Biography for
Mark Ruffalo More at IMDbPro »

Date of Birth

22 November 1967, Kenosha, Wisconsin, USA

Birth Name

Mark Alan Ruffalo

Height

5' 9" (1.75 m)

Mini Biography

A native of Wisconsin, Mark Ruffalo moved with his family to Virginia Beach, Virginia where he lived out most of his teenage years. Following high school, Mark moved with his family to San Diego and soon migrated north, eventually settling in Los Angeles. He took classes at the Stella Adler Conservatory and subsequently co-founded the Orpheus Theatre Company, an Equity-Waiver establishment where he did yeoman work. Practically performing in every capacity, he went from acting, writing, directing and producing to running the lights and building sets while building up his resume. Despite good stage reviews, Mark couldn't get arrested in film and TV, having to bartend for nearly nine years to make ends meet. Ready to give it all up, a chance meeting and resulting collaboration with playwright/screenwriter Kenneth Lonergan changed everything. Ruffalo won NY success in Lonergan's play "This Is Our Youth", which led to his winning the male lead in Lonergan's film You Can Count on Me (2000). His stunning, mesmerizing performance as Laura Linney's ne'er-do-well brother had Hollywood opening its eyes wide to this new serious talent. Some reviewers even found themselves comparing him to an early Marlon Brando. Despite this career-breaking success, Mark remains true to his stage roots and small theater company in L.A., occasionally directing and performing in-between taking on the big, lucrative film projects that are now offered. Although he is not yet a top marquee item, Mark has continued to impress with his range and versatility in both leads and character roles and remains consistently in demand. His more notable films of late have included XX/XY (2002), My Life Without Me (2003) and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004).

IMDb Mini Biography By: Gary Brumburgh / gr-home@pacbell.net

Spouse

Sunrise Coigney

(11 June 2000 - present) 3 children

Trade Mark

Frequently plays likeable everyman types

Trivia

He was set to appear in Signs (2002) but had to drop out when he was diagnosed with a brain tumor. His part in Signs (2002) went to Joaquin Phoenix. The brain tumor Mark was diagnosed with was found to be benign. Following brain surgery, he has fully recovered after suffering from a partial facial paralysis.

Father was a construction painter and mother a hairstylist. Both are Italian-Americans and later divorced. His three siblings -- Scott, Tania and Nicole -- are all hairdressers.

Studied at the Stella Adler Conservatory in Los Angeles.

Children: son Keen (b. June 2001) and daughters Bella Noche (b. May 2005) and Odette (b. October 20, 2007).

Bartended for nearly a decade while trying to break in to show business.

In an interview with Moviemaker magazine, he claims to have made 800 auditions in his lifetime before making it big.

Attended First Colonial High School in Virginia Beach, Virginia.

He is one of four children.

Benicio Del Toro was a fellow student at the Stella Adler drama school in Los Angeles.

He is an Italian-American.

Was in attendance at Chris Penn's funeral.

Was a close friend of Heath Ledger. He is also friends with 'Gael Garcia Bernal'.

He was supposed to play the part of "Perry Smith" in Infamous (2006) but had other engagements and so recommended Daniel Craig, who then went on to get the job.

His brother, Scott Ruffalo, died December 8, 2008 after being found outside his Beverly Hills home after a gunshot wound to the head. He was a 39-year-old hairdresser and was married to Luzelena. His body was cremated.

While appearing in the drama "Awake and Sing!", he was nominated for the 2006 Tony Award (New York City) for Supporting or Features Actor in a Drama.

Sold his three-bedroom, 2,957-square-foot house in Los Angeles' Hollywood Hills for $1,650,000. He had bought the property in 2004 for the same price in which he later sold it for. [2009]

Is a vegetarian.

Sold his L.A. home in 2009 and moved his family to Callicoon, New York.

Is of Italian and French Canadian descent.

He was diagnosed with a benign brain tumor (more specifically, an acoustic neuroma) in 2002; he subsequently had it removed and is in good health.

Personal Quotes

With indies, all they have is their script and it's very important to them. The characters are better drawn, the stories more precise and the experience greater than with studio films where sometimes they fill in the script as they're shooting.

For some reason, my whole life has been, 'You can't do this, you can't do that.' The other day I was watching these kids crossing the road, and they have these crossing guards, kids who help other kids across the road. They would never let me be a crossing guard when I was a little kid . It would come up, I'd always raise my hand, I would never get picked . They thought I was too wild, but I knew I was responsible enough, if I was given that task.

The true value of somebody in this town [Hollywood] is very hard to determine. It's all smoke and mirrors.

The whole experience of getting close to mortality changed my perspective on work. I wasn't enjoying acting before: I felt like I wasn't in charge of my career. I wasn't doing things that made me feel good. I was really bitter, I thought I deserved more, and I wasn't grateful for all the great shit that had happened to me. If you're not grateful, then it's very easy to be an asshole. After the brain tumor happened, I realized I love acting, I've always loved it, I may never get a chance to do it again.

Certainly, it's very easy to fall in love with cash. If you're going to make all your decisions based on cash, you're going to have a pretty naffy career.

"I don't like this idea of Method. I come from that school, but what I was taught was that it's your imagination. You do your homework, and you use your imagination. People use the Method as a shield; it shields them from being vulnerable. I hear all these young actors who are like, 'I'm Method, I'm gonna go live in the house, you know, I totally get it, I've done it, I've been there', but one thing I know is it kills spontaneity. They'll still give great performances, but they're not playing with the other actors - it's all about them. And spontaneity and vulnerability are gold on screen and on stage - they are the fucking magic. When Brando reaches down and picks up that glove and puts it on his hand, that is magic. You can't plan that." (He is referring to a scene in On The Waterfront: Eva Saint Marie accidentally dropped a glove on set and, rather than wait for another take, Brando picked it up and put it on, without missing a line.)

I want to do a western. Nobody does westerns anymore.

I love acting with kids, cause they're great acting partners. They're totally present. Even when they're acting, they're still available and you can crack them up or something weird will happen and they'll go with it. You can throw them little curve-balls and they'll go with it. I always like having kid energy around. I think it's good for a movie, even when you're doing dramatic stuff.

[on navigating his career] - I try to do the things that speak to me in one way or another, and sometimes I'm even drastic. I like extremes. I like to change things up and keep from getting complacent or stale. I moved away from L.A. [to upstate New York] because it was feeling empty and it didn't feel like Los Angeles was a fertile place for me as an artist anymore. I didn't like the distance between my family and myself that I was experiencing from having to work all the time. I let my heart sort of guide me on that, and I turned out okay. It was a bit of a gamble, but it's turned out pretty good. But mostly it's just trying to keep it fresh and new and exciting for me and hopefully for everyone else.

[on favorite performances that he's given or films that he's done] - Every five years or so, there's some great thing that I'm really proud of, an experience that I'm really proud of. I stopped long ago putting too much emphasis on the results of how a film was going to be reviewed or what kind of money it makes. Those are important things, but as far as to my satisfaction, I've really focused on the experiences. The Kids Are All Right is a special one; My Life Without Me; In the Cut. What Doesn't Kill You is a really great movie that was little seen, but I think is one of my personal favorites. You Can Count On Me, of course, and probably Zodiac. Those are my top picks, as far as things that I've done. Another one, We Don't Live Here Anymore. Not the most beloved of movies, or widely known, but they're the ones I've had a good time making.

(2011, on moving out of L.A.) I'd had it with L.A., and I'd really had it with the business side of acting, the machinery of it all. You're an artist, but then all of a sudden you're a product at the same time, and there's this company that's sprung up around you. I got depressed. I was losing my love for it. So I said, 'I'm done.' I fired everybody and moved my family out here (to Callicoon, New York). I had to make a radical move.

(2011, on his early struggling actor days) It was brutal. The years are stripping away, but when you're talking to anyone from home, you're saying something like, 'Well, I'm just working on my craft right now,' when the truth is that I can't get a fucking job because no one will hire me. It was humiliating.