Dan's Papers -November 6, 2009 -

Over a period of 20 years, Montauk resident Fred Melamed made "millions" as a voiceover artist. He was the spokesperson for CBS Sports and Mercedes Benz, and played many voiceover parts in Woody Allen movies as well as countless other films, TV series and commercials.

"Voiceover was my waitress job for about 20 years," said Melamed recently over coffee in Bridgehampton. "I have a voice like Orsen Welles-not the voice of a real person."

In the first decade of 2000, all that changed. Commercial media were looking for a different sound-the less articulate guy next door. Suddenly, Melamed's waitress gig was up.

Melamed describes himself during that period, beginning in about 2003, as being in the desert. He moved out to the East End from Manhattan with his wife Leslee Speier and 18-month-old twin sons. "After decades of being so busy, suddenly it came to very little," he said. "But it encouraged me to go back to acting again, and writing."

Then Melamed got serious.

A call came from the powerhouse directing team, the Coen brothers, who were getting ready to shoot their latest film, A Serious Man (now playing in East Hampton at the UA movie theatre).

"They called me directly," said Melamed, beaming at the memory. "It's very exciting when a director calls you and offers you a role."

The role is Sy Ableman, "the most insufferable, pompous windbag," Melamed said with a laugh. For his work, he has received unanimous critical acclaim. The Chicago Tribune said, "Fred Melamed plays Sy, and the role is unthinkable in any other hands." The New York Times called him "splendidly unctuous," and Roger Ebert said of the cast, "My favorite is Melamed."

In addition, The L.A. Times' Oscars update predicted Melamed would take the statue for Best Supporting Actor, and in fact, as of this writing, he is on six major critics' lists for that specific award.

"I've been in this long enough to know not to get caught up in the whirlwind," said Melamed. "But if you've spent some time in the desert, it's very nice. It makes you very grateful."

Most ironic about Melamed's quick assent-if not from a pile of ashes but the dunes of Montauk-is that he never auditioned for the role. He knew the Coens from his graduate school days at Yale Drama, where he met fellow students John Turturro and Frances McDormand, who was in the first film the brothers made and is married to Joel Coen. "We were in the same orbit," Melamed said. He didn't run across the Coens again until 1990, when they were casting Barton Fink. "I auditioned for the role of a movie studio head and came in second," he said. Then came another opportunity with the eccentric filmmakers. "They remembered when they were casting Hudsucker Proxy with Paul Newman and Tim Robbins," Melamed said. "But the role required appearing naked save for a diaper. I turned it down."

Fast forward to a few years ago. The Coens were working on three films: Burn after Reading, No Country for Old Men and A Serious Man. They were screening footage of the Woody Allen film Hollywood Ending, to look at actress Tia Leoni. Melamed happened to be in the scene. "They said, 'Oh, Fred. He'd be good for Sy,'" said Melamed. Thus the phone call.

The Coens decided they wanted to cast A Serious Man with unknowns. Asked how that made him feel, Melamed answered with his booming voice, "happy that I could get a good part in it!"

Melamed felt the script "was brilliant," and shooting the film was "total fun and joy. I had an absolute, joyous blast. The most fun I've ever had."

The Coens, precise in their writing and directing, rarely agree to deviation from their written words. Yet Melamed said they allow the actors great freedom. "They give you a fully realized character, script and milieu, and leave the rest up to you," he said-unlike Woody Allen. "He'd say, 'Here's the script but if you don't like it, say anything you want.'"

A Serious Man is the story of Larry Gopnik, a professor whose life is falling apart on many levels. His wife Judith (played by Sari Lennick) requests a spiritual divorce so she and Sy can marry. Larry's daughter steals money from him for her nose job, his son steals from his sister to pay off drug debts. His brother Arthur (played by Richard Kind), has moved in, and his students are blackmailing him. Larry consults with several rabbis, who offer him little practical advice. The play was described by one critic as "100% Jewish," which has led to some accusations of anti-Semiticism against the Coens, who are Jewish.

Melamed said, "In all of their films, the Coens made broad fun of a lot of people. Criticizing the film as anti-Semitic was inevitable. That happens whenever you deal with a specific group-especially a group that tends to be obsessed with its own persecution. I can say that because I'm a Jew."

While enjoying the attention brought on by the film, Melamed is working on his own project: finishing a screenplay called Also, A Villager, which he hopes to direct. "It's a fictionalized account about E. Forbes Smiley, a cartographic authority and map dealer who built the collections of wealthy collectors and venerable institutions. After 20 years as a respected, well-liked insider, Smiley was caught stealing from the Beinecke Library at Yale-he used an Exacto blade to cut from a book an original 400-year-old map of 'New England' drawn by Captain John Smith of Pocahontus fame."

Smiley, whose 3 1/2-year jail sentence ends in January, was also Melamed's college roommate and his friend for many years. "About 10 years ago, Forbes' wife and I tried to convince him to go to therapy. He never talked to me again." Once Melamed strikes a deal for the film, he hopes to make it on the East End.

In addition to now auditioning for major films, Melamed spends his time on the board of the Child Development Center of the Hamptons (CDCH). When his twin sons were 14 months old, they were both diagnosed with autism. Living in the city, the Melameds were on waiting lists to get the services the children needed. By a circuitous path, they found Janice Goldman, then the head of CDCH who guaranteed that Lee and Alec would have the necessary early intervention treatment and services. Now seven years old, the twins continue to do very well at CDCH. "They're both very happy children," said Melamed.

Melamed had an interesting childhood himself. Born in Manhattan, he was adopted at two weeks old and raised on the Upper East Side by his adoptive father, television producer Louis Melamed, and an aspiring actress mother. Young Fred went to Hunter College Elementary School, then Riverdale Country School before moving on to Hampshire and Yale. He worked at the highly respected Guthrie Theatre, and appeared on Broadway in Amadeus.

At the age of 27, Melamed got another life-changing phone call from a woman who left the message, "My name is Nancy. Please call me collect in Los Angeles."

Assuming it was career related, the young actor called and the woman said, "I'm your birth mother."

They met, and the connection was apparent to Melamed at first sight. As it turned out, Nancy (Zala) got pregnant at 20 and arranged with her OB/GYN to have the child adopted. She subsequently had a career as an actress and filmmaker. When he was 50, Melamed met his biological father, who is a retired psychoanalyst related to the renowned acting family the Adlers. "It all made sense," he said of his genetic make-up.

As opposed to every detail of A Serious Man, which don't always make sense. "Some films end in a tidy way that lets you return to your life when you leave the theatre," said Melamed. "This one doesn't."

Considering the impact A Serious Man had on Melamed's professonal life, he should know.