David Cross

At age 17, Cross began performing stand-up comedy. The day after he graduated from Northside High School in Atlanta, Cross relocated to New York City. Lacking a plan, he drifted, working briefly for a lawn care company on Long Island. Later, he enrolled at Emerson College in Boston. He would drop out after only a semester, but during his time there, Cross joined This is Pathetic, a college sketch group, where he met John Ennis. In the summer of 1985, the two aspiring actors took a road trip to Los Angeles, although this did not significantly further their acting careers. In Boston, Cross began to perform stand-up more regularly. From the mid-1980s to the early 1990s, Boston had a booming comedy scene, although Cross did not fit the types of acts being booked most of the time. He recalls that it was "a loud, dumb, pandering, racist, homophobic-type scene".[8]

In 1990, a new comedy scene began to emerge at the comedy club chain Catch a Rising Star. Alongside Janeane Garofalo, Louis C.K., and other comics, Cross appeared regularly several nights a week. Cross formed the sketch comedy group "Cross Comedy" with 12 other performers, and they put on a new show every week. They were known for playing tricks on the audience, such as introducing fake comics or planting fake hecklers. Cross became increasingly focused on his comedy work.[8]

Cross later performed at the alternative comedy club Un-Cabaret in Los Angeles, where radio artist Joe Frank heard him, and hired him to appear in Frank's 1994 radio programs, A Hearing and The Last Run (in 1997 combined to become The OJ Chronicles),[9] where Cross appears as OJ's valet. Cross also starred in the Joe Frank program Jam, produced in 1999,[10] and has more recently worked with Joe Frank on radio shows for KCRW's Unfictional.[11]

Cross's stand-up comedy blends political commentary and satire.[12] In 1999, he performed a one-hour comedy special, The Pride Is Back, on HBO. In 2003, he released his first tour film, Let America Laugh, and was named #85 on Comedy Central's list of the 100 greatest stand-ups of all time. He has released five comedy albums: 2002's Shut Up You Fucking Baby!, 2004's It's Not Funny, 2010's Bigger and Blackerer, 2016's Making America Great Again/...America...Great..., and 2019's Oh, Come On. He was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Comedy Album twice, in 2003 for Shut Up You Fucking Baby! and in 2016 for ...America...Great....[13]

Cross' first three records were released on CD by indie-rock label Sub Pop, and on vinyl by comedy label Stand Up! Records for Shut Up and It's Not Funny. He self-released 2016's ...America...Great... on CD, with Stand Up! again releasing a vinyl version. Oh, Come On was released by Comedy Dynamics.[14][15][16][17] Cross tends to release his albums in overlapping audio and video formats which each contain material not found on the other. This is the case on Bigger and Blackerer, Oh, Come On, and perhaps most obviously the 2016 companion set Making America Great Again (a Netflix video) and ...America...Great... (CD/vinyl audio), which have different titles.[18][19] Oh, Come On's video and audio versions were recorded at two different shows on the same tour.[20]

Cross's stand-up material was featured in Comedy Central's 2004 animated series Shorties Watchin' Shorties. He appears on several Un-Cabaret compilation albums, including Freak Weather Feels Different and The Good, the Bad and the Drugly.

Cross at the 2007 Plug Awards

Cross began his professional television career as a writer on The Ben Stiller Show. The series hired him toward the end of its run, and he occasionally made brief appearances in the sketches. He had a speaking role in "The Legend of T.J. O'Pootertoot", a sketch written almost entirely by Cross. It was during this period that he first met Bob Odenkirk, with whom he would later co-create the HBO sketch comedy series Mr. Show in 1995. Cross won an Emmy for his work on The Ben Stiller Show in 1993.[21] In 1997 he played Newton, an employee of the NYC Morgue in Men in Black, and reprised the character, now as an owner of a video rental store, in Men in Black II in 2002.

Cross later co-starred as Tobias Fünke in Arrested Development, originally intended to be only a minor role.[22] He also played smaller roles on programs such as Just Shoot Me!, The Drew Carey Show, NewsRadio, Strangers with Candy, Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job, and Aqua Teen Hunger Force. From October 2005, Cross regularly appeared on Comedy Central's The Colbert Report as Stephen Colbert's nemesis Russ Lieber, a fictional liberal radio talk show host from Madison, Wisconsin.[23] Cross developed an animated series for Comedy Central called Freak Show, which co-starred H. Jon Benjamin and was cancelled due to low ratings.[24] He has appeared several times on Wonder Showzen.

Cross teamed up with Mr. Show director and producer Troy Miller and Odenkirk to produce a feature film Run Ronnie Run, based on one of their Mr. Show characters. The film satirized the reality television craze, and featured cameos from many stars; however, Odenkirk got into conflict with the studio New Line Cinema, and they released it direct-to-video. In 1994 and again in 1999, Cross was a guest voice actor on Joe Frank's radio show, featured in the episodes "The Last Run", "A Hearing", "The O.J. Chronicles", and "Jam". In 2013, he returned, making an appearance in an episode of Frank's radio show, entitled "A Conversation."[25]

In 2004, Cross provided voices for a Marine in Halo 2 and a store clerk named Zero in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.[26] He was also the voice of the "Happy-Time Harry" doll and Bert Banana in Aqua Teen Hunger Force (although the part was credited as Sir Willups Brightslymoore). Cross has made guest appearances in Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!. He directed the music video for The Black Keys' song "10 A.M. Automatic", a spoof of public-access television. Paste Magazine ranked it number 24 on their list of the 50 Best Music Videos of the Decade (2000–2009).[27]

Cross appeared in The Strokes' music video for "Juicebox" as a bad local "morning zoo" radio DJ. He also appeared in The New Pornographers' video for "Use It", in Superchunk's video for "Watery Hands" (along with Janeane Garofalo), and in Yo La Tengo's video for "Sugarcube" (along with Bob Odenkirk and John Ennis). Cross contributes to Vice magazine, writing a column, My America. In 2005, he contributed to the UNICEF benefit song "Do They Know It's Hallowe'en?" and appeared in one of PETA's "I'd Rather Go Naked Than Wear Fur" campaigns.[28]

In the Beastie Boys' 2006 concert film Awesome; I Fuckin' Shot That!, Cross portrays Nathaniel Hörnblowér in the fictional segment "A Day in the Life of Nathaniel Hörnblowér". In I'm Not There, Cross portrays Allen Ginsberg. Both Bill Lawrence and Zach Braff of the TV series Scrubs were eager to have Cross make a cameo appearance on the series as Tobias Fünke, but due to the series' cancellation, the plan never came to fruition.[29][30]

Cross provided commentary on the Vicarious music video DVD for Tool. He has previously performed comedy as an opening act for the band and its members appeared on Mr. Show several times. He portrayed Ian Hawke in Alvin and the Chipmunks, Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel, and Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked and voiced Crane in the Kung Fu Panda film franchise.

Cross starred in David's Situation, a pilot for HBO. It filmed in May 2008 and included many Mr. Show alumni at the taping. On August 6, 2008, Bob Odenkirk announced on bobanddavid.com that David's Situation would not be produced.[31]

Cross at the 2009 Brooklyn Book Festival

Cross's black comedy series The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret, in which he stars and co-writes with Shaun Pye, has run on Channel 4 in the United Kingdom and IFC in the United States since October 2010,[32] for a total 18 episodes. On March 29, 2010, his first comedy special in six years, Bigger and Blackerer, was streamed on Epix HD. A CD with "slightly different content" was released on May 25, 2010.[33]

In 2009, Cross released his first book I Drink for a Reason. The book features memoirs, satirical fictional memoirs, and material from Cross that originally appeared in other publications.[34] In September 2009, Cross performed at his own comedy stage at the ATP New York 2009 music festival, for which he picked Eugene Mirman, H. Jon Benjamin, Jon Glaser, and Derrick Brown & The Navy Gravy to join him. In the same year, Cross and Benjamin created and wrote for Paid Programming on Adult Swim. Paid Programming was not picked up for a full series and Benjamin referred to it as an "abject failure".[35]

Cross starred alongside Julia Stiles and America Ferrera in It's a Disaster, which premiered at the 2012 Los Angeles Film Festival. Oscilloscope Laboratories acquired US distribution rights to the film, releasing it in select theaters beginning April 13, 2013.[36]

Cross's directorial debut film Hits premiered at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival.[37][38] Instead of selling the film rights to distributors, Cross instead opted to sell the movie over Bit Torrent through their "bundles" program,[39] which BitTorrent launched to help "legitimize" the platform.[39] According to The Verge, it was the first feature film to be distributed in such a format.[39] At the same time, Cross launched a Kickstarter campaign for the movie's general release which would then distribute the movie using a pay what you want methodology.[39]

In April 2015, episodes were ordered for a new sketch comedy show starring Cross and Odenkirk called W/ Bob & David.[40] It premiered in November 2015 on Netflix. Cross and Odenkirk write, star in, and produce the show.

On the January 10, 2016, broadcast of the National Public Radio-syndicated quiz show Ask Me Another, Cross appeared as a celebrity guest and performed well enough that at the audience's request the show's producers took the unusual step of allowing him to advance to the show's final, championship round; he then won that round and became that episode's overall champion, winning a prize package that included a pair of denim cutoff shorts that he himself had autographed.

He created the eight-episode black comedy series Bliss, which was released by the BritBox streaming service in 2018. It stars Stephen Mangan as Andrew, a fraudulent travel writer, who is struggling to maintain long-term relationships with two partners, Kim (Heather Graham) and Denise (Jo Hartley), who are not aware of one another.[41][42] The same year Cross provided the lead character's "white voice" in the science fiction comedy film Sorry to Bother You,[43][44]

In April 2005, Cross criticized stand-up comedian Larry the Cable Guy in a Rolling Stone interview, saying, "It's a lot of anti-gay, racist humor—which people like in America—all couched in 'I'm telling it like it is.' He's in the right place at the right time for that gee-shucks, proud-to-be-a-redneck, I'm-just-a-straight-shooter-multimillionaire-in-cutoff-flannel-selling-ring-tones act. That's where we are as a nation now. We're in a state of vague American values and anti-intellectual pride."

In response, Larry devoted a chapter in his book GIT-R-DONE to Cross and the "PC left", claiming that Cross had "screwed with my fans, it was time for me to say something". Larry claimed that Rolling Stone was baiting comedians to attack him, and they turned to Cross only after Lewis Black refused; as Larry and Black are good friends.[55] Cross responded with An Open Letter to Larry the Cable Guy posted on his website.[56] He continued to mock Larry in his stand-up, satirizing Blue Collar TV during a guest appearance on Wonder Showzen. In December 2005, he ended his performance on Comedy Central's Last Laugh '05 by mockingly yelling Larry's catchphrase, "GIT-R-DONE!", to the audience as he left the stage. He pokes fun at Larry's comedy in Freak Show with a character called "Danny the Plumber Guy".

Cross has criticized Inside the Actors Studio host James Lipton on a Mr. Show sketch and in his stand-up performance The Pride Is Back, calling him "pretentious."[57] Lipton, who thought that Cross's impression of him was not good-natured, would later appear alongside Cross in Arrested Development, in the recurring role of Prison Warden Stefan Gentiles. During filming, Cross was impressed with Lipton's acting and comedic ability, and the two became good friends.[58] On one commentary track for season four of Mr. Show, Cross discussed the encounter, complimenting Lipton for his professionalism and performance, saying that he liked Lipton personally but still "didn't care for" Inside The Actors Studio.

Responding to critics of his decision to appear in the critically panned, but commercially successful, Alvin and the Chipmunks, Cross noted that the film paid for a summer cottage, and more than "all my other projects combined: book, TV show, the two pilots, Year One, yeah."[59][60] Although he has admitted to taking the role primarily for the money, he has said that he does not regret doing so or consider it to be "selling out" as he has nothing against entertainment designed for children to enjoy that does not send a bad message.[61] Cross reprised his Chipmunks role in the film's two sequels, Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel and Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked, but not Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Road Chip.

Cross has been critical of several pop music acts in his standup comedy, notably Creed and its lead singer, Scott Stapp. On his 2004 album It's Not Funny, Cross referred to Creed as "the third-worst band in history”, and maligned the group's pop sensibilities for being too ubiquitous, suggesting that Stapp hung around "10th grade girls' locker rooms" to find inspiration for his song lyrics.[62] Cross then relates an anecdote about Stapp being a last-minute replacement for another celebrity at a taping of Celebrity Poker Showdown in 2003. Cross became concerned that a confrontation would take place since he had "said the most awful shit about that guy [Stapp] on stage and in print."[63] Cross said that as the taping was preparing to commence, he approached Stapp and extended his hand, introducing himself, and that Stapp shook his hand and sarcastically intoned, "Thanks for the words”, to which Cross replied, "Well, you know..."[64]