Paul Giamatti
Giamatti at the 2010 Toronto International Film Festival
Born	Paul Edward Valentine Giamatti (1967-06-06) June 6, 1967 (age 45) New Haven, Connecticut
Nationality	American
Alma mater	Yale University
Occupation	actor
Years active	1989–present
Religion	Atheism
Spouse(s)	Elizabeth Cohen (m.1997)
Parents	Angelo Bartlett Giamatti Toni Marilyn (Smith) Giamatti

Paul Edward Valentine Giamatti (/dʒiəˈmɑːti/; born June 6, 1967) is an American actor. Giamatti began his career as a supporting actor in several films produced during the 1990s including Private Parts, The Truman Show, Saving Private Ryan, The Negotiator, and Man on the Moon before earning lead roles in several projects in the 2000s including American Splendor, Sideways, Cinderella Man, The Illusionist, John Adams, Cold Souls, Barney's Version, and Win Win.

Early life [edit]

Giamatti, the youngest of three children, was born in New Haven, Connecticut, the son of Angelo Bartlett Giamatti, a Yale University professor who later became president of the university and commissioner of Major League Baseball,^[1] and Toni Marilyn (née Smith), a homemaker and English teacher who taught at Hopkins School and had also previously acted.^[2][3] His paternal grandfather's family were Italian immigrants from Telese Terme, near Naples (the surname was originally spelt "Giammattei", Italian pronunciation: [dʒamatˈtɛi]).^[4] The rest of Giamatti's ancestry is Irish and English;^[5] his paternal grandmother had deep roots in New England, dating back to the colonial era.^[6] His brother, Marcus, is also an actor and his sister, Elena, is a jewelry designer.

Giamatti was first educated at The Foote School and later graduated from Choate Rosemary Hall in 1985. Giamatti attended Yale, where he was elected to the Skull and Bones secret society.^[7] Giamatti was active in the undergraduate theater scene, working alongside actors Ron Livingston and Edward Norton, who were also Yale students. Giamatti graduated from Yale in 1989 with a bachelor's degree in English and went on to earn a Master of Fine Arts degree from the Yale School of Drama, where he studied with Earle R. Gister. Giamatti performed in numerous theatrical productions, including Broadway and a stint from 1989 to 1992 with Seattle's Annex Theater,^[8] before appearing in some small television and film roles in the early 1990s.

Career [edit]

In 1997, Giamatti landed in his first high-profile role as Kenny "Pig Vomit" Rushton in the film adaptation of Howard Stern's Private Parts. Stern praised Giamatti's performance often on his radio program, calling for him to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. Giamatti appeared in a number of supporting roles in the 1998 big-budget films including The Truman Show, Saving Private Ryan, and The Negotiator. In 1999, Giamatti played Bob Zmuda (and Tony Clifton) in Miloš Forman's Andy Kaufman biopic, Man on the Moon. Giamatti continued steadily in the early 2000s by appearing in major studio releases including Big Momma's House, Planet of the Apes, and Big Fat Liar.

Giamatti at the premiere of Barney's Version in January 2011

In 2003, Giamatti began to earn critical acclaim after his lead role in film American Splendor. In 2004, Giamatti gained mainstream recognition and fame with the 2004 independent romantic comedy Sideways. His portrayal of a depressed writer vacationing in the Santa Barbara wine country garnered him a Golden Globe nomination and an Independent Spirit Award. Following the commercial success of Sideways, Giamatti appeared in Cinderella Man, for which he earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor. He was also nominated for a Golden Globe and won the Screen Actors Guild Award for Best Supporting Actor - Motion Picture. In 2006, Giamatti was the lead in M. Night Shyamalan's Lady in the Water, a supernatural thriller, followed by the animated film The Ant Bully, and Neil Burger's drama The Illusionist co-starring Edward Norton.

In 2008, Giamatti received his first Emmy Award^[9] for "Outstanding Lead Actor in a Miniseries or a Movie" for his title performance in the HBO miniseries John Adams, a role that also led to a Screen Actors Guild award. That same year, he starred in the independent film Pretty Bird which is a fictionalized retelling about the drama behind the invention of a rocketbelt.^[10] Giamatti was set to play the lead role, Colonel Tom Parker, in Bubba Nosferatu: Curse of the She-Vampires,^[11] which was to co-star Ron Perlman, who replaced Bruce Campbell.^[12]

In 2012, Giamatti became the voiceover actor for Liberty Mutual insurance commercials.^[13]

In 2013, Giamatti returned to his alma mater to play Shakespeare's Hamlet at the Yale University Theater in New Haven to rave reviews.^[14]

Giamatti will play villain The Rhino in The Amazing Spider-Man 2.^[15]

Awards [edit]

Giamatti was nominated for 45 separate awards between 2001 and 2008, and won 26 of them, including both an Emmy and a Golden Globe for John Adams. All of his nominations except one were for American Splendor, Sideways, Cinderella Man, or John Adams; the exception was a Blockbuster Entertainment Award nomination for Big Momma's House.^[16] In 2011, he won a second Golden Globe, for his portrayal of the titular character in the Canadian film Barney's Version. The Brooklyn Academy of Music asked Giamatti, its "2007 BAM Cinema Club Chair", to pick films for an eight-movie series called "Paul Giamatti Selects" and shown at the Academy in August and September 2007. His selections indicated a taste for paranoia and "the darkest of dark comedy," according to a writer for The New York Times, and included Frenzy, Dr. Strangelove, Brewster McCloud, The Big Clock, The Seventh Victim, Dawn of the Dead (1978 version), Seconds, and Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978 version).^[1][17][18]

Personal life [edit]

A resident of the Brooklyn Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York,^[17] Giamatti has been married to Elizabeth Giamatti (née Cohen) since 1997. They have a son, Samuel Paul, known as Sam (born 2001), who is raised in Elizabeth's Jewish religion. Giamatti himself is an atheist.^[19]

In culture [edit]

Comedian James Adomian performs an impression of Giamatti on the Comedy Bang Bang podcast. The AV Club describes Adomian's caricature of Giamatti as "a fantastically broken-down sad-sack."^[20]

Filmography [edit]

References [edit]

External links [edit]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Paul Giamatti

• Paul Giamatti at the Internet Movie Database
• Paul Giamatti at the Internet Broadway Database
• Paul Giamatti at the Internet Off-Broadway Database
• Paul Giamatti: 'I'm clearly not Brad Pitt,' The Guardian, Oliver Burkeman, November 12, 2009
• Paul Giamatti at Emmys.com