Dan Futterman

Dan Futterman is an American actor, screenwriter, and producer born on June 8, 1967, in Silver Spring, Maryland. He grew up in Larchmont, New York, where he attended Mamaroneck High School, graduating in 1985. He went on to earn a degree from Columbia University in 1989. Futterman is the son of Linda Futterman, a psychoanalyst, and Stanley Futterman, a lawyer, and was raised alongside two siblings in a Conservative Jewish household. He is married to television writer and producer Anya Epstein, granddaughter of Philip G. Epstein, the Academy Award-winning screenwriter of Casablanca, and sister of baseball executive Theo Epstein. The couple has two daughters.

Futterman's stage career began in 1991 with the WPA production Club Soda. He made his Broadway debut in 1993, taking over the role of Louis Ironson from Joe Mantello in Tony Kushner's Tony Award-winning Angels in America, appearing in both Millennium Approaches and Perestroika. He subsequently appeared in Jon Robin Baitz's A Fair Country in 1996, playing an American diplomat's son who encounters difficulties in South Africa, and in Dealer's Choice in 1997, portraying an ambitious card player.

His screen acting career began with a small role as a thug in The Fisher King in 1991. He went on to appear in several films throughout the 1990s, including the 1996 ensemble drama Far Harbor, in which he played a doctor in an interracial relationship, and the romantic comedy Breathing Room that same year. Also in 1996, he played Val Goldman, the son of gay nightclub owners portrayed by Robin Williams and Nathan Lane, in the comedy The Birdcage. He appeared in the London-set con artist film Shooting Fish in 1997 and took the lead role in the thriller Urbania as a young gay man seeking revenge for his lover's murder. Later film credits include Enough with Jennifer Lopez in 2002 and A Mighty Heart in 2007, in which he portrayed murdered journalist Daniel Pearl opposite Angelina Jolie.

On television, Futterman is best known for co-starring as Vincent Gray, the brother of the central character, on the CBS drama series Judging Amy, a role he began in 1999. He also appeared in the TNT television film Thicker Than Blood in 1998 alongside Mickey Rourke, and in the HBO World War II drama When Trumpets Fade that same year. Additional television credits include a recurring role on The WB drama Related, a four-episode arc on Will & Grace, a guest appearance on Sex and the City as a pastry chef named Stephan, a recurring role on the USA series Political Animals in 2012, and showrunner duties on the 2021 Showtime series American Rust.

As a writer, Futterman collaborated with his longtime friend and fellow Mamaroneck High School alumnus Bennett Miller on the 2005 biographical film Capote, for which Futterman wrote the screenplay and served as executive producer alongside actor Philip Seymour Hoffman, who starred in the title role. The screenplay earned Futterman an Academy Award nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay, as well as recognition from the Independent Spirit Awards, the Boston Society of Film Critics, and the Los Angeles Film Critics Association. He received a second Academy Award nomination, this time for Best Original Screenplay, for co-writing Foxcatcher with E. Max Frye, another Miller-directed film released in 2014 starring Steve Carell, Channing Tatum, and Mark Ruffalo.

From 2007 to 2010, Futterman and his wife Anya Epstein served together as writers and executive producers on the HBO drama series In Treatment. The pair also developed a half-hour drama series called T for SundanceTV, based on a story from the radio program This American Life, with Ira Glass among the slated executive producers. Futterman additionally adapted and produced the ten-part Fox series Gracepoint, and served as an executive producer alongside Lawrence Wright and Alex Gibney on The Looming Tower, a 2018 Hulu series.