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Tony Randall to a Jewish family in Tulsa, Oklahoma, the only child of Mogscha Rosenberg, an art and antiques dealer, and his wife, Julia Finston.

He was first attracted to show business when a ballet company played in Tulsa. He attended Northwestern University for a year before traveling to New York City to study at the Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre. He studied under Sanford Meisner and choreographer Martha Graham around 1935. Under the name Anthony Randall, he acted in radio soap operas and worked onstage opposite stars Jane Cowl in George Bernard Shaw's . Tony then served for four years with the United States Army Signal Corps in World War II. Then he worked at the Olney Theatre in Montgomery County, New York before heading back to New York City.

He was the founder of National Actors Theatre in New York City, and also starred in many plays and popular movies, including , the first television show to feature a gay lead character (however, this was never directly referenced in the show).

He was a frequent and popular guest on and often spoke of his love of opera, claiming it was due in no small part to the salaciousness of many of the plotlines. He also admitted to (actually bragged about) sneaking tape recorders into operas to make his own private bootleg recordings. He would often chide Johnny Carson for his chain-smoking, and was generally fastidious and fussy, much like his Felix Unger characterization. He seemed to have a wealth of facts and trivia at his disposal, and he told Carson that the secret was simply "to retain everything you were supposed to have learned in elementary school."

In keeping with his penchant for both championing and mocking the culture that he loved, during the Big Band Era revival in the mid-1960s he produced a record album of 1930s songs, , inspired by (and covering) The New Vaudeville Band's one-hit wonder, "Winchester Cathedral." He mimicked (and somewhat exaggerated) the vibrato of Carmen Lombardo, and the two of them once sang a duet of Lombardo's signature song "Boo Hoo (You've Got Me Crying for You)" on the Carson show.

He was married to Florence Gibbs from 1942 until her death from cancer in 1992 and then, from November 17, 1995 until his death, to Heather Harlan, with whom he had two children, Julia Laurette Randall (b. 1997) and Jefferson Salvini Randall (b. 1998).

Tony Randall died in his sleep of complications from pneumonia at the age of 84, which he contracted following bypass surgery in December 2003.

His final film appearance was in . In the book, Klugman told many stories about Randall's kindness and generosity and said Randall was the best friend he ever had.

He was nominated for five Golden Globe awards and two Emmys, winning one Emmy in 1975 for his work in the sitcom Tony Randall endorsed a game, called "Word Quest", in 1984. where the objective was to guess the proper definition of a given word.. The film received an Oscar for William Tuttle's makeup artistry, but many believe Randall never received proper acknowledgement for his versatile performances in the film.Randall, along with John Goodman and Drew Barrymore was one of the first guests on the debut episode of Late Night with Conan O'Brien on September 13, 1993. He would also appear in Conan's 5th Anniversary Special with the character PimpBot 5000.