Michael Fairman

Cast · Writer · Director

Born

February 25, 1934 · New York City, New York, USA

Michael Fairman is a veteran of film, stage and television, with a career spanning more than 40 years. He has portrayed Adlai Stevenson in the political thriller Thirteen Days (2000) starring Kevin Costner, was featured in David Lynch's Academy Award-nominated Mulholland Drive (2001) and played Ben Affleck's father in Dreamworks' Forces of Nature (1999). This versatile actor can be seen regularly on television, having guest appearances on popular shows such as ER (1994), The Practice (1997), The X-Files (1993), Boston Public (2000), Family Law (1999) and Dharma & Greg (1997), to name just a few. He started out his career as a navigator in the U.S. Air Force. While stationed at Tachikawa Air Force Base near Tokyo, he joined a theater group and has been acting ever since. After the Air Force, he enrolled in the Dramatic Arts Department of New York University. Beginning with Oedipus in Sophocles Oedipus Rex, he played leads throughout college, including a series of classical roles at the Oregon Shakespearean Festival. He has played everything from Stanley Kowalski in "A Streetcar Named Desire" to Pozzo in "Waiting for Godot" to his critically acclaimed "The Night Thoreau Spent in Jail" and was in numerous productions off-Broadway. This extensive stage experience led Michael to numerous recurring roles in such hit TV shows as L.A. Law (1986), Hill Street Blues (1981) and Cagney & Lacey (1981), and extended runs on the soap operas General Hospital (1963), Ryan's Hope (1975) and Love of Life (1951). Fairman is in the soon-to-be-released feature film comedy Wheelmen (2005).