Wayne Federman

Wayne Federman (born June 22, 1959) is an American comedian, actor, author, writer, comedy historian, producer, and musician.

He is noted for numerous stand-up comedy appearances in clubs, theaters, and on television; his book on The History of Stand-Up; and supporting comedic acting roles in The X-Files, The Larry Sanders Show, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Crashing, Silicon Valley, Legally Blonde, 50 First Dates, The 40-Year-Old Virgin, and Step Brothers.

He was the head monologue writer for NBC's Late Night with Jimmy Fallon in its first season.

He won a 2022 Primetime Emmy Award for producing the HBO documentary George Carlin's American Dream.

Federman was born in Los Angeles, one of six children.

He grew up in Silver Spring, Maryland, and moved to Plantation, Florida at age 10.

He played the drums and at age 14 began performing in a band at local weddings.

He taught himself ventriloquism and performed at various school (South Plantation High School) functions as well as local churches and service organizations.

He delivered his high school's sports results on Miami radio station WWOK and made his local television debut on WPLG's Youth and the Issue debating the death penalty.

In 1976, Federman worked as an extra in John Frankenheimer's Black Sunday, shot at the Miami Orange Bowl.

Federman is Jewish.

In the fall of 1977, Federman was accepted into the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University where he studied with legendary acting coach Stella Adler.

He performed his own show, Comedy Tonight, at the Eisner and Lubin Auditorium, with future Broadway star Donna Murphy.

Federman made his national television debut on the syndicated stand-up program Comedy Tonight in 1986.

He also appeared in two home videos: New Wave Comedy and the Dodge Comedy Showcase.

In 1987, Federman moved to Los Angeles and began working at The Improv, IGBYs, The Laugh Factory, and The Comedy & Magic Club.

He taped a series of televised stand-up performances, including An Evening at the Improv, George Schlatter's Comedy Club, CBS Morning Show, 2 Drink Minimum, Star Search, Good Times Cafe, The A-List, and MTV ½ Hour Comedy Hour.

He toured extensively, performing at over 200 colleges.

He co-founded the improvisational group "No Fat Guy" with Marc Raider, Scott LaRose, and Steve Hytner, and later briefly formed a music-comedy team with Jordan Brady.

Federman began booking television commercials and appeared in dozens of national spots for clients, including Eureka Vacuums, Holiday Inn, U.S. Navy, Wendy's, Taboo, Eagle cars (with Greg Kinnear), McDonald's, Glad Bags, Sprite, Total Raisin Bran, Ford, U.S. Olympic Team, Suzuki Samurai, Sizzler, Del Monte, U.S. Cellular, Coors, and 7–11.

He gained some prominence as the first "not exactly" guy in the long-running Hertz Rent A Car campaign.

Federman began landing small television parts on Baywatch, Amen, Dear John, A Different World, Doogie Howser, M.D., and NewsRadio.

He had recurring roles on L.A. Law (3 episodes) and Living Single (3 episodes).

In 1994, Federman made his debut on The Tonight Show and has subsequently appeared many times on the program.

He also appeared on Late Fridays, Comedy Showcase, and Premium Blend.

In 1998, Wayne portrayed Larry Sander's brother Stan on The Larry Sanders Show, and was later reunited with Garry Shandling on The X-Files episode "Hollywood A.D.".

Written and directed by David Duchovny, the creative episode followed "Wayne Federman", a Hollywood producer/writer and college friend of assistant FBI director Walter Skinner.

Television led Wayne to film roles in Jack Frost, Dill Scallion, Legally Blonde, 50 First Dates, Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle, The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Unaccompanied Minors, Knocked Up, Step Brothers, Funny People, and The House.

He became known for appearing in just one scene in a film and then disappearing; he calls this the "Federman-and-out".

In 2004, he taped his own 1/2-hour stand-up special for the series, Comedy Central Presents.

In 2006, Federman landed the recurring role of "Johnson" on the short-lived CBS sitcom Courting Alex.

He co-wrote and starred in Max and Josh, a short film that premiered at the 2006 Sundance Film Festival, where it won the Volkswagen Relentless Drive Award.

From 2007 to 2013, Federman wrote, produced, and hosted an annual holiday variety show entitled A Very Federman Christmas at the Los Angeles nightclub Largo.

Guests included Paul F. Tompkins, Kevin Nealon, Jon Hamm, Dana Gould, Sarah Silverman, Mary Lynn Rajskub, Samm Levine, Margaret Cho, Greg Behrendt, Willie Garson, Paul Williams, Matt Besser, John C. Reilly, and Andrew Daly.

After attending NYU, Federman brought his one-man show to the 13th Street Theater.

There he performed in rotation with Brother Theodore.

He also starred in the theater's long-running production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, in which he played six roles.

Soon he was performing stand-up comedy at various New York Comedy Clubs, most notably The Comic Strip (now known as Comic Strip Live) and Catch a Rising Star.

It was during these years that he incorporated music into his act.

He closed his sets by playing hard rock tunes from Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix, Iron Butterfly, and The Rolling Stones on his electric ukulele.