Please Rewind Talent Wall

Jeff Goldblum

Jeff Goldblum has made a career out of bringing an unusual rhythm to the screen. He can seem thoughtful and restless at once, delivering a performance as though every idea has arrived half a second before the words needed to express it. That quality has served him across science fiction, drama, comedy and the stranger territory between them. Born in West Homestead, Pennsylvania, on October 22, 1952, Goldblum moved to New York City at 17 to pursue acting. He studied at the Neighborhood Playhouse under Sanford Meisner and made his Broadway debut in the musical Two Gentlemen of Verona. His first film role came in Death Wish in 1974, playing a home-invading thug—a sharp contrast with the curious, conversational screen persona audiences would later come to know. The Please Rewind movies capture a particularly rich stretch of his work. In 1983, he appeared in both The Right Stuff and The Big Chill, followed by The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension in 1984 and Silverado in 1985. Together, those films place him comfortably inside ensembles without making him feel interchangeable with anyone else. The Fly arrived in 1986 as one of his defining leading roles, demanding an intensity that pushed his familiar intelligence and nervous energy into darker territory. He later appeared in The Fly II. Jurassic Park gave Goldblum another major role as Dr. Ian Malcolm, a part he continued in The Lost World: Jurassic Park and later reprised in Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom and Jurassic World Dominion. He also appears in The Prince of Egypt, while other supporting work has included Independence Day, The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, The Grand Budapest Hotel, Thor: Ragnarok and Asteroid City. Goldblum is also an accomplished jazz pianist. With the Mildred Snitzer Orchestra, he released The Capitol Studios Sessions in 2018, followed by I Shouldn’t Be Telling You This and Plays Well with Others. Acting and jazz suit the same qualities in him: timing, improvisational spirit and an evident pleasure in finding an unexpected note.