Richard Stephen Dreyfuss (/ˈdraɪfəs/; né Dreyfus; born October 29, 1947) is an American actor best known for starring in popular films during the 1970s through 1990s, including American Graffiti, Jaws, Stand by Me, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Down and Out in Beverly Hills, The Goodbye Girl, Always, and Mr. Holland's Opus.
Dreyfuss won the Academy Award for Best Actor in 1977 for The Goodbye Girl, and was nominated in 1995 for Mr. Holland's Opus. He has also won a Golden Globe Award, a BAFTA Award, and was nominated in 2002 for Screen Actors Guild Awards in the Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Drama Series and Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Television Movie or Miniseries categories.
Dreyfuss was born in Brooklyn, New York, the son of Geraldine Dreyfus (née Robbins; 1921–2000), a peace activist, and Norman Dreyfus (1920–2013), an attorney and restaurateur, and was raised in the Bayside area of Queens, New York. His family is Jewish. He has commented that he "grew up thinking that Alfred Dreyfus and are from the same family." His father disliked New York, and moved the family first to Europe, and later to Los Angeles, California, when Dreyfuss was nine. Dreyfuss attended Beverly Hills High School.