Will Ferrell Funny man John William Ferrell was born in 1967 in Irvine, California. His father, Lee Ferrell, was the keyboardist for The Righteous Brothers. He has one brother, Patrick Ferrell, who has appeared in small roles in some of Will’s films including Elf and Night at the Roxbury. Throughout most of his high school career, Will was predominately an athlete and scholar, but began to show his talent for acting when he was responsible for making the daily morning announcements; he did so in disguised voices. Ferrell later attended the University of Southern California majoring in Sports Broadcasting.
He was also a member of the Delta Tau Delta fraternity. He graduated in 1989 and took an internship with NBC Sports. After ad-libbing an on-air joke during one of his broadcasting sessions and drawing laughs from the crowd, he decided to focus on comedy. One of the first improvisational groups he worked with was The Groundlings in Los Angeles. After success with several improv groups, Ferrell was asked to join the comedy television show Saturday Night Live in 1995. Will became best known for his work doing impersonations of famous people. Some of his best impersonations included: U.S. President George W Bush, Neil Diamond, Janet Reno, and Alex Trebek. One of Ferrell’s skits on Saturday Night Live as the night clubber Steve Butabi was created into his first feature film, A Night at the Roxbury in 1998. This quickly led to other films and the formation of what has become known unofficially as the Frat Pack. The Frat Pack is somewhat of a support group for comedic actors including Will Ferrell, Vince Vaughn, Jack Black, Luke Wilson, Owen Wilson, Ben Stiller, and Steve Carell. The actors frequently collaborate with each other on films, appear on TV shows together, and go to award shows together. Some of their collaborations include Old School, Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy, and Wedding Crashers.
Saturday Night Live, desperate to keep Will Ferrell as a cast member, increased his salary in 2001 to $350,000; the highest any cast member has ever received. Ferrell’s final appearance on SNL was on May 18, 2002. He left the show in order to pursue his career as a movie actor full time. Ferrell’s career has taken off since he left the show. In 2005, Premiere magazine voted him #38 on the World’s Most Powerful People list. The year before, he was ranked #51. This power became evident when he was paid 20 million dollars for each of his roles in Kicking and Screaming as well as Bewitched, co-starring Nicole Kidman, both released in 2005. He was also voted as the third funniest person in America by Entertainment Weekly. In 2006, Ferrell starred in Curious George, Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby, and Stranger Than Fiction. In 2000, Ferrell married the Swedish actress, Viveca Paulin. Their son, Magnus, was born in March of 2004. They have homes in both New York City and Los Angeles. The couple enjoys jogging together and has even completed both the Boston marathon in 2003 and the New York City marathon in 2001. Ferrell’s time for the Boston marathon was 4 hours, 2 minutes, and 29 seconds. For the New York City marathon both he and his wife finished at the same time of 5 hours, 1 minute, and 56 seconds. YUDDY |
