Palillo's extensive stage credits include the Off-Broadway production of Lanford Wilson's The Hot l Baltimore, a tour of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream with Mickey Rooney, a production of William Inge's Summer Brave, as well as Amadeus, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, and Guys and Dolls. His own play, The Lost Boy was first performed at the Helen Hayes Theatre Company in Nyack, New York, in 2005.

As artistic director of Palm Beach's Cuillo Center for the Arts, Palillo directed and acted in productions of A Closer Walk with Patsy Cline and The Phantom of the Opera. He was also a professor of acting at the G-Star School of the Arts. In 2009, he appeared on Broadway in the benefit Broadway Backwards 4.

Palillo's voice-over credits include the animated series' Laverne and Shirley in the Army, Darkwing Duck and Rubik, the Amazing Cube. His screen credits include the sitcom Ellen and role in the film Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives.

He is survived by his partner of 41 years, Joseph Gramm.