During a ceremony held in Rome, he was awarded the "Premio per gli Italiani nel Mondo." It is an award given by the Marzio Tremaglia Foundation and the Italian government to Italian emigrants who have distinguished themselves abroad and to their descendants.
He shot Scarface (1983) in Los Angeles, California, and Amadeus (1984) in Prague, Czech Republic, which required four round-trip flights between the two films.
One of his first plays in Los Angeles was a dramatization of a work by Ray Bradbury: "The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit." He and Bradbury remained friends until Bradbury's death on June 5, 2012.
He attended the University of Texas at El Paso and the University of Texas at Austin.
He was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and grew up in El Paso, Texas. His father, Fred Abraham, was a Syrian immigrant of the Antiochian Orthodox faith. His mother, Josephine (Stello) Abraham, was born in Pennsylvania to an Italian family.
Early in his career he appeared in a long series of television commercials playing the "Bunch of Grapes" character who spoke for Fruit of the Loom underwear.
He graduated from El Paso High School in El Paso, Texas (1958).
In the early 1960s he studied drama for a year in New York City at HB Studio in Greenwich Village under the supervision of theater practitioner Uta Hagen.
After his Best Actor Oscar for Amadeus (1984), he turned down roles in films such as the black comedy mystery Clue (1985) and Poltergeist II: The Other Side (1986).
He is the first person from an Arab country to win the Oscar for Best Actor. Rami Malek, who won for his role in Bryan Singer's Bohemian Rhapsody (2018), was the second.
He continues to work as a theater professor at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York (CUNY).
He had two younger brothers, Robert Abraham and Jack Abraham, who died in separate car accidents. His wife of 60 years, Kate Hannah, died of multiple sclerosis on November 19, 2022, at the age of 82.
He was the real-life hero of a crime scene at the Classic Stage Company in New York City; during a public rehearsal of "Much Ado About Nothing," he struggled with a young robber in the dressing room.
He was expelled from the AppleTV+ sitcom Mythic Quest (2020) after being accused of inappropriate conduct on the film set. In his response statement, Abraham apologized and said he never "intended to offend anyone, I made jokes that upset some of my colleagues and as a result I lost a great job with great people."
He worked with Dr. Peter Weller in Woody Allen's comedy Mighty Aphrodite (1995). Both stars appeared in the hugely popular Star Trek series. Abraham appeared in Star Trek: Insurrection (1998) and Weller in Star Trek Into Darkness (2013).
He appeared in three films nominated for the Best Picture Oscar: All the President's Men (1976), Amadeus (1984) and The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014). Amadeus won in the category.
He appeared in three films selected by the Library of Congress for the National Film Registry as "culturally, historically or aesthetically significant": All the President's Men (1976), Amadeus (1984) and The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014).
He played Sir Sean Connery's mortal enemy in two films: the inquisitor Bernardo Gui in The Name of the Rose (1986) and Professor Robert Crawford in Finding Forrester (2000).
In two of his best-known films, he is foregrounded as the frame of the story and portrayed as an old man narrating his story from the past: Amadeus (1984) and The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014).
He auditioned for the role of Charlie Gordon in An Unmarried Woman (1978), but writer and director Paul Mazursky found that Cliff Gorman resembled Mazursky's artist friends in New York City more.
He was awarded the John H. Finley Award by the City College of New York (CCNY) alumni association for exemplary dedicated service to New York City (2009). He was awarded the Gielgud Award for excellence in the dramatic arts by the National Arts Club in Manhattan, New York City (2010).
He was awarded two Off-Broadway Theater Awards for Outstanding Performance for his roles in Anton Chekhov's play "Uncle Vanya" (1984) and William Shakespeare's play "The Merchant of Venice" (2011).
He received an honorary degree (Doctor of Fine Arts) from Rider University in Lawrenceville, New Jersey (1990).
His first major success as a film actor was the character Antonio Salieri in Amadeus (1984), at the age of 45.
He speaks Spanish fluently and has also spoken Arabic and Italian for some film roles.
He worked with Christopher Plummer in the revenge drama Money (1991). Both stars appeared in the hugely popular Star Trek series. Plummer appeared in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country (1991) and Abraham in Star Trek: Insurrection (1998).
He demanded equal pay with Morgan Freeman for The Bonfire of the Vanities (1990). When the producers could not accept this, Abraham chose not to be credited.
He worked with Ron Perlman in the mystery film The Name of the Rose (1986). Both stars appeared in the hugely popular Star Trek series. Abraham appeared in Star Trek: Insurrection (1998) and Perlman in Star Trek: Nemesis (2002).
In September 1993, while staying in Wenatchee, Washington, during the filming of Surviving the Game (1994), Abraham was injured in a car accident when a drunk driver struck him, breaking his ankle, bruising his ribs and causing lacerations to his face. Abraham's Chevrolet Lumina was wrecked; he recovered, but the drunk driver died.