Steve Carell

Steven John "Steve" Carell (born August 16, 1962) is an American actor, comedian, director, producer, and writer. After a five-year stint on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, Carell found greater fame in the late 2000s for playing Michael Scott on the American version of The Office. He has also starred in lead roles in the films The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Little Miss Sunshine, Evan Almighty, Dan in Real Life, Get Smart, Date Night, Dinner for Schmucks, Crazy, Stupid, Love, Seeking a Friend for the End of the World, The Incredible Burt Wonderstone, and The Way Way Back, and voiced characters in the animated films Over the Hedge, Horton Hears a Who!, Despicable Me and Despicable Me 2. Carell was nominated as "America's funniest man" in Life magazine, and received a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor in a Television Comedy Series for his work on The Office. Early life The youngest of four brothers, Carell was born at Emerson Hospital in Concord, Massachusetts, and raised in nearby Acton, Massachusetts. His father, Edwin A. Carell, was an electrical engineer, and his mother, Harriet T. (née Koch), was a psychiatric nurse. His maternal uncle, Stanley Koch, worked with scientist Allen B. DuMont to create cathode ray tubes.Carell is of Italian (from his paternal grandfather), German, and Polish descent. His father was born under the surname "Caroselli", and later adapted it to "Carell". Carell was raised Roman Catholic, and was educated at Nashoba Brooks School, The Fenn School, and Middlesex School. Carell also played ice hockey and lacrosse while in high school. Carell played the fife, performing with other members of his family, and later joined a reenacting group portraying the 10th (North Lincoln) Regiment of Foot. Carell attributed his interest in history to this, earning a degree in the subject from Denison University in Granville, Ohio in 1984. While at Denison, Carell was a member of Burpee's Seedy Theatrical Company, a student-run improvisational comedy troupe, and was a goalie on Big Red hockey team for four years. Career Carell states that he worked as a mail carrier in Littleton, Massachusetts. He later recounted that he quit after 6 months because his boss told him he was not very good as a mail carrier; he needed to be faster. Early in his performing career, Carell acted on the stage in a touring children's theater company and later in the comedy musical, Knat Scatt Private Eye. He also acted in a television commercial for Brown's Chicken in 1989. After that, Carell performed with Chicago troupe The Second City in 1991, where Stephen Colbert was his understudy for a time. That same year, he obtained his first film work in a minor role as Tesio in Curly Sue. In spring 1996, he was a cast member of The Dana Carvey Show, a small, short-lived sketch comedy program on ABC. Along with fellow cast member Stephen Colbert, Carell provided the voice of Gary, half of The Ambiguously Gay Duo, the Robert Smigel-produced animated short which continued on Saturday Night Live later that year. While the program lasted only seven episodes, The Dana Carvey Show has since been credited with forging Carell's career. The Office During 2005, Carell signed a deal with NBC to star in The Office, a mockumentary about life at a mid-sized paper supply company, which was a remake of a successful British TV series. He played the role of Michael Scott, the idiosyncratic regional manager of Dunder Mifflin Inc, in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Although the first season of the adaptation suffered mediocre ratings, NBC renewed it for another season due to the anticipated success of Carell's film The 40-Year-Old Virgin, and the series subsequently became a ratings success. Carell won a Golden Globe and Television Critics Association award during 2006 for his Office role. He also received six Emmy Award nominations for his work in the series (2006–2011). Carell earned approximately US$175,000 per episode of the third season of The Office, twice his salary for the previous two seasons. Personal life Carell is married to Saturday Night Live alumna Nancy Walls, whom he met when she was a student in an improvisation class he was teaching at Second City. They have two children, Elisabeth Anne "Annie" (born May 26, 2001) and John "Johnny" (born June 2004). In addition to working with Carell as a fellow correspondent on The Daily Show, Nancy Carell acted with him on The Office as his realtor and short-lived girlfriend Carol Stills, and also cameoed as a sex therapist in The 40-Year-Old Virgin and played Linda in Seeking a Friend for the End of the World.