Max Casella was born in Washington D.C. to David Deitch, a fiercely political journalist, and Doris Casella, a social worker and activist. His father's writing for The Boston Globe took the family to Cambridge, Massachusetts, where they lived through Max's high school years.
Casella's acting career began with iconic roles, including Disney's Newsies and the series Doogie Howser, M.D. He has since added every category to his arsenal, from Broadway to video game voicing, and has starred in numerous films and television shows.
Recent film credits include Scenes From an Empty Church, The Rhythm Section, and Late Night. He has also appeared in Academy Award-nominated films such as Jackie and Woody Allen titles Wonder Wheel and Blue Jasmine.
On television, Casella has spent five seasons on The Sopranos, was a series regular on HBO's Vinyl, and has appeared in Woody Allen's Crisis In Six Scenes, NBC's Shades of Blue, and HBO's Boardwalk Empire. He has also recurs on Amazon's The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel and on seasons of Ray Donovan and TBS' The Detour.
Casella made his Broadway debut as Timon in the original cast of Julie Taymor's Tony Award-winning musical The Lion King, for which he received a Theatre World Award for Outstanding Broadway Debut and a Drama Desk Nomination.
He has also appeared in numerous stage productions, including Ethan Coen's 'A Play is A Poem', Simon McBurney's 'The Kid Stays In The Picture', Public Theatre's Shakespeare in the Park production of 'Troilus And Cressida', and as Nick Bottom in Julie Taymor's critically acclaimed production of 'A Midsummer Night's Dream'.
As a member of the LAByrinth Theater Company, he starred alongside Ellen Burstyn in The Atmosphere of Memory, and at BAM in Endgame with John Turturro. He has also written a TV series and other works about being raised by raucous iconoclasts while living with pituitary dwarfism.
Casella has two children, Mia and Gioia, with educator and set teacher Leona Casella.
