Dane Cook

He is one of the first comedians to use a personal webpage and Myspace to build a large fan base, and in 2006 was described as "alarmingly popular". Cook starred in numerous films such as Employee of the Month (2006), Good Luck Chuck (2007), and My Best Friend's Girl (2008). He also acted in Mystery Men (1999), Waiting.. (2005), Dan in Real Life (2007), Mr. Brooks (2007) and provided the lead voice role in the 2013 animated sports comedy film Planes, and its 2014 sequel Planes: Fire & Rescue as Dusty Crophopper. He was the second comedian (after Andrew Dice Clay) to sell out Madison Square Garden's large arena space. In 2006, Retaliation became the highest-charting comedy album in 28 years and went platinum. He performed an HBO special in late 2006, Vicious Circle, a straight-to-DVD special titled Rough Around The Edges (which is included in the album of the same name), and a Comedy Central special in 2009 titled Isolated Incident.

• Born — 18 March 1972 • Birth Name — Dane Jeffrey Cook • Birthplace — Cambridge, Massachusetts, U.S. • Occupation — * Comedian • actor • Years Active — 1990–present • Website — danecook.com

Cook was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the second son of Donna Jean (née Ford; died 2006) and George F. Cook (died 2007). He has an older half-brother, Darryl, and five sisters. He grew up in a Catholic family of Irish descent. Cook has described himself as having been "pretty quiet, pretty introverted, shy" as a child, although he was a "wild child" at home. He overcame his shyness in his junior year of high school, when he began acting and doing stand-up comedy. After graduating from high school, he studied graphic design in college as a back-up plan, in case he did not achieve success in comedy. He now designs all of his merchandise, including the cover of his album, Harmful If Swallowed.

In 1990, Cook began performing stand-up in comedy clubs. On October 30, 1992, Cook and a group of local emerging improv/sketch comedians were scheduled to appear at the Boston Garden as part of local radio station WBCN's "Rock of Boston" music concert. Although they anticipated appearing earlier in the lineup, they were scheduled to perform between popular band Spin Doctors and the final headline act Phish, making them somewhat nervous but determined to do well. Moments after they took the stage however, the crowd, neither expecting nor appreciating a comedy act at this late stage in the evening's program and impatient for Phish to go on, expressed their displeasure by throwing their shoes at the stage. Robert Kelly, also on stage as a member of the comedy group, pleaded with the audience to settle down and let them perform their act; the crowd instead escalated to throwing lighters. Sustaining minor injuries, Cook and the comedy group left the stage. Cook described the incident – as well as how dejected he felt and his resulting determination to someday return to the Boston Garden and perform successfully someday – as part of a web series for The Tonight Show entitled "Worst I Ever Bombed".

In 1994, Cook moved to New York City and began performing. Two years later, he moved to Los Angeles, where he still lives today. His big break came in 1998 when he appeared on Comedy Central's Premium Blend. In 2000, Cook did a half-hour special on Comedy Central Presents. Since then his special has won the Comedy Central Stand-up showdown twice in a row.

In 2003, Cook released his first CD/DVD, Harmful If Swallowed. He signed a contract with Comedy Central Records. The album is certified platinum. He released his second CD/DVD in 2005, entitled Retaliation. This album went double platinum and made Cook the first comic in 27 years to have an album in the top 5 on the Billboard charts after Steve Martin's A Wild and Crazy Guy moved as high as number two in late 1978. He performed at the MTV Video Music Awards, and then afterwards he joined Snoop Dogg in presenting the award for Best New Artist. On April 15, 2005, Cook performed his first HBO Special entitled Vicious Circle. Vicious Circle was filmed "in the round" at the TD Garden. The same year, Cook shot two pilot episodes for his own sitcom, Cooked. The sitcom was not picked up and the two pilot episodes were later released on DVD as the Lost Pilot. That same year, he embarked on a 30-day, 20-show college tour called Tourgasm with his longtime friends Robert Kelly, Gary Gulman, and Jay Davis. The tour was filmed and was later made into a 9-episode documentary on HBO. On December 3, 2005, Cook hosted Saturday Night Live (SNL). He would then go on to host the premiere of season 32 of SNL a year later. The same year Cook launched his own company, Superfinger Entertainment, in order to produce his own albums and videos. In 2006, Cook headlined for Dave Attell's Insomniac Tour and hosted the 2006 Teen Choice Awards alongside Jessica Simpson. The following year he won the award for Best Comedian. On November 12, 2007, Cook became the second comic to sell out Madison Square Garden's large arena space after Andrew Dice Clay accomplished this feat in 1990. He did two sold-out shows in one night. The show was filmed and would later be put onto a DVD to be sold on Cook's third comedy album. Cook won the Big Entertainer Award at the VH1 Big in '06 Awards, and Rolling Stone magazine's Hot Comic of the Year. The following day, November 13, 2007, he released his third CD/DVD entitled Rough Around The Edges, which was filmed live at Madison Square Garden in New York City. During that time, he embarked on his first arena tour. • Illustration — Cook at Comic Con 2007 promoting Good Luck Chuck On April 10, 2007, Cook broke the Laugh Factory's endurance record (previously held by Richard Pryor) by performing on stage for three hours and 50 minutes. Dave Chappelle would break the record five days later by performing for six hours and seven minutes. Chappelle beat that record on December 3, 2007, by performing for six hours and twelve minutes. On January 1, 2008, Cook broke Chappelle's record, by performing on stage for seven hours. From May 23, 2008, to May 25, 2008, Cook reunited with Robert Kelly and Al Del Bene for three shows at The Coliseum in Caesars Palace. From May 29-June 4, 2008, the trio went to Iraq to perform for the troops. Del Bene was the Emcee, Kelly was the feature, and Cook was the headliner. He finished his fourth album, Isolated Incident; a performance which aired on Comedy Central on May 17, 2009, with the release of the record following two days later. He kicked off that tour at the Mohegan Sun in Uncasville, Connecticut, on April 25, 2009. This album was the last as part of Cook's four-record deal with Comedy Central Records. The new album was performed at Laugh Factory in Hollywood, which is considered to be Cook's home base, where he goes to work on new material. He released the DVD version of Isolated Incident in November 2009.

In 2012, Cook caused a minor controversy when a joke he made in a comedy club about the 2012 Aurora, Colorado, shooting was recorded and made the headlines: So I heard that the guy came into the theater about 25 minutes into the movie. And I don't know if you've seen the movie, but the movie is pretty much a piece of crap… Yeah, spoiler alert. And I know that if none of that would have happened, I'm pretty sure that somebody in that theater, about 25 minutes in, realizing it was a piece of crap, probably was like, "Ugh fucking shoot me". He later apologized on Twitter: "I am devastated by the recent tragedy in Colorado & did not mean to make light of what happened. I made a bad judgment call with my material last night & regret making a joke at such a sensitive time. My heart goes out to all of the families & friends of the victims." In 2014, Showtime aired Cook's Troublemaker special. In September 2016 Cook headlined with Sebastian Maniscalco at the Oddball Comedy Festival in Dallas, Texas, and the Oddball Comedy & Curiosity Festival in Irvine, California. He also toured Canada in November at the annual Montreal "Just For Laughs" comedy festival. In May 2018 he performed at Hard Rock Rocksino in Northfield Park, Ohio. At the end of 2018 Cook announced the "Tell It Like It is" Tour, his first full-scale stand-up tour since "Under Oath" in 2013. The tour began in February 2019 in Huntington, New York and concluded in November in Los Angeles, California.

• Illustration — Cook at a USO tour in 2008 On November 18, 2010, it was announced that both Cook and Josh Hamilton would be starring in Neil LaBute's 2011 Broadway production of Fat Pig; however, before the show began it was postponed for financial reasons. In 2012, he played Franz Liebkind in the Hollywood Bowl production of The Producers.

His first TV role was playing a quarterback named Kyle on the 1995 ABC comedy Maybe This Time, which starred Marie Osmond, Betty White and Ashley Johnson. In October 2005, during an interview with Jay Leno on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, actress Charlize Theron leaned forward and allowed Cook to kiss her backside. In May 2012, it was announced that Cook would be starring in the new NBC comedy Next Caller. On October 12, 2012, the show was canceled prior to its airing after filming four out of six episodes.

Cook's style is principally "long-form storytelling" and "multipurpose phrases". Cook says his onstage persona is a combination of the personalities of his mother, Donna, and his father, George. "My mother is like a Looney Tunes cartoon. She's wiggly... She has the ability to tongue in cheek a lot, and do it in a way where she's being physical. My dad is the polar opposite. He always had a little 'what the fuck' in his voice. Even if he knew nothing about what he was talking about, he could sell it. So I looked at these two extremely funny people and created a style of comedy from absorbing their actions." He explains:

Comedian Joe Rogan claimed that Cook performed a bit on an episode of Premium Blend that Rogan had developed on I'm Gonna Be Dead Someday, and claimed to have performed the routine earlier in clubs with Cook present. In 2010, Rogan had Cook as a guest on his podcast, telling him that he was a "good dude" and that he was "...glad we put all that shit past and hung out...I think you are doing some awesome shit." Cook replied: "That means the world hearing that from you, Joe... You've got a lot of integrity and I've always had a lot of respect for you." There was also widespread Internet discussion regarding three bits from Cook's 2005 album Retaliation, and similar bits from comic Louis C.K.'s 2001 album Live in Houston. In 2011, Cook played himself in an episode of Louie, scripted by C.K., centering on a fictional encounter between the two comics during which they discuss the controversy. In an interview in 2012, Louis C.K. defended Cook, saying: "I don't think he stole from me knowingly... I think he sort of got some of my jokes in his head and got sloppy. He's a good guy and not capable of maleficence."

• Illustration — Cook at Madison Square Garden in 2008 • Tourgasm 2005 (w/ Robert Kelly, Gary Gulman, Jay Davis) • Dave Attell's Insomniac Tour 2006 (w/ Dave Attell, Greg Giraldo and Sean Rouse) • Rough Around The Edges Tour 2007 • Globo Thermo Tour 2008 (w/ Robert Kelly and Al Del Bene) • Isolated Incident 2009 • Under Oath 2013 • Tell It Like It Is Tour 2019

Cook's half-brother, Darryl McCauley, served as his business manager until 2008, when Cook discovered that McCauley and his wife Erika had embezzled at least $12 million from him. They were charged with embezzlement and larceny in 2010, and pleaded guilty. Darryl was sentenced to six years in prison and 16 years of probation, and Erika was sentenced to three years in prison and 13 years of probation. Both were ordered to pay restitution to Cook. Cook says he has never had a drink of alcohol or done drugs. In 2017, Cook began dating fitness instructor Kelsi Taylor, who is 26 years his junior. They became engaged on July 13, 2022. The couple married on September 23, 2023, in an intimate ceremony at a private estate in O'ahu, Hawaii.

Albums by Dane Cook • Title — Details — Peak chart positions • US — US Heat — US Indie — US Comedy — CAN • Harmful If Swallowed — * Released: July 22, 2003 — 67 — 19 — 25 — 2 — — • Retaliation — * Released: July 26, 2005 — 4 — — — 1 — 1 — — • Vicious Circle — * Released: November 28, 2006 — — — — — — — — — — • Rough Around the Edges: Live from Madison Square Garden — * Released: November 13, 2007 — 11 — — — 3 — 1 — 20 • Isolated Incident — * Released: May 19, 2009 — 4 — — — 1 — 1 — 5 • I Did My Best: Greatest Hits Album — * Released: November 22, 2010 — 165 — — — 15 — 1 — 94 • "—" denotes the album didn't chart.

• "I'll Never Be You" (2006) • "Forward" (2007) • "Drunk Girl/Red Car" (2010) Cook co-wrote and performed the song "Ruthie Pigface Draper" for the Dan In Real Life film with Norbert Leo Butz. Cook provided guest vocals on the 2011 song In the Future by Steel Panther from their third studio album Balls Out.

Dane Cook filmography • Year — Title — Role — Notes • 1995–1996 — Maybe This Time — Kyle — 9 episodes • 1997 — Flypaper — Tim • Buddy — Fair Cop • 1999 — Spiral — David • Simon Sez — Nick Miranda • Mystery Men — The Waffler • 2000 — Comedy Central Presents — Himself — Stand-up comedy series Episode: June 28, 2000 • 1999–2001 — The Late Show — Himself — Episode: April 12, 1999 Episode: March 14, 2001 • 2002 — L.A.X. — Terrell Chasman • The Touch — Bob • 2002–2007 — Crank Yankers — Sav McCauley / Jack Larson / Foreign Guy — 4 episodes • 2003 — Stuck on You — Officer Fraioli • 8 Guys — Dane • Windy City Heat — Roman Polanski — Television film • 2004 — Mr. 3000 — Sausage Mascot — Voice • Torque — Neal Luff • Good Girls Don't... — Max — Episode: "Whatever Happened to Jane's Baby?" • 2005 — Waiting... — Floyd • London — George • Duck Dodgers — Van Chancy — Episode: "The Kids Are All Wrong/Win, Lose or Duck" • | 2006 — Employee of the Month — Zack Bradley • 2007 — Farce of the Penguins — Online Penguin — Voice • Mr. Brooks — Mr. Smith • Good Luck Chuck — Chuck/Charlie • Dan in Real Life — Mitch Burns • | 2008 — My Best Friend's Girl — Tank Turner • 2010, 2019 — Laugh Factory — Himself / Comedian — Episodes: "Dane Cook: Laugh Factory Birthday", "Flashback Fridays: Birthday Jokes" • 2011 — Answers to Nothing — Ryan • Hawaii Five-0 — Matt Williams — Episode: "Loa Aloha" • Louie — Himself — Episode: "Oh Louie/Tickets" • Detention — Principal Karl Verge • | 2012 — Guns, Girls and Gambling — Sheriff Hutchins • 2012–2013 — Next Caller — Cam — 5 episodes • | 2013 — Planes — Dusty Crophopper — Voice • 2014 — Planes: Fire & Rescue • Comedy Bang! Bang! — Himself — Episode: "Dane Cook Wears a Black Blazer & Tailored Pants" • 2015 — 400 Days — Cole Dvorak — Also executive producer • 2017 — American Gods — Robbie • 2018 — Robot Chicken — Harriet's Boss / Braveheart Mouse / Dave Seville — Voice Episode: "3 2 1 2 333, 222, 3...66?" • 2018 — The American Meme — Himself — Documentary film • 2019 — American Typecast — Alex — Also producer, writer and director • 2019 — American Exit — Charlie