Actor and filmmaker Adam Goldberg first made an impression on film critics and audiences alike as the cynical Private Mellish in Steven Spielberg's Saving Private Ryan. In 1998, the same year that Ryan was released, Goldberg made his feature directorial, screenwriting, and executive-producing debut with Scotch and Milk, a neo-noir drama centering around a group of L.A. friends burdened by love (or lack thereof) and a fixation with the 1950s. The film, which won the Grand Jury Prize at the 1998 Los Angeles Independent Film Festival, helped to establish Goldberg as a talent worth watching.
Born in Santa Monica on October 25, 1970, Goldberg was raised in Hollywood. He began performing at a young age, studying with Tracy Roberts when he was 14 and enrolling at Los Angeles' Lee Strasberg Institute a year later. He continued to act on stage while attending Sarah Lawrence College, and he subsequently returned to L.A. to pursue his career. Goldberg made his film debut in 1992 alongside Billy Crystal in Mr. Saturday Night, and the following year he could be seen in Richard Linklater's Dazed and Confused, which cast him as a neurotic high school junior. He continued to act in supporting roles in a number of varied films, earning little notice until Spielberg cast him in the award-winning Saving Private Ryan.
He wrote and directed the indie Scotch and Mil in 1998, and also contributed a voice to Babe: Pig in the City. At the beginning of the 21st century he could be seen in the Best Picture Oscar winner A Beautiful Mind, as well as the comedy The Hebrew Hammer, and reteaming with Richard Linklater on Waking Life. In 2004 he returned to directing and writing with I Love Your Work. He continued to work in a variety of interesting projects including Déjà vu, 2 Days in Paris, and Zodiac. He had a major supporting role on the short-lived TV series The Unusuals and in 2012 he played the part of Harry Reems in the Linda Lovelace biopic Inferno.
