Frederick Coffin
American actor (1943-2003)
Frederick D. Coffin (January 16, 1943 – July 31, 2003) was an American film actor, singer, songwriter, and musician.
Early life
Coffin was born in Detroit, Michigan in 1943 to actress Winifred Deforest Coffin and writer Dean Coffin, and was one of five children. He was educated at Western Reserve Academy in Hudson, Ohio, where he studied theater and was also a serious athlete, graduating in 1961. He enrolled the University of Michigan in 1962, where he intended to play football but instead decided to focus on acting, earning a B.A. then a master's degree in theater.
Career
Coffin made his screen debut in 1973 when he appeared in the television film Much Ado About Nothing, an adaptation of the play, in which he also starred. He appeared in his first feature film in 1976 in the drama Dragonfly, with Beau Bridges and Susan Sarandon. His second feature was the Golden Globe nominated King of the Gypsies, with Shelley Winters. During the 1980s, Coffin appeared in several films: the horror film Alone in the Dark, which starred Donald Pleasence, Without a Trace, Mother's Day, Credited as Holden McGuire Nothing Lasts Forever, the biography film Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life Is Calling with Richard Pryor, the action comedy A Fine Mess with Ted Danson, and The Bedroom Window. In the 1990s, Coffin continued to appear in films, one of which he is known for is the comedy film Wayne's World, with Mike Myers and Dana Carvey, and the Steven Seagal film Hard to Kill. In 1999, Coffin would appear, in perhaps his best known role among millennials, as corrupt business man Parker Wyndham in the Disney Channel original movie Zenon: Girl of the 21st Century.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Frederick Coffin” is american actor (1943-2003). The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Frederick, Coffin and American, not as a finished interpretation.
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The phrase “american actor (1943-2003)” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 12, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q4354022. VIAF identifies the subject as 61358938. The Library of Congress control number is no2008097395. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1943, 2003, 1961 and 1962.
A concise life account rarely captures disputed attribution, private networks or the changing language used to describe a career. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Frederick Coffin” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.