Wayne Federman (born June 22, 1959) is an American comedian, actor, author, writer, comedy historian, producer, and musician.

He delivered his high school's sports results on Miami radio station WWOK and made his local television debut on WPLG's Youth and the Issue debating the death penalty.

[1] In the fall of 1977, Federman was accepted into the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University where he studied with legendary acting coach Stella Adler.

He closed his sets by playing hard rock tunes from Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix, Iron Butterfly, and The Rolling Stones on his electric ukulele.

In 1987, Federman moved to Los Angeles and began working at The Improv, IGBYs, The Laugh Factory, and The Comedy & Magic Club.

He co-founded the improvisational group "No Fat Guy" with Marc Raider, Scott LaRose, and Steve Hytner, and later briefly formed a music-comedy team with Jordan Brady.

Federman began booking television commercials and appeared in dozens of national spots for clients, including Eureka Vacuums, Holiday Inn, U.S. Navy, Wendy's, Taboo, Eagle cars (with Greg Kinnear), McDonald's, Glad Bags, Sprite, Total Raisin Bran, Ford, U.S. Olympic Team, Suzuki Samurai, Sizzler, Del Monte, U.S. Cellular, Coors, and 7–11.

Federman began landing small television parts on Baywatch, Amen, Dear John, A Different World, Doogie Howser, M.D., and NewsRadio.

Written and directed by David Duchovny, the creative episode followed "Wayne Federman", a Hollywood producer/writer and college friend of assistant FBI director Walter Skinner.

Television led Wayne to film roles in Jack Frost, Dill Scallion, Legally Blonde, 50 First Dates, Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle, The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Unaccompanied Minors, Knocked Up, Step Brothers, Funny People, and The House.

Guests included Paul F. Tompkins, Kevin Nealon, Jon Hamm, Dana Gould, Sarah Silverman, Mary Lynn Rajskub, Samm Levine, Margaret Cho, Greg Behrendt, Willie Garson, Paul Williams, Matt Besser, John C. Reilly, and Andrew Daly.

In 2000, Federman began co-authoring (with Marshall Terrill) a new, authorized biography of NBA basketball legend Pete Maravich.

On April 20, 2010, Federman unearthed a long-lost live episode of the General Electric Theater while working on a television retrospective for the Reagan Centennial Celebration.

January 2012 saw the launch of the annual Wayne Federman International Film Festival, featuring comedians screening the movies they love.

Participants included Paul F. Tompkins, Garry Shandling, Andy Kindler, Kevin Pollak, Margaret Cho, Doug Benson, Zach Galifianakis, Bill Burr, Will Forte, Sacha Baron Cohen, Chris Hardwick, Lauren Lapkus, Kathy Griffin, Dana Gould, Bill Hader, Patton Oswalt, Tig Notaro, Aziz Ansari, Jeff Garlin, and Sarah Silverman.

In 2012, 2013, 2014, and 2015, Federman co-wrote the Independent Spirit Awards, hosted by Seth Rogen, Andy Samberg, Patton Oswalt, and the team of Fred Armisen and Kristen Bell respectively.

Bang!, The Nerdist Podcast, Never Not Funny, Doug Loves Movies, You Made It Weird, The Adam Corolla Show, Ridiculous History, Sup Doc, FitzDog Radio, The Carson Podcast, Improv4Humans, Kevin Pollak Chat Show, Sklarbro Country, The Joe Rogan Experience, Who Charted, and The 500 with Josh Adams Meyers.

Some guests that have appeared on The History of Standup include Margaret Cho, Mike Birbiglia, Tig Notaro, Lily Tomlin, Demetri Martin, Shecky Greene, Judd Apatow, Pete Holmes, Jimmy Pardo, journalist Julie Seabaugh, and comedy historian Kliph Nesteroff.

In November 2011, Federman wrote an article documenting Ronald Reagan's pivotal role during the SAG strike of 1960 that established residual payments for film actors.

In September 2015, Federman wrote a long-form article entitled "From Sullivan to CK: a History of Modern American Standup" for Splitsider magazine.