F. Murray Abraham

F. Murray Abraham is the actor who portrayed Ahdar Ru'afo in . He is primarily a stage actor, though he has appeared in many films and several television productions. He is perhaps best known for portraying evil characters… particularly vagabond-poaching entrepreneur Derek R. Wolfe in the 1994 film Surviving the Game; corrupt police-detective John Practice in the 1993 film The Last Action Hero; and murderously-jealous composer in (1984), for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor.
== Personal life ==
Abraham was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and raised in El Paso, Texas, where he spent his teenage years as a member of local gangs. He attended the University of Texas at Austin, after which he studied acting under in New York City.
== Career ==
=== Films ===
Abraham has had a long and distinguished acting career in film, which began with small roles in classics such as They Might Be Giants (1971, with Eugene Roche), Serpico (1973), and All the President's Men (1976, with Stephen Collins, Nicholas Coster, Gene Dynarski, Paul Lambert, and Richard Herd). He then had significant roles in such films as The Big Fix (1978, with Fritz Weaver, Nicholas Coster, William Glover, and Jorge Cervera, Jr.) and Scarface (1983, with Harris Yulin and Mark Margolis).
Perhaps Abraham's best-known film work is his Best Leading Actor Academy Award-winning performance as Antonio Salieri in the 1984 film Amadeus. He is one of only four Star Trek performers to have been nominated for an Academy Award in the category of Best Actor in a Leading Role (the others being Frank Langella, Paul Winfield, and Benedict Cumberbatch) and the only one to have won the award. Louise Fletcher won an Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role for One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975), and Whoopi Goldberg for Best Actress in a Supporting Role for Ghost (1990). Joel Grey and Christopher Plummer won for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for Cabaret (1972) and Beginners (2010), respectively.
Abraham has acted with actor Christian Slater in (1986, with Ron Perlman), (1989, with Olivia d'Abo and Robert Foxworth), and (1991, with Seymour Cassel). In 1990, Abraham made an uncredited appearance in , featuring Kim Cattrall, Saul Rubinek, Richard Libertini, and Kirsten Dunst. actress Terry Farrell also appeared uncredited in the film. 
In 1993, Abraham played the villain in . He also made a cameo appearance as "Dr. Harold Leecher" (a parody of Dr. Hannibal Lecter) in (1993, co-starring William Shatner, with James Doohan as Montgomery Scott, Charles Napier, and Whoopi Goldberg). In 1994, Abraham appeared in , along with Jeff Corey. 
Abraham played gangster in two films released in 1995, both of which co-starred Clint Howard: Baby Face Nelson, which also featured Leland Orser and Doug Wert; and Dillinger and Capone, with Jeffrey Combs, Catherine Hicks, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Bert Remsen, and Time Winters. Abraham then starred in (1995, with guest actor David Ogden Stiers and guest star Peter Weller).
Following roles in such films as (1997) and (1999), Abraham played literature professor Robert Crawford in (2000, with April Grace, Matt Malloy, and Michael Nouri). Abraham's later film credits include (2001), (2004) (2008, co-starring Paul Sorvino). and (2014).
He was recently voiced the character of Grimmel in How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World.
=== Television ===
Abraham has worked less frequently in television than in film. He was a regular on the short-lived NBC soap opera How to Survive a Marriage in 1974 and has made guest-appearances on only four episodic television series, including All in the Family, two episodes of Kojak ("A Question of Answers" featuring Richard Herd and "The Godson" directed by Russ Mayberry), and the pilot for A.E.S. Hudson Street (starring Rosana DeSoto).
His television credits primarily consist of made-for-TV movies, including A Season of Giants (1991, with Steven Berkoff and John Glover), The First Circle (1992, with Robert Joy and Christopher Plummer), Journey to the Center of the Earth (1993, co-starring Francis Guinan, Jeffrey Nordling, Tim Russ, and Carel Struycken), Color Justice (1997, with Bruce Davison and Saul Rubinek). His more recent TV movie credits include 2008's Shark Swarm , featuring Renie Rivas and Rick Scarry and directed by James A. Contner.
Abraham also appeared in several TV mini-series. In 1982, he co-starred in NBC's Marco Polo, in which Deep Space Nine guest actor Kenneth Marshall played the title role. This production also featured star Leonard Nimoy and Star Trek movie and Next Generation veteran David Warner in the cast. Abraham next portrayed President Abraham Lincoln in the 1986 CBS mini-series Dream West, working alongside fellow Star Trek alumni Jeff Allin, Erich Anderson, , Lee Bergere, William O. Campbell, James Cromwell, Michael Ensign, Stefan Gierasch, Alice Krige, Matt McCoy, Glenn Morshower, Fritz Weaver, and Noble Willingham. Abraham's Insurrection director and co-star, Jonathan Frakes, had a role in this mini-series, as well. Abraham also starred in the 1996 mini-series Dead Man's Walk, co-starring Keith Carradine.
Recently Abraham appeared in four episodes of the drama series The Good Wife and in three episodes of the comedy series Louie, both between 2011 and 2014. Between 2012 and 2015 he starred as Dar Adal in the Showtime series Homeland on which he worked with Maury Sterling and Mark Moses. For Homeland, Abraham received an OFTA Television Award nomination and Emmy Award nomination as Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series in 2015 as well as two Screen Actors Guild Award nominations as part of the Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series in 2014 and 2016. 
=== Theater ===
Abraham has amassed an extensive resume of stage plays. His first professional stage performance was in a Los Angeles production of Ray Bradbury's The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit. From 1966 through 1968, he performed in the long-running off-Broadway musical, The Fantasticks.
He has performed in many Broadway productions. He made his Broadway debut in the Tony Award-nominated The Man in the Glass Booth in 1968, working with Lawrence Pressman. In June the following year, Abraham acted with Anthony Call in the off-Broadway production, Tonight in Living Color.
In 1975, Abraham co-starred with Stephen Collins in the Broadway farcical comedy The Ritz (Abraham starred in the film adaptation of this film the following year). In 1978, Abraham acted alongside Roy Brocksmith and Wallace Shawn in The Master and Margarita at the Joseph Papp Public Theater. 
In 1980, Abraham was nominated by the Drama Desk Awards for his starring role in the Broadway production of Teibele and Her Demon, in which he acted alongside Ron Perlman. He received a second Desk Drama Award nomination in 1992 for his role in an off-Broadway production of David Mamet's A Life in the Theater.
Abraham and Next Generation regular Brent Spiner performed together in an off-Broadway production of The Seagull in 1980. Abraham and Spiner again worked together on Star Trek: Insurrection eighteen years later. 
Abraham performed in many other off-Broadway productions throughout the 1980s, including The Golem in 1984 (with Jordan Lund and Mark Margolis), The Madwoman of Chaillot in 1985 (with Ivar Brogger), and A Midsummer Night's Dream in 1987 (with Erick Avari and Richard Riehle). Both Abraham and guest actor Dan Butler played the role of Pozzo in the 1988 Lincoln Center Theater production of Waiting for Godot, which starred Robin Williams.
Abraham returned to Broadway in 1994 to portray AIDS-inflicted attorney Roy Cohn in Tony Kushner's epic two-part masterpiece Angels in America, in which he worked with Megan Gallagher. More recent Broadway credits include Triumph of Love in 1997 and Mauritius in 2007. He has also continued expanding his off-Broadway credits, with performances of King Lear (1996), Trumbo: Red White and Blacklisted (2003), and The Merchant of Venice (2007).
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