David Cross

Early life

Cross was born in Roswell, Georgia, to Jewish parents, Barry and Susi Cross. His father is an immigrant from Leeds, England.

Six months after his birth, Cross's family moved to Florida. After additional moves to New York and Connecticut, the family re-settled in Roswell, where Cross remained for nearly a decade. He is the oldest of three children and has two younger sisters.

The family had little money. Cross recalled that they were evicted from their home and that he spent some time living in motels and at friends' homes in his youth. Cross's father left the family when Cross was 10 years old; the two have not spoken since Cross was 19, though they both primarily resided in New York City until Cross sold his home there in 2011.

Career

Stand-up

Cross began performing stand-up comedy around the age of 17. 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 a semester, but during his time there, Cross joined This is Pathetic, a college sketch group, where he met John Ennis. Aspiring toward an acting career, the two took a road trip to Los Angeles in the summer of 1985, 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".

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.

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"), where Cross appears as OJ's valet. Cross also starred in the Joe Frank program "Jam", produced in 1999, and worked with Frank on radio shows for KCRW's Unfictional: "A Conversation" (2013) and "Downfall" (2015).

Cross's stand-up comedy blends political commentary and satire. 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 No. 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....

Television, film and voice roles

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 with Bob and David (Mr. Show) in 1995. Cross won an Emmy for his work on The Ben Stiller Show in 1993. 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. 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. Cross developed an animated series for Comedy Central called Freak Show, which co-starred H. Jon Benjamin and was cancelled due to low ratings. 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".

In 2004, Cross provided voices for a Marine in Halo 2 and a store clerk named "Zero" in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. 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).

Influences

Cross has said his comedic influences include Bill Hicks, Andy Kaufman, Monty Python's Flying Circus, Lou Costello, Steven Wright, Richard Pryor, and Lenny Bruce.

Controversies

In October 2005, Cross was sued by Nashville club manager Thomas Weber, who accused Cross of supposedly taping him without permission for Shut Up You Fucking Baby and Let America Laugh in apparent violation of Weber's privacy rights. In April 2006, the case against Cross was dismissed and the case proceeded with Warner Music, Subpop Records, WEA Corporation, and the Alternative Distribution Alliance. In October 2017, Cross apologized to actor-comedian Lo Mutuc, at the time known by the name Charlyne Yi, after they reported that he had made racially insensitive comments toward them in the mid-2000s and later. He later theorized that he was doing an impression of a Southern redneck. Five days later, he tweeted, "Charlyne I'm sorry that I hurt you and that this whole thing played out as it did."

In August 2018, members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints protested against a photo which Cross tweeted of himself wearing "Mormon religious undergarments." The tweet was meant to promote his show at the University of Utah's Kingsbury Hall in Salt Lake City, Utah. The university president issued a statement condemning apparent "bigotry and religious intolerance" and calling the imagery "deeply offensive." Citing the First Amendment, the university said it would not "censor the content of those coming to campus."

Criticisms and feuds

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 supposedly "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. Cross responded with An Open Letter to Larry the Cable Guy posted on his website. 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 poked fun at Larry's comedy in Freak Show with a character called "Danny the Plumber Guy."

Cross 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." Lipton, who thought Cross's impression of him was not good-natured, later appeared alongside Cross in Arrested Development, in the recurring role of Prison Warden Stefan Gentles. During filming, Cross was impressed with Lipton's acting and comedic ability, and the two became good friends. 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.

Despite critical praise for his performance, David Cross received backlash from fans for his role in Alvin and the Chipmunks. In December 2007, comedian Patton Oswalt joked in a MySpace blog post that he and fellow comedian Brian Posehn were offered the role of Ian but rejected it, adding, "We both threw the script across the room in disgust. David Cross caught it." Responding to critics of his decision to appear in the film, Cross said he had rejected the role initially but reconsidered. Cross reprised his role as Ian Hawke in Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel (2009) and Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked (2011). Cross described Chipwrecked as "literally without question, the most unpleasant experience I've ever had in my professional life." He accused an unidentified female producer of antisemitism and mistreating him. He was also "forced at legal gunpoint" to spend a week shooting footage on a Carnival Cruise, which Cross argued was unnecessary since he had no lines and was unrecognizable in a pelican suit. The comments cost Cross a $150,000 bonus for violating his non-disparagement clause by discussing his grievances publicly.

Personal life

Cross married Amber Tamblyn in 2012. On February 21, 2017, Tamblyn announced that she and Cross had a daughter.

Cross was raised Jewish, but became an atheist in adulthood, and no longer practices Judaism.

On September 26, 2013, Kickstarter co-founder Yancey Strickler revealed that Cross was the first investor in the crowdfunding platform. Strickler included Cross among the "friends and family" who first financed Kickstarter in 2006.

Cross is a fan of and friends with the musical group Beastie Boys. He is sampled on the beginning of the group's single "Ch-Check It Out" from their album To the 5 Boroughs. One of the group's members, Mike D, did not believe that this was Cross's voice in the sample, and Cross says he had to perform the voice in front of Diamond to prove it was actually him. Cross revealed this while hosting the Beastie Boys SiriusXM channel. Cross also appeared in the group's music video for "Make Some Noise" which was nominated for Video of The Year at the 2011 MTV Video Music Awards. In the Spike Jonze directed documentary Beastie Boys Story in 2020, Cross has a post-credit scene in which he interrupts the group's theater performance to poke fun at the commercial failure of their second album, Paul's Boutique.

Cross has dual British and American citizenship.

Views

Cross has described his political philosophy as "definitely more socialist Democrat than centrist politician". In an interview in 2016, Cross praised Senator Bernie Sanders and said he admired Sanders "way before he ran for President". In 2021, Cross featured on a video produced by the Gravel Institute, a progressive think tank.

In October 2023, Cross signed the Artists4Ceasefire open letter calling for a permanent ceasefire in the Gaza War. In March 2025, during an interview with Katie Halper, Cross referred to the state of Israel as "corrupt" and an "apartheid state."

Cross condemned the Riyadh Comedy Festival and several of the comedians performing, due to the human rights record in Saudi Arabia. He referred to the government of Saudi Arabia as "literally, the most oppressive regime on Earth". He stated that the comedians who signed on are "performing for blood money", and that the comedians who in their acts complain about cancel culture and a lack of freedom of speech were hypocritical. Cross concluded the open letter by encouraging people to donate to the Human Rights Foundation.

Discography