Richard Dreyfuss

Dreyfuss was born on October 29, 1947, in Brooklyn, New York, the second and younger son of Norman Dreyfuss, an attorney, restaurateur and plastics company owner originally from a "violent gang culture in Brooklyn", and Geraldine (nee Robbins), a peace activist. He is the second child of three children. He had an older brother, Lorin, who was an actor, film producer and screenplay writer, and a younger sister, Cathy. His father Norman suffered from the debilitating physical effects of a mortar explosion at the Battle of the Bulge in World War II, requiring the use of crutches, canes, and special footwear provided by the Army for the rest of his life. He left the family when his son was 21 years old, and remarried more than once; he and his son were not on speaking terms at the time of his death. Dreyfuss was raised in the Bayside area of Queens. His family is Jewish, descended from immigrants from Russia and Poland; the Dreyfuss family was from Rzeszow. He has commented that he "grew up thinking that Alfred Dreyfus and [he] are from the same family" and that his great-grand aunt was Hesya Helfman, one of the assassins of Tsar Alexander II of Russia and the only one to escape execution for the deed. His father disliked New York, and moved the family first to Europe, and later to Los Angeles when Dreyfuss was nine. Dreyfuss attended Beverly Hills High School.