Comedians
by donnysimon | created - 11 Aug 2018 | updated - 1 month ago | Public
1. Jay Leno
Producer | The Tonight Show with Jay Leno
Jay Leno began his career in night clubs, where he worked 300 nights a year before hitting it big in 1992 with his own late-night talk show, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno (1992). By that time he had appeared on television, acted in a few films (American Hot Wax (1978)) but hit paydirt with his ...
2. Jerry Seinfeld
Producer | Seinfeld
Jerry Seinfeld was born in Brooklyn, New York, the son of Betty (Hesney) and Kalman Seinfeld. His father was of Hungarian Jewish descent, while Jerry's maternal grandparents, Salha and Selim Hosni, were Syrian Jewish immigrants (from Aleppo). He moved with his family, including sister Carolyn, to ...
3. Sid Caesar
Actor | Grease
Comedian, saxophonist, composer, actor and musician, he performed within the orchestras of Charlie Spivak, Shep Fields and Claude Thornhill as saxophonist. Later, as super-hip jazz musician "Cool Cees" in television skits, he played tenor saxophone, and sang with the satirical trio "The Hair Cuts" ...
4. Buddy Hackett
Actor | It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World
Brooklyn-born Buddy Hackett was known mainly as a nightclub comic, especially in Las Vegas, where he first performed in 1952 and wound up being one of the biggest headliners in that city's history. Hackett always referred to himself as a "saloon comic" and preferred the intimacy of his stage act--...
5. Terry-Thomas
Actor | It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World
One of Britain's most beloved eccentric comedians, the irrepressible, gap-toothed Terry-Thomas was born Thomas Terry Hoar-Stevens in Lichfield Grove, Finchley. He was the son of Ellen Elizabeth (Hoar) and Ernest Frederick Stevens, a fairly well-to-do London businessman. He was afforded a private ...
6. Phil Silvers
Actor | It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World
Phil Silvers was a comedic actor of Russian-Jewish descent, nicknamed as "The King of Chutzpah." He was best known for his starring role as United States Army Master Sergeant Ernest "Ernie" Bilko in the very popular hit sitcom "The Phil Silvers Show" (1955-1959). He later had important roles in the...
7. Milton Berle
Actor | It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World
Milton Berle was an American comedian and actor.
Berle's career as an entertainer spanned over 80 years, first in silent films and on stage as a child actor, then in radio, movies and television. As the host of NBC's Texaco Star Theatre (1948-55), he was the first major American television star and ...
8. Andy Kaufman
Actor | Taxi
Referred to by some as a dadaistic comedian, Andy Kaufman took comedy and performance art to the edges of irrationality and blurred the dividing line between reality and imagination. Born in New York City on January 17, 1949, the first son of Stanley and Janice Kaufman, Andy grew up on New York in ...
9. Joey Bishop
Actor | The Joey Bishop Show
Perpetually glum standup comedian Joey Bishop was born Joseph Abraham Gottlieb on February 3, 1918, in the Bronx, New York. He was the youngest of five children of Chana "Anna" (Siegel) and Jacob Gottlieb, a bicycle repairman. His father was an Austrian Jewish immigrant and his mother was a ...
10. Jerry Lewis
Actor | The Nutty Professor
Jerry Lewis (born March 16, 1926 - August 20, 2017) was an American comedian, actor, singer, film producer, screenwriter and film director. He is known for his slapstick humor in film, television, stage and radio. He was originally paired up with Dean Martin in 1946, forming the famed comedy team ...
11. Bob Hope
Actor | The Ghost Breakers
Comedian Bob Hope was born Leslie Townes Hope in Eltham, London, England, the fifth of seven sons of Avis (Townes), light opera singer, and William Henry Hope, a stonemason from Weston-super-Mare, Somerset. His maternal grandmother was Welsh. Hope moved to Bristol before emigrating with his parents...
12. George Carlin
Actor | Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure
George Denis Patrick Carlin was born and raised in Manhattan, New York City, to Mary (Bearey), a secretary, and Patrick John Carlin, an advertising manager for The Sun; they had met while working in marketing. His father was from Donegal, Ireland, and his mother was Irish-American. His parents ...
13. Flip Wilson
Writer | Flip
Flip Wilson was born on December 8, 1933 in Jersey City, New Jersey, USA. He was a writer and actor, known for Flip (1970), The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh (1979) and Uptown Saturday Night (1974). He was married to Cookie Mackenzie and Lovenia Patricia (Peaches) Wilson. He died on November 25, 1998 ...
14. Richard Pryor
Actor | Superman III
Highly influential, and always controversial, African-American actor/comedian who was equally well known for his colorful language during his live comedy shows, as for his fast paced life, multiple marriages and battles with drug addiction. He has been acknowledged by many modern comic artist's as ...
15. Bill Cosby
Actor | The Cosby Show
Bill Cosby is one of the world's most well-known entertainers and comedians. William Henry Cosby, Jr. was born on July 12, 1937, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to Anna Pearl (Hite), a maid and William Henry Cosby, Sr., a U.S. Navy sailor. After 10th grade, Cosby joined the Navy and completed high ...
16. Red Skelton
Writer | The Red Skelton Show
The son of a former circus clown turned grocer and a cleaning woman, Red Skelton was introduced to show business at the age of seven by Ed Wynn, at a vaudeville show in Vincennes. At age 10, he left home to travel with a medicine show through the Midwest, and joined the vaudeville circuit at age 15....
17. Redd Foxx
Actor | Sanford and Son
Redd Foxx began doing stand-up comedy on the infamous "Chitlin' Circuit" in the 1940s and 1950s. Foxx was one of the premier "blue humor" comedians. Blue humor was very dirty, too dirty for white audiences. For years his party albums were not available in white record stores. In the 1960s his ...
18. Jackie Gleason
Actor | The Hustler
Comedian, actor, composer and conductor, educated in New York public schools. He was a master of ceremonies in amateur shows, a carnival barker, daredevil driver and a disc jockey, and later a comedian in night clubs. By the mid-1950s he had turned to writing original music and recording a series ...
19. Art Carney
Actor | Harry and Tonto
Art Carney was an American actor with a lengthy career but is primarily remembered for two roles. In television, Carney played municipal sewer worker Ed Norton in the influential sitcom "The Honeymooners" (1955-1956). In film, Carney played senior citizen Harry Coombes in the road movie "Harry and ...
20. Imogene Coca
Actress | National Lampoon's Vacation
Imogene Coca is best remembered for playing opposite Sid Caesar in the live 90-minute Your Show of Shows (1950), which ran every Saturday night in regular season on NBC from February 1950 to June 1954. Their repertoire of comedy acts included the very memorable, hilarious, timeless and ...
21. Danny Thomas
Actor | Make Room for Daddy
Known primarily as a TV actor, he starred as a nightclub singer on the popular The Danny Thomas Show (1953).
He also served TV behind the cameras partnering with Sheldon Leonard and Aaron Spelling to create such shows as Dick Van Dyke's show, The Dick Van Dyke Show (1961), The Andy Griffith Show (...
22. Corbett Monica
Actor | Broadway Danny Rose
Corbett Monica was born on June 1, 1930 in St. Louis, Missouri, USA. He was an actor, known for Broadway Danny Rose (1984), The Joey Bishop Show (1961) and The Grasshopper (1970). He was married to Helen Stover. He died on July 22, 1998 in North Miami, Florida, USA.
23. Groucho Marx
Actor | A Night at the Opera
The bushy-browed, cigar-smoking wise-cracker with the painted-on moustache and stooped walk was the leader of The Marx Brothers. With one-liners that were often double entendres, Groucho never cursed in any of his performances and said he never wanted to be known as a dirty comic. With a great love...
24. Chico Marx
Actor | Duck Soup
As a kid trying to negotiate his way through various gang territories to a floating crap game or a new pool hall where he was not yet known as a hustler, Leonard (Chico) Marx learned to fake several accents. Because he later employed an Italian accent in the Marx Brothers' act, people assumed his ...
25. Harpo Marx
Actor | A Night at the Opera
With poofy, curly red hair, a top hat and a horn, the lovable mute was the favorite of the Marx Brothers. Though chasing women was a favorite routine of his in the movies, Harpo was a devoted father and husband. He adopted the mute routine in vaudeville and carried it over to the films. Harpo was ...
26. Lou Costello
Actor | Hold That Ghost
Lou Costello was born Louis Francis Cristillo in Paterson, New Jersey, to Helen (Rege) and Sebastiano Cristillo. His father was from Calabria, Italy, and his mother was an American of Italian, French, and Irish ancestry. Raised in Paterson, Costello dropped out of high school and headed west to ...
27. Bud Abbott
Actor | Hold That Ghost
Long acknowledged as one of the best "straight men" in the business, Bud Abbott was born William Alexander Abbott in Reading, Pennsylvania to Rae (Fisher) and Harry Abbott, who had both worked for the Barnum and Bailey Circus. When Bud was three his family moved to Asbury Park, New Jersey, which he...
28. Stan Laurel
Actor | Saps at Sea
Stan Laurel came from a theatrical family, his father was an actor and theatre manager, and he made his stage debut at the age of 16 at Pickard's Museum, Glasgow. He traveled with Fred Karno's vaudeville company to the United States in 1910 and again in 1913. While with that company he was Charles ...
29. Oliver Hardy
Actor | Saps at Sea
Although his parents were never in show business, as a young boy Oliver Hardy was a gifted singer and, by age eight, was performing with minstrel shows. In 1910 he ran a movie theatre, which he preferred to studying law. In 1913 he became a comedy actor with the Lubin Company in Florida and began ...
30. Moe Howard
Actor | If a Body Meets a Body
Moe Howard, the "Boss Stooge" and brother of Stooges Curly Howard and Shemp Howard, began his acting career in 1909 by playing bit roles in silent Vitagraph films. At 17 he joined a troupe working on a showboat and also appeared in several two-reel comedy shorts. In 1922 he, brother Shemp and Larry...
31. Curly Howard
Actor | If a Body Meets a Body
Jerome "Curly" Howard, the rotund, bald Stooge with the high voice was the most popular member of The Three Stooges. His first stage experience was as a comedic conductor for the Orville Knapp Band in 1928. Curly joined The Three Stooges in 1932, replacing his brother Shemp Howard. He made more ...
32. Shemp Howard
Actor | Scrambled Brains
Shemp Howard was born Samuel Horwitz in Brooklyn, New York, USA. He was also the brother of fellow stooges Moe Howard and Curly Howard. Larry Fine was not related to any of the other stooges.
When not working with The Three Stooges, Shemp made a lot of feature film appearances, such as The Bank Dick...
33. Larry Fine
Actor | Disorder in the Court
Larry began performing as a violinist at a young age. During his teenage years, he earned his living as a singer and boxer. At 18, Larry began working vaudeville with "The Haney Sisters and Fine" and in 1925, he joined Ted Healy and Moe Howard in the act that would eventually become The Three ...
34. Joe E. Brown
Actor | Some Like It Hot
Joe E. Brown happily claimed that he was the only youngster in show business who ran away from home to join the circus with the blessings of his parents. In 1902, the ten-year-old Brown joined a circus tumbling act called the Five Marvellous Ashtons that toured various circuses and vaudeville ...
35. Joe Besser
Actor | The Desert Hawk
Joe Besser was born on August 12, 1907 in St. Louis, Missouri. Short, chubby, balding, childish character actor who began his career on the vaudeville circuit before breaking into films in the early 1930s. He was a frequent foil of Bud Abbott and Lou Costello in their films and played Stinky on ...
36. Tom Hanks
Producer | Cast Away
Thomas Jeffrey Hanks was born in Concord, California, to Janet Marylyn (Frager), a hospital worker, and Amos Mefford Hanks, an itinerant cook. His mother's family, originally surnamed "Fraga", was entirely Portuguese, while his father was of mostly English ancestry. Tom grew up in what he has ...
37. Robin Williams
Actor | Mrs. Doubtfire
Robin McLaurin Williams was born on Saturday, July 21st, 1951, in Chicago, Illinois, a great-great-grandson of Mississippi Governor and Senator, Anselm J. McLaurin. His mother, Laurie McLaurin (née Janin), was a former model from Mississippi, and his father, Robert Fitzgerald Williams, was a Ford ...
38. Larry Storch
Actor | F Troop
As a kid in the 1930s growing up in a tough New York neighborhood, kinetic wiseguy Larry Storch took in the multi-ethnic flavor of his surroundings and started blurting out various accents as a juvenile to provoke laughs and earn attention. Little did he know that this early talent would take him ...
39. Dick Van Dyke
Actor | Mary Poppins
Dick Van Dyke was born Richard Wayne Van Dyke in West Plains, Missouri, to Hazel Victoria (McCord), a stenographer, and Loren Wayne Van Dyke, a salesman. His younger brother was entertainer Jerry Van Dyke. His ancestry includes English, Dutch, Scottish, German and Swiss-German. Although he had ...
40. Dick Shawn
Actor | It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World
One-of-a-kind comedian Dick Shawn was as intriguingly clever and off-the-wall as they came. As such, he proved to be rather an acquired taste on film and TV. A counterculture favorite far ahead of his time, it became a hit-and-miss effort in proper vehicles for this man's eccentric genius. He ...
41. Lucille Ball
Actress | I Love Lucy
The woman who will always be remembered as the crazy, accident-prone, lovable Lucy Ricardo was born Lucille Desiree Ball on August 6, 1911 in Jamestown, New York, the daughter of Desiree Evelyn "DeDe" (Hunt) and Henry Durrell "Had" Ball. Her father died before she was four, and her mother worked ...
42. Carol Burnett
Soundtrack | The Carol Burnett Show
The entertainment world has enjoyed a six-decade love affair with comedienne/singer Carol Burnett. A peerless sketch performer and delightful, self-effacing personality who rightfully succeeded Lucille Ball as the carrot-topped "Queen of Television Comedy," it was Burnett's traumatic childhood that...
43. Tony Randall
Actor | The Odd Couple
Tony Randall was born on February 26, 1920 in Tulsa, Oklahoma as Aryeh Leonard Rosenberg. He attended Tulsa Central High School and later Northwestern University and New York City's Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre. After graduating, he starred in two plays: George Bernard Shaw's '...
44. John Belushi
Actor | Saturday Night Live
John Belushi was born in Chicago, Illinois, USA, on January 24, 1949, to Agnes Demetri (Samaras) and Adam Anastos Belushi, a restaurant owner. His father was an Albanian immigrant, from Qytezë, and his mother was also of Albanian descent. He grew up in Wheaton, where the family moved when he was ...
45. Dan Aykroyd
Writer | Ghostbusters
Daniel Edward Aykroyd was born on July 1, 1952 in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, to Lorraine Hélène (Gougeon), a secretary from a French-Canadian family, and Samuel Cuthbert Peter Hugh Aykroyd, a civil engineer who advised prime minister Pierre Trudeau. Aykroyd attended Carleton University in 1969, where...
46. Bill Murray
Actor | Lost in Translation
Bill Murray is an American actor, comedian, and writer. The fifth of nine children, he was born William James Murray in Wilmette, Illinois, to Lucille (Collins), a mailroom clerk, and Edward Joseph Murray II, who sold lumber. He is of Irish descent. Among his siblings are actors Brian Doyle-Murray, ...
47. Chevy Chase
Actor | Memoirs of an Invisible Man
Chevy Chase was born Cornelius Crane Chase on October 8, 1943 in Lower Manhattan, New York, to Cathalene Parker (Browning), a concert pianist and librettist, and Edward Tinsley "Ned" Chase, an editor and writer. His parents both came from prominent families, and his grandfathers were artist and ...
48. Eddie Murphy
Actor | The Nutty Professor
Edward Regan Murphy was born April 3, 1961 in Brooklyn, New York, to Lillian Lynch (born: Lillian Laney), a telephone operator, and Charles Edward Murphy, a transit police officer who was also an amateur comedian and actor. After his father died, his mother married Vernon Lynch, a foreman at a ...
49. Goldie Hawn
Actress | Private Benjamin
Goldie Jeanne Hawn was born November 21, 1945 in Washington, D.C. and raised in Takoma Park, Maryland to Laura Hawn, a jewelry shop/dance school owner & Rut Hawn, a band musician. She has a sister, Patti Hawn, and a brother, Edward, who died in infancy before her birth. She was raised in the Jewish...
50. John Candy
Actor | Planes, Trains & Automobiles
Candy was one of Canada's greatest and funniest character actors. His well-known role as the big hearted buffoon earned him classics in Uncle Buck (1989) and Planes, Trains & Automobiles (1987). His career has handed him some dry spells but Candy always rebounded.
Born in Newmarket, Ontario, in ...
51. Mel Brooks
Actor | Spaceballs
Mel Brooks was born Melvin Kaminsky on June 28, 1926 in Brooklyn, New York. He served in WWII, and afterwards got a job playing the drums at nightclubs in the Catskills. Brooks eventually started a comedy act and also worked in radio and as Master Entertainer at Grossinger's Resort before going to ...
52. Gene Wilder
Actor | Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory
When he was 11, he wanted to be a comedian like Sid Caesar. Then, when he was 15 and saw Lee J. Cobb in 'Death of a Salesman,' he decided he would be a comedy actor and found that Mel Brooks was a great influence on his screen writing. He combined both talents with directing in The World's Greatest...
53. Carl Reiner
Writer | The Dick Van Dyke Show
Carl Reiner is a legend of American comedy, who achieved great success as a comic actor, a director, producer and recording artist. He won nine Emmy Awards, three as an actor, four as a writer and two as a producer. He also won a Grammy Award for his album "The 2,000 Year Old Man", based on his ...
54. Morey Amsterdam
Actor | The Dick Van Dyke Show
Born in Chicago, Morey Amsterdam started in Vaudeville at the age of 14, as a straight man for his piano-playing brother. His father, a concert violinist who worked with the Chicago Opera and the San Francisco Symphony, wanted Morey to pursue a career in classical music however Morey had other ...
55. Rose Marie
Actress | The Dick Van Dyke Show
Rose Marie was a legend of show business, with a career stretching 90 years, since her debut as her self in a Vitaphone musical short that appeared on the bill with The Jazz Singer (1927) at its premiere in 1927. According to Rose Marie, when she approached Al Jolson at the Winter Garden Theater in...
56. Rob Reiner
Actor | All in the Family
Robert Reiner was born in New York City, to Estelle Reiner (née Lebost) and Emmy-winning actor, comedian, writer, and producer Carl Reiner.
As a child, his father was his role model, as Carl Reiner created and starred in The Dick Van Dyke Show. Estelle was also an inspiration for him to become a ...
57. Jim Nabors
Actor | Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C.
Tall, spade-jawed, hopelessly genial balladeer/actor Jim Nabors was born in James Thurston Nabors on June 12, 1930 in Sylacauga, Alabama and raised there, graduating from the University of Alabama. A typing clerk at the United Nations in his salad days, he eventually moved to Los Angeles, ...
58. Andy Griffith
Actor | The Andy Griffith Show
Andy Griffith is best known for his starring roles in two very popular television series, The Andy Griffith Show (1960) and Matlock (1986). Griffith earned a degree in music from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. In the 1950s, he became a regular on The Ed Sullivan Show (1948) and ...
59. Don Knotts
Actor | The Andy Griffith Show
Don Knotts, the legendary television character actor, was born Jesse Donald Knotts on July 21, 1924 in Morgantown, West Virginia, to William Jesse Knotts and the former Elsie Luzetta Moore. He was the youngest of four sons in a family that had been in America since the 17th century.
His first stint ...
60. Don Rickles
Actor | Kelly's Heroes
Donald Jay Rickles was born May 8, 1926 in New York. Following the Golden Era of Hollywood, he remained active until early 2017. He got his start in night clubs, toiling for over 20 years, until 1958, when he made his film debut in Run Silent Run Deep (1958). The movie was a big hit. Afterward, ...
61. Dick Martin
Producer | Laugh-In
Dick Martin, the comedian and television director who achieved TV immortality as the co-host of Laugh-In (1967) as the comic foil to straight man Dan Rowan, was born on January 30, 1922 in Battle Creek, Michigan. The young Martin was a writer for the popular radio sit-com "Duffy's Tavern" before ...
62. Dan Rowan
Producer | Laugh-In
Dan Rowan was a comedian most famous as the straight man to Dick Martin, with whom he co-hosted the watershed TV program Laugh-In (1967) from 1968-1973. The comedian debuted into small-town life as Daniel Hale David in Beggs, Oklahoma on July 22, 1922, the son of show people. As a child, Rowan ...
63. Jo Anne Worley
Actress | Beauty and the Beast
This tall, attractive, rubber-faced, tunnel-mouthed comedienne with the trademark bouffant black hair is a one-of-a-kind commodity and certainly no shrinking violet when it comes to entertaining. Unapologetically, she adores the center stage...and vice versa -- the stage loves her. Like several of ...
64. Arte Johnson
Actor | Laugh-In
Arte Johnson was born on January 20, 1929 in Benton Harbor, Michigan, USA. He was an actor and writer, known for Laugh-In (1967), Love at First Bite (1979) and Baggy Pants & the Nitwits (1977). He was married to Gisela Johnson and Texie Waterman. He died on July 3, 2019 in Los Angeles, ...
65. Tom Smothers
Actor | The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour
Tom Smothers was born on February 2, 1937 in Governors Island, New York City, New York, USA. He was an actor and producer, known for The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour (1967), Speed Zone (1989) and The Informant! (2009). He was married to Marcy Carriker, Rochelle Ruth Robley and Stephanie R. Shorr. ...
66. Dick Smothers
Actor | Casino
Dick Smothers was born on November 20, 1938 in New York City, New York, USA. He is an actor and writer, known for Casino (1995), The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour (1967) and The Informant! (2009). He was previously married to Denby Franklin, Lorraine Wallace and Linda Miller.
67. Ben Turpin
Actor | Yankee Doodle in Berlin
First of all, the cross-eyed comedian of silent days was not born that way. Supposedly his right eye slipped out of alignment while playing the role of the similarly afflicted Happy Hooligan in vaudeville and it never adjusted. Ironically, it was this disability that would enhance his comic value ...
68. Chester Conklin
Actor | Modern Times
Iowa-born Chester Conklin was raised in a coal-mining area by a devoutly religious father who hoped that his son would go into the ministry. However, Chester got the performing bug one day when he gave a recitation at a community singing festival and won first prize. Knowing his father would never ...
69. Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle
Actor | Coney Island
Roscoe Arbuckle, the youngest of nine children, reportedly weighed 16 pounds at birth in Smith Center, Kansas on March 24, 1887. His family moved to California when he was one year old. At age 8 he first appeared on the stage. His first part was with the Webster-Brown stock company. From then until...
70. Zasu Pitts
Actress | Greed
Classic comedienne Zasu Pitts, of the timid, forlorn blue eyes and trademark woebegone vocal pattern and fidgety hands, was born to Rulandus and Nellie (Shay) Pitts, the third of four children on January 3, 1894. Her aged New York-native father, who lost a leg back in the Civil War era, had settled...
71. Jack Benny
Actor | The Jack Benny Program
The son of a saloon keeper, Jack Benny (born Benny Kubelsky) began to study the violin at the age six, and his "ineptness" at it, would later become his trademark (in reality, he was a very accomplished player). When given the opportunity to play in live theatre professionally, Benny quit school ...
72. Eddie 'Rochester' Anderson
Actor | It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World
The son of a minstrel and circus tightrope walker, Eddie Anderson developed a gravel voice early in life which would become his trademark to fame. He joined his older brother Cornelius as members of "The Three Black Aces" during his vaudeville years, singing for pennies in the hotel lobby. He ...
73. George Burns
Actor | Oh, God!
George Burns was an American actor, comedian, singer, and published author. He formed a comedy duo with his wife Gracie Allen (1895-1964), and typically played the straight man to her zany roles. Following her death, Burns started appearing as a solo performer. He once won an Academy Award for Best...
74. Gracie Allen
Actress | A Damsel in Distress
Gracie Allen was born on July 26, 1895 in San Francisco, California, USA. She was an actress and writer, known for A Damsel in Distress (1937), The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show (1950) and The Gracie Allen Murder Case (1939). She was married to George Burns. She died on August 27, 1964 in ...
75. Bea Benaderet
Actress | Petticoat Junction
Bea Benaderet had a remarkable career in radio and television. In the earlier days of radio, before television, she provided the voice for numerous names of characters on the radio, on shows like "Fibber McGee and Molly," "My Favorite Husband" with Lucille Ball & "The Jack Benny Show. She was born ...
76. Dudley Moore
Actor | Arthur
Dudley Moore, the gifted comedian who had at least three distinct career phases that brought him great acclaim and success, actually started out as a musical prodigy as a child. Moore -- born in Dagenham, Essex, England to working class parents in 1935 -- won a music scholarship to Magdalen College...
77. Dana Carvey
Actor | Wayne's World
One of SNL's most talented alumni, comedian Dana Carvey reigned supreme during his six-season run creating some of the show's most memorable characters, including "Church Lady", "Garth" of Wayne & Garth fame, Grumpy Old Man and bodybuilding "Hans" of Hans & Franz notoriety. This sharp and witty ...
78. Alan Arkin
Actor | Argo
Alan Arkin was an Academy Award-winning American actor who was also an acclaimed director, producer, author, singer and composer.
He was born Alan Wolf Arkin on March 26, 1934, in Brooklyn, New York. His family were Jewish emigrants from Russia and Germany. In 1946, the Arkins moved from Brooklyn to...
79. Tom Poston
Actor | Christmas with the Kranks
Veteran comedic actor Tom Poston, he with the bugged-out eyes that commonly accentuated a vague look of bewilderment, was born in Columbus, Ohio, on October 17, 1921. By age nine, the young boy was appearing with an acrobatic troupe.
Poston later attended Bethany College in West Virginia when World ...
80. Bob Newhart
Actor | Elf
Bob Newhart is an American actor and stand-up comedian. His comedic style involves deadpan delivery of dialogue, a slight stammer when talking, and comedic monologues. He has cited earlier comedians George Gobel (1919-1991), Ray Goulding (1922-1990), and Bob Elliott (1923-2016) as his main ...
81. Mort Sahl
Actor | Johnny Cool
Crowned as leading the new breed of modern comedians by Time magazine in 1960, Mort Sahl is the first entertainer ever to appear on its cover. Before comedy clubs existed, Sahl began performing at the hungry i music club in San Francisco in the early 1950s. He differed from other comedians, ...
82. Lenny Bruce
Writer | Dance Hall Racket
Lenny Bruce was born Leonard Alfred Schneider on October 13, 1925, in Mineola, Long Island, New York. His British-born father, Myron, was a shoe clerk, his mother, Sadie, was a dancer. Lenny's parents were divorced when he was a child. To support herself and her son, Sadie Schneider pursued a ...
83. Gilbert Gottfried
Actor | Aladdin
At the tender age of 15, Gilbert Gottfried began doing stand-up at open mike nights in New York City and, after a few short years, became known around town as "the comedian's comedian". After spending several years mastering the art of stand-up comedy, producers of the legendary NBC late-night ...
84. Sam Kinison
Actor | Back to School
Sam Kinison was a popular stand-up comedian from Yakima, Washington, mainly active in the 1980s and the early 1990s. He also had a few acting roles in film and television. His only recurring role was that of Hugh, the main character's alter ego in the short-lived sitcom "Charlie Hoover" (1991). The...
85. Rodney Dangerfield
Actor | Back to School
Rodney Dangerfield was born Jacob Cohen on November 22, 1921 in Deer Park, Suffolk County, Long Island, New York. He was the son of Dorothy "Dotty" (Teitelbaum) and Phillip Cohen, who performed in vaudeville under the name Phil Roy. His father was born in New York, to Russian Jewish parents, and ...
86. Judy Carne
Actress | Laugh-In
Trained in music and dance, tiny-framed, pixie-like Judy Carne was born Joyce Botterill in Northampton, England on April 27, 1939, the daughter of a grocer. Trained in dance, she appeared in music revues as a teenager and changed her name at the advice of a dance teacher.
Slowly building up a career...
87. Ruth Buzzi
Actress | Laugh-In
Ruth Buzzi was born July 24, 1936 in Westerly, Rhode Island to Rena and Angelo Buzzi. Her father was a nationally recognized stone sculptor. Raised in Wequetequock, Connecticut, she attended Stonington High School. She gained experience as a cheerleader, performing before crowds at athletic events.
...
88. Lily Tomlin
Actress | Nashville
Lily Tomlin was born September 1, 1939 in Detroit, Michigan, to Lillie Mae (Ford) and Guy Tomlin, who moved to Michigan from Paducah, Kentucky, during the Great Depression. Her mother was a nurse's aide and her father was a factory worker. She graduated from Cass Technical High School in 1957, and ...
89. Nipsey Russell
Actor | The Wiz
Nipsey Russell was born in Atlanta, Georgia, in 1918. He got his start in Rock and Roll Review and other music revues in the 1950s. In the 1960s Russell achieved his first major role as Officer Anderson in Car 54, Where Are You? (1961). After being on the show for a year, Russell was a mainstay on ...
90. Dick Gregory
Actor | The Hot Chick
Dick Gregory was born on October 12, 1932 in St. Louis, Missouri, USA. He was an actor and writer, known for The Hot Chick (2002), The Leisure Seeker (2017) and Reno 911! (2003). He was married to Lillian Gregory. He died on August 19, 2017 in Washington, District of Columbia, USA.
91. Marty Feldman
Actor | Young Frankenstein
"I am too old to die young, and too young to grow up," Marty Feldman told a reporter -- a week before he died.
This beloved comedian, who poked fun at himself, as well as others, was born Martin Alan Feldman on July 8, 1934, in London, England. His parents were of Ukrainian Jewish heritage (from ...
92. Marty Ingels
Actor | Pac-Man
Martin Ingerman was born on March 6, 1936 in New York City. He had an older brother named Arthur. He had a rough childhood and was often picked on. After he finished school, he went into the army. Later, he appeared in a couple of game shows and won. He wanted to be an actor so he went to ...
93. Adam Sandler
Actor | The Waterboy
Adam Richard Sandler was born September 9, 1966 in Brooklyn, New York, to Judith (Levine), a teacher at a nursery school, and Stanley Alan Sandler, an electrical engineer. He is of Russian Jewish descent. At 17, he took his first step towards becoming a stand-up comedian when he spontaneously took ...
94. Will Ferrell
Producer | Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby
John William Ferrell was born in Irvine, California, to Betty Kay (Overman), a teacher, and Roy Lee Ferrell, Jr., a musician. His parents were originally from Roanoke Rapids, North Carolina.
A graduate of the University of Southern California, Ferrell became interested in performing while a student ...
95. Steve Carell
Actor | The Office
Steve Carell, one of America's most versatile comics, was born Steven John Carell on August 16, 1962, in Concord, Massachusetts. He is the son of Harriet Theresa (Koch), a psychiatric nurse, and Edwin A. Carell, an electrical engineer. His mother was of Polish descent and his father of Italian and ...
96. Ben Stiller
Producer | Tropic Thunder
Benjamin Edward Meara Stiller was born on November 30, 1965, in New York City, New York, to legendary comedians Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara. His father was of Austrian Jewish and Polish Jewish descent, and his mother was of Irish Catholic descent (she converted to Judaism).
His parents made no real...
97. Jerry Stiller
Actor | The Heartbreak Kid
As the short, straight-man counterpart of the stellar husband-and-wife comedy team "Stiller & Meara", Jerry Stiller and wife Anne Meara were on top of the comedy game in the 1960s, a steady and hilarious presence on television variety, notably The Ed Sullivan Show (1948), on which they appeared 36 ...
98. Anne Meara
Actress | Heavyweights
The incredibly gifted comedienne-actress Anne Meara is known for her comedic efforts alongside husband-comedian, Jerry Stiller; together, they were 'Stiller and Meara'; they were original members of the improvisational company, the Compass Players, which later evolved as the Second City Theater. ...
99. Phil Hartman
Actor | NewsRadio
Phil Hartman was born Philip Edward Hartmann on September 24, 1948, in Brantford, Ontario, Canada. His surname was originally "Hartmann", but he later dropped the second "n". He was one of eight children of Doris Marguerite (Wardell) and Rupert Loebig Hartmann, a salesman. He was of German, Irish, ...
100. Tina Fey
Actress | Date Night
Elizabeth Stamatina Fey was born in 1970 in Upper Darby, Pennsylvania, just west of Philadelphia, to Xenobia "Jeanne" (Xenakes), a brokerage employee, and Donald Henry Fey, who wrote grant proposals for universities. Her mother is Greek, born in Piraeus, while her father had German, Northern Irish,...
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