David Kirk Traylor

Biography

David Kirk Traylor (born October 28, 1956, Indianapolis, Indiana) is an American mime, actor, singer, and comedian best known as Mr. Zed, a deadpan humanoid robot character he created during his junior year abroad in Rome at Temple University. He became a television star in Italy through Pronto Raffaella? (1983–1985) with Raffaella Carrà, wrote for the Italian Spitting Image, and hosted the world's first all-digital-video TV series, The Mr. Zed Show (1994–2000), broadcast to 35 countries. He appeared on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno (1993), competed on Bring the Funny (2019), and has performed for the Pope and the U.S. President. In a recent interview he described Zed as "not dead, just put aside," saying at seventy he is open to new possibilities. His notable film credits include She (1984) (Sandahl Bergman, David Goss), At War with Love (2016) (Pif, Miriam Leone), Miss Marx (2020) (Romola Garai, Patrick Kennedy), American Night (2021) (Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Emile Hirsch), and Naples to New York (2024) (Pierfrancesco Favino, Dea Lanzaro). On television he appeared in Un posto al sole (2021), Bring the Funny (2019), and The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon (2014).