Ben Stiller (born November 30, 1965) is an American actor, comedian, and filmmaker. He is the son of the comedians and actors Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara. Stiller was a member of a group of comedic actors colloquially known as the Frat Pack. His films have grossed more than $2.6 billion in Canada and the United States, with an average of $79 million per film. Throughout his career, he has received various awards and honors, including an Emmy Award, a Directors Guild of America Award, a Britannia Award and a Teen Choice Award.
When he was approximately 15, Stiller obtained a small part with one line on the television soap opera Guiding Light, although in an interview he characterized his performance as poor. He was later cast in a role in the 1986 Broadway revival of John Guare’s The House of Blue Leaves, alongside John Mahoney; the production would garner four Tony Awards.
During its run, Stiller produced a satirical mockumentary whose principal was fellow actor Mahoney. Stiller’s comedic work was well received by the cast and crew of the play, and he followed up with a 10-minute short titled The Hustler of Money, a parody of the Martin Scorsese film The Color of Money. The film featured him in a send-up of Tom Cruise’s character and Mahoney in the Paul Newman role, only this time as a bowling hustler instead of a pool shark. The short got the attention of Saturday Night Live, which aired it in 1987 and two years later offered Stiller a spot as a writer. In the meantime, he had a bit role in Steven Spielberg’s Empire of the Sun.
In 1989 Stiller wrote and appeared on Saturday Night Live as a featured performer. However, since the show did not want him to make more short films, he left after four episodes. He then put together Elvis Stories, a short film about a fictitious tabloid focused on recent sightings of Elvis Presley. The film was considered a success, and led him to develop the short film Going Back to Brooklyn for MTV; it was a music video starring comedian Colin Quinn that parodied LL Cool J’s recent hit “Going Back to Cali.”
In the early 1990s, Stiller had minor roles in films such as Stella and Highway to Hell as well as a cameo in The Nutt House. In 1992, Stiller was approached to direct Reality Bites, based on a script by Helen Childress. Stiller devoted the next year and a half to rewriting the script with Childress, fundraising, and recruiting cast members for the film. It was eventually released in early 1994, directed by Stiller and featuring him as a co-star. The film was produced by Danny DeVito. Reality Bites debuted as the fifth highest-grossing film over the President Day opening weekend and received mixed reviews.
Stiller joined his parents in the family film Heavyweights (1995), in which he played two roles. Following Heavyweights, he had a brief uncredited role in Adam Sandler’s Happy Gilmore (1996) where he played Hal L., the sadistic orderly running the nursing home. Next, he had lead roles in If Lucy Fell and Flirting with Disaster, before tackling his next directorial effort with The Cable Guy, which starred Jim Carrey. Stiller once again was featured in his own film, as twins. The film received mixed reviews, but was noted for paying the highest salary for an actor up to that point, as Carrey received $20 million for his work in the film. The film also connected Stiller with future Frat Pack members Jack Black and Owen Wilson.
Also in 1996, MTV invited Stiller to host the VH1 Fashion Awards. Along with SNL writer Drake Sather, Stiller developed a short film for the awards about a male model known as Derek Zoolander. It was so well received that he developed another short film about the character for the 1997 VH1 Fashion Awards and finally remade the skit into a film.
Here’s a selection of 14 photos of a young Ben Stiller in the late 1980s and 1990s:
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