Paul Muni.

The show was a financial failure, but Randall received a Tony Award nomination for his dance turn with prima ballerina Alexandra Danilova.

[12] Randall starred in an NBC-TV special, The Secret of Freedom, which was filmed during the summer of 1959 in Mount Holly, New Jersey, and broadcast on the network during the fall of 1959 and again in early 1960.

He had a Pillow Talk-style supporting role in Let's Make Love (1960) with Marilyn Monroe and Yves Montand, and Lover Come Back (1961) with Hudson and Day.

In 1961, Randall played a highly dramatic role in "Hangover," an episode of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour in which he portrayed an alcoholic advertising executive spiraling into self-destruction.

In addition to portraying and voicing the eponymous seven faces (Dr. Lao, the Abominable Snowman, Merlin, Apollonius of Tyana, The Giant Serpent, Pan, and Medusa), Randall also appeared without makeup in a two-second cameo as a solemn spectator in the crowd, for a total of eight roles in the film.

Randall took the lead in Fluffy (1965), a comedy about a lion; The Alphabet Murders (1965), playing Hercule Poirot for Frank Tashlin; Our Man in Marrakesh (1966), as a secret agent; and Hello Down There (1969).

Randall returned to television in 1970 as Felix Unger in The Odd Couple, opposite Jack Klugman, a role that lasted five years.

Their productions included The Crucible (1991), A Little Hotel on the Side (1992), The Master Builder (1992), The Seagull (1992), Saint Joan (1993), Three Men on a Horse (1993), Timon of Athens (1993), The Government Inspector (1993), The Flowering Peach (1994), Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1994), The School for Scandal (1995), Inherit the Wind (1996), and The Gin Game (1997).

On September 4, 1955, Randall and Klugman appeared together with Gena Rowlands in the episode "The Pirate's House" of the CBS anthology series Appointment with Adventure.

Randall was a frequent guest on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson and often spoke of his love of opera and the salaciousness of many of its plotlines.

[citation needed] Randall was well-known for being a guest panelist on the game show What’s My Line?, from 1958 to 1967, Password, The Hollywood Squares, and the $10,000 and $20,000 Pyramids.

Randall, along with John Goodman and Drew Barrymore, was among the first guests on the debut episode of Late Night with Conan O'Brien on September 13, 1993.

[citation needed] On November 7, 1994, Randall appeared on the game show Jeopardy!, as part of a celebrity episode, playing on behalf of the National Actors Theatre.

A noted raconteur, Randall, along with co-writer Mike Mindlin, wrote a collection of amusing and sometimes racy showbusiness anecdotes called Which Reminds Me, published in 1989.

In the 1980s, Randall served as off-camera narrator for several video productions by the Metropolitan Opera, announcing performers to the television audience as they appeared on stage during curtain calls and providing brief descriptions of scenes.

On November 17, 1995, at the age of 75, he married 25-year-old Heather Harlan,[21] an understudy from the production of The School for Scandal in which Randall was starring at National Actors Theatre; the ceremony was officiated by Rudy Giuliani.

[28] Randall died in his sleep on May 17, 2004, at NYU Medical Center of pneumonia that he had contracted following coronary bypass surgery in December 2003.