Adrien Nicholas Brody was born in Woodhaven, Queens, New York, the only child of retired history professor Elliot Brody and Hungarian-born photographerSylvia Plachy. He accompanied hismother on assignments for the Village Voice, and credits her with makinghim feel comfortable in front of the camera. Adrien attended the AmericanAcademy of Dramatic Arts and LaGuardia High School for the PerformingArts in New York.

Despite a strong performance inThe Thin Red Line (1998),time constraints forced the director to edit out much of Adrien's part.In spite of his later work withSpike Lee andBarry Levinson, he never becamethe star many expected he would become untilRoman Polanski called on him to play acelebrated Jewish pianist in Nazi-occupied Warsaw. He pulled off abrilliant performance inSenjô no pianisuto (2002), drawing on the heritage and rare dialect of his Polish-born grandmother, as well as his father, who lost family members during the Holocaust, and his mother, who fled Communist Hungary as a child during the 1956 uprising against the Soviet Union.