About Richard Benjamin
Richard Samuel Benjamin is an American actor and director. He has starred in a number of well-known films, including Goodbye, Columbus (1969), Catch-22 (1970), Portnoy's Complaint (1972), Westworld, The Last of Sheila and Saturday the 14th (1981). In 1968, Benjamin was nominated for an Emmy Award for Best Actor in a Comedy Series for his performance on the CBS sitcom He & She, which aired from 1967-1968. In 1976, Benjamin received a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role - Motion Picture for his performance as aged vaudevillian Willy Clark's comedically long-suffering nephew, confidante and talent agent, Ben Clark, in Herbert Ross' The Sunshine Boys (1975), based on Neil Simon's 1972 hit stage play of the same name. Benjamin's first lead role in a film came with an adaptation of the Philip Roth novella, Goodbye, Columbus (1969) with Ali MacGraw. Benjamin supported Walter Matthau and George Burns in the film adaptation of Neil Simon's The Sunshine Boys (1975), for which he won a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor in a Motion Picture. Benjamin played a frustrated fiancé of a woman who falls for the vampire Count Dracula in the surprise box-office smash Love at First Bite (1979) starring George Hamilton and Susan Saint James. After directing for television, his first film as a director was the 1982 comedy My Favorite Year, starring Peter O'Toole, who was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor.
Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.