Pablo Schreiber

Pablo Tell Schreiber, born on April 26, 1978, in Ymir, British Columbia, Canada, is a Canadian and American actor whose career spans stage, television, and film. His father, Tell Carroll Schreiber (1941–2021), was an American actor who named his son after the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda, reflecting his strong interest in literature. His mother, Lorraine Reaveley, is a Canadian psychotherapist specializing in body-based psychotherapy. At six months old, Schreiber moved with his family to Winlaw, British Columbia, an unincorporated rural community. His parents separated when he was twelve, after which he relocated to Seattle with his father. Actor Liev Schreiber is his older paternal half-brother.

After high school, Schreiber enrolled at the University of San Francisco, where he initially pursued basketball. He later transferred to Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, graduating in 2000 with a degree in theatre.

Schreiber's Broadway career spans 2006 to 2009 and includes three productions. In 2006, he appeared in Awake and Sing!, a performance that earned him both a Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Ensemble Performance and a Tony Award nomination for Best Featured Actor in a Play. He also participated in The 24 Hour Plays in 2004. In 2008, he starred in reasons to be pretty alongside Piper Perabo and Alison Pill, a role for which he received the 2009 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Featured Actor in a Play. The following year, he played Eben in Desire Under the Elms opposite Carla Gugino. In 2011, he returned to the stage in the Off-Broadway production Gruesome Playground Injuries at Second Stage Theatre.

On television, Schreiber first gained attention playing Nick Sobotka in season two of the HBO series The Wire in 2003, later making a cameo in the show's fifth season in 2008. He went on to appear in Law & Order: Criminal Intent and Law & Order before taking on the recurring role of serial rapist William Lewis in an eight-episode arc on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit from 2013 to 2014. Between 2008 and 2009, he appeared in multiple series including Dirt, Army Wives, The Beast, Numb3rs, and It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. In 2011, he was cast as Johnny Leary in the FX series Lights Out, which aired for one season, and also played roles in Weeds and A Gifted Man.

In October 2012, Schreiber was cast as George "Pornstache" Mendez in the Netflix drama Orange Is the New Black, a role he held from 2013 to 2017 with an additional guest appearance in 2019. The performance earned him a Primetime Emmy nomination for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series in 2015 and the "We Love to Hate You Award" at the 2014 Young Hollywood Awards. Beginning in 2017, he portrayed Mad Sweeney, a self-described leprechaun indebted to Mr. Wednesday, in the Starz series American Gods, based on Neil Gaiman's novel of the same name. He appeared across all three seasons of the series through 2021. In April 2019, Schreiber was cast as Master Chief / John-117 in the Paramount+ live-action series Halo, based on the video game franchise. To prepare for the physically demanding role, he worked with a trainer and a chef to build muscle. The series premiered on March 24, 2022, and ran through 2024. He also co-starred as Allan Gore in the 2022 streaming miniseries Candy, opposite Jessica Biel, a biographical crime drama based on the 1980 Texas murder case involving Candy Montgomery.

Schreiber's film work began with a minor role in the 2001 black comedy Bubble Boy. He appeared in The Manchurian Candidate in 2004, which also starred his half-brother Liev Schreiber, and had supporting roles in Lords of Dogtown (2005), Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008), and Nights in Rodanthe (2008). In 2016, he co-starred in Michael Bay's biographical war film 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi, playing GRS team member and former U.S. Army Ranger Kris "Tanto" Paronto alongside John Krasinski and James Badge Dale. The film was written by Chuck Hogan and based on Mitchell Zuckoff's 2014 book of the same name. In 2018, he starred in the action heist film Den of Thieves opposite Gerard Butler, playing Ray Merrimen, a MARSOC Marine veteran who leads a crew planning to rob the Federal Reserve Bank of Los Angeles. Schreiber underwent weapons training and military movement boot camp in preparation for the role. That same year, he co-starred with Dwayne Johnson in the action thriller Skyscraper and appeared in the biographical drama First Man as astronaut Jim Lovell. He starred in the drama film Lorelei with Jena Malone, released in 2021. Schreiber also narrated the audiobook version of Bret Easton Ellis's American Psycho.

Schreiber married yoga teacher Jessica Monty in 2007. The couple has two sons, born in 2009 and 2012.