Fred Melamed was born in New York City to Lou and Syma Melamed. His father was a television producer, having contributed to such watershed comedies as Car 54, Where Are You, and Sargeant Bilko. Fred received his theatrical training at the Yale School of Drama, after which he appeared with resident companies including Minneapolis' Guthrie Theater, The Kennedy Center, The Yale Repertory Theater, and as a founding member of Shakespeare & Co. In 1983, he made his Broadway debut in the Tony Award-Winning Amadeus.
On television, Fred will headline with Maria Bamford on the Netflix original series, Lady Dynamite from Mitch Hurwitz this spring. He recurs as errant father Charles Cole on Hulu's Golden Globe-nominated Casual, patrician chick-magnet J. Cronkite Valley Forge on New Girl, sports casting legend Glen Klose on Now We're Talking and Sir Patrick Stewart's messed-up psychiatrist Dr. Mendelson on Starz' Blunt Talk. In the past, Melamed's major roles have included Harvey Oberholt on House of Lies, Avi Mensusen on Girls, Professor Donald Holt on Married, Leonard Hillman on Childrens Hospital, Larry David's name-dropping psychiatrist Arthur Thurgood from Curb Your Enthusiasm, tough-guy jurist Alan Karpman on The Good Wife, and irascible voiceover legend Fred Melamed opposite Robin Williams on The Crazy Ones, among others.
In film, Melamed has had a long association with Woody Allen. He has appeared in 7 Allen films, including the Oscar-Winning Hannah and Her Sisters, Another Woman, Crimes and Misdemeanors, Radio Days, Husbands & Wives, Hollywood Ending, and Shadows and Fog.
But it was for his portrayal of "sensitive" villain Sy Ableman, in Joel and Ethan Coen's A Serious Man, nominated for Best Picture at the 2010 Academy Awards, that Melamed became most widely known. For his performance, he won the Independent Spirit Robert Altman Award, New York Magazine listed his as among the Best Performances of The Decade, and Empire called Sy Ableman "One of The Best Coen Bros. Characters of All Time." Melamed appeared on the Best Supporting Actor Oscar ballot of several American critics, including A.O. Scott of The New York Times, Roger Ebert of The Chicago Sun-Times, and Michael Phillips of The Chicago Tribune. He was named by Harry Domenico Rossi as among The 25 Greatest Screen Villains of All Time. Fred will re-team with the Coen brothers for the upcoming Hail, Caesar!
Fred also starred as Sam Sotto, insecure king of movie trailer voices in Lake Bell's "In a World..." , a film about a father and daughter, both striving to rule the cream of L.A.'s voiceover royalty. The film won the Waldo Salt Award for Best Screenplay at Sundance. He starred opposite Elliott Gould in Fred Won't Move Out, a picture detailing the decline of a stubborn patriarch and his family, and as James Brown's record company owner Syd Nathan in Get On Up.
Among Melamed's other films are Bone Tomahawk, opposite Kurt Russell and Richard Jenkins, The Dictator, with Sacha Baron Cohen and Sir Ben Kingsley, Peter Yates' Suspect, with Cher, Dennis Quaid and Liam Neeson, The Good Mother, with Diane Keaton and Jason Robards, Roland Joffe's The Mission, with Robert De Niro and Jeremy Irons, James Toback's The Pickup Artist, with Robert Downey, Jr. and Dennis Hopper, and Marshall Brickman's Lovesick, with Dudley Moore and Sir Alec Guinness.
As a writer, he has produced screenplays including Girl of the Perfume River, A Jones for Gash, and most recently The Preservationist, a fictional film inspired by the case of Melamed's college friend, Edward Forbes Smiley III, a renowned cartographic expert and dealer, who admitted to having been the most brazen and prolific map thief of all time.
He lives with his wife and twin sons in Los Angeles.
