Veteran character actor Joel Fabiani's career has spanned over 45 years of television, movies, and theater. He has appeared in numerous series, yet his name is mostly unknown.
Joel Fabiani was born in Watsonville, California. His father's job forced the family to move frequently, and as a result Joel attended 17 different schools in his youth. After graduating from high school he joined the army, working as an ordinance clerk. Following discharge, he went to college at Santa Rosa Community College and earned a degree in English.
While in college he began to be interested in acting, so he went to San Francisco and spent two years working at the Actors Workshop. With all of his acting experience in plays, he decided to move to New York. He was able to land roles in summer stock and off-Broadway productions.
His first role on television was in the CBS religious program
Look Up and Live in 1962. He also appeared on Broadway in a few plays, including the U.S. production of
Beyond the Fringe. He continued alternating his time between off-Broadway and summer stock touring companies until he realized he needed regular, reliable work. He decided to concentrate solely on commercials at that point, although he did have a small role in the pilot movie for the NBC series
Ironside.
A cigarette commercial caught the eye of British producer Monty Berman while Berman was in the States in search of American actors for television shows in the works in England. The ITC Production company, best-known for producing
The Saint,
The Avengers, and
The Prisoner, had a show in pre-production that required an American actor. Fabiani was offered the role. He accepted and went to England to star in
Department S.
In the series, Fabiani played an FBI agent who was the field leader of an elite branch of Interpol, assigned to the most baffling cases anywhere in the world. The series was very successful in England, and was syndicated worldwide. Instead of renewing
Department S for a second season, however, the producers decided to focus a new series based on Peter Wyngarde's character of novelist Jason King. The spin-off,
Jason King, did not include any of the other
Department S cast members. Fabiani was out of work after 28 episodes.
Fabiani and his wife returned to America and went to Hollywood. This proved to be Fabiani's most prolific era, as he was frequently seen as the "guest murder victim" or villain in countless television shows during the 70s. During this time he also began appearing in films, beginning with a small role as Barney in
Looking for Mr. Goodbar. He appeared in a total of six films, the most recent being as the assassination victim in
Snake Eyes.
Fabiani's early career was punctuated with brief appearances on soap operas (including one episode of
Dark Shadows, where only the back of his head was shown). He returned to the soaps, both prime time soaps (having recurring roles on both
Dallas and
Dynasty) and daytime (most recently on
All My Children).
Fabiani, who in one interview described himself as a "voracious reader", took his passion for reading and his very smooth voice into a new line of work: reading books for audio tapes.
Joel lives in New York City and still finds work as a guest star on prime time programs and daytime soap operas.
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Veteran character actor Joel Fabiani's career has spanned over 45 years of television, movies, and theater. He has appeared in numerous series, yet his name is mostly unknown.
Joel Fabiani was born in Watsonville, California. His father's job forced the family to move frequently, and as a result Joel attended 17 different schools in his youth. After graduating from high school he joined the army, working as an ordinance clerk. Following discharge, he went to college at Santa Rosa Community College and earned a degree in English.
While in college he began to be interested in acting, so he went to San Francisco and spent two years working at the Actors Workshop. With all of his acting experience in plays, he decided to move to New York. He was able to land roles in summer stock and off-Broadway productions.
His first role on television was in the CBS religious program
Look Up and Live in 1962. He also appeared on Broadway in a few plays, including the U.S. production of
Beyond the
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