Richard Dreyfuss' Main TV Roles Show Character(s) Stephen Fry - The Secret Life Of The Manic Depressive (UK) Richard Dre… American Chronicles Narrator The Education of Max Bickford Max Bickford A Touch of Grace Donald Karen (1964) David Rowe … The Second Hundred Years Ben Jr.

Main Movie Roles 2010 - Piranha 2009 - My Life In Ruins 2009 - I Knew It Was You: Rediscovering John Cazale 2008 - W. 2006 - Poseidon 1998 - Krippendorf's Tribe 1996 - James and the Giant Peach 1995 - The American President 1994 - Silent Fall 1993 - Another Stakeout 1993 - Lost in Yonkers 1991 - What About Bob? 1990 - Postcards from the Edge 1989 - Always 1989 - Let It Ride 1988 - Moon Over Parador 1987 - Tin Men 1987 - Stakeout 1986 - Stand by Me 1986 - Down and Out in Beverly Hills 1981 - Whose Life Is It Anyway? 1980 - The Competition 1978 - The Big Fix 1977 - Close Encounters of the Third Kind 1977 - The Sentinel 1977 - The Goodbye Girl 1975 - Jaws 1974 - Inserts 1973 - Dillinger 1973 - American Graffiti 1969 - Hello Down There 1967 - The Graduate 1967 - Valley of the Dolls

BIOGRAPHY:

American leading man who has played his fair share of irritating pests and brash, ambitious hustlers, Richard Dreyfuss worked his way up through bit parts (The Graduate (1967), for one) and TV before gaining attention with his portrayal of Baby Face Nelson in John Milius' Dillinger (1973). He gained prominence as a college-bound young man in American Graffiti (1973) and as a nervy Jewish kid with high hopes in The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz (1974). By the latter part of the 1970s Dreyfuss was established as a major star, playing leads (and alter-egos) for Steven Spielberg in two of the top-grossing films of the that decade: Jaws (1975) and Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977). He won a Best Actor Oscar in his first romantic lead as an out-of-work actor in The Goodbye Girl (1977). Dreyfuss also produced and starred in the entertaining private eye movie The Big Fix (1978). After a brief lull in the early 1980s, a well-publicized drug problem and a string of box-office disappointments (The Competition (1980), Whose Life Is It Anyway? (1981), The Buddy System (1984)), a clean and sober Dreyfuss re-established himself in the mid-'80s as one of Hollywood's more engaging leads. He co-starred with Bette Midler and Nick Nolte in Paul Mazursky's popular Down and Out in Beverly Hills (1986). That same year he provided the narration and appeared in the opening and closing "bookends" of Rob Reiner's nostalgic Stand by Me (1986). He quickly followed that with Nuts (1987) opposite Barbra Streisand, Barry Levinson (I)'s Tin Men (1987) in a memorable teaming with Danny DeVito and Stakeout (1987) with Emilio Estevez. Dreyfuss continued working steadily through the end of the 1980s and into the 1990s, most notably in Mazursky's farce Moon Over Parador (1988), Spielberg's Always (1989), Postcards from the Edge (1990) and Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead (1990). He appeared as a member of an ensemble that included Holly Hunter, Gena Rowlands and Danny Aiello in the romantic comedy Once Around (1991) and as a pop psychiatrist, the author of several successful self-help books, who is driven to the edge by nutcase Bill Murray (I) in the popular comedy What About Bob? (1991). Dreyfuss has also remained active in the theater ("Death and Maiden", 1992) and on TV. He returned to features in the adaptation of Neil Simon (I)'s play Lost in Yonkers (1993) and followed with a supporting turn as the querulous political opponent in The American President (1995). Dreyfuss received some of the best notices of his career as a determined, inspiring music teacher coping with a deaf son and the demands of his career in Mr. Holland's Opus (1995).


TRIVIA:

• Was married to Svetlana Erokhin in Harrisonburg, Virginia while in town for a speaking engagement at James Madison Univeristy.
• Claims to be a descendant of 'Alfred Dreyfus' (qv), who was wrongfully imprisoned at the notorious Devil's Island penal colony in French Guiana.
• One of six actors to appear in films directed by both George Lucas and Steven Spielberg (the others are Harrison Ford, Liam Neeson, Christopher Lee, Richard Dreyfuss and Samuel L. Jackson). Richard Dreyfuss is the only one whose films weren't part of the "Star Wars" or "Indiana Jones" series.
• Twice in his career he has left high profile musical productions due to his inabilty to cope with the physical demands of his roles. The first was in 1978 during pre-production of All That Jazz and most recently with the West End production of The Producers.
• Born in Brooklyn, New York, he grew up in Beverly Hills, L.A., California from an early age.
• Was a conscientious objector during the Vietnam War.
• Treated for infection in right lung in a NYC hospital, April-May 2002.
• Suffered a well-publicized drug problem in the early 1980s.