Andy Samberg (born David A. J. Samberg;[1] August 18, 1978)[2] is an American actor, comedian, musician, writer and producer. He is a member of the comedy music group the Lonely Island, along with childhood friends Akiva Schaffer and Jorma Taccone. Samberg was also a cast member and writer for the NBCsketch comedy series Saturday Night Live from 2005 to 2012, where he and his fellow group members are credited with popularizing the SNL Digital Shorts.[3]
David A. J. Samberg was born in Berkeley, California on August 18, 1978.[2] His mother, Marjorie "Margi" (née Marrow), is a retired teacher, who taught at John Muir Elementary School, and his father, Joe Samberg, is a photographer.[5] He has two sisters, Johanna and Darrow.[6] His family is Jewish, and Samberg described his upbringing as "I wouldn’t say we’re super-religious, but we’re very much in touch with the cultural aspect of it."[7] Samberg never had a bar mitzvah.[8] He attended Chabot Elementary School[9] with his future Brooklyn Nine-Nine co-star Chelsea Peretti.[10] At age 5, he told his parents that he wanted to change his name to Andy.[11][12]
Samberg majored in experimental film. He became an online star and made his own comedy videos with his friends Akiva Schaffer and Jorma Taccone.[21] When YouTube was created in 2005, the streaming of their videos became much more widespread. Samberg became a featured player on Saturday Night Live in part because of the work he had done on his sketch comedy website TheLonelyIsland.com, which helped him land an agent and eventually get hired at Saturday Night Live.[22] Prior to joining its cast, Samberg was (and remains) a member of the comedy troupe the Lonely Island, along with Taccone and Schaffer. The trio began writing for Saturday Night Live in 2005 and released their debut album Incredibad in 2009. Samberg appeared in numerous theatrical films, commercials, music videos, and hosted special events, including the 2009 MTV Movie Awards.
In September 2005, Samberg joined Saturday Night Live as a featured player and writer. Though his live sketch roles were limited in his first year, he appeared in many prerecorded sketches including commercial parodies and various other filmed segments. On December 17, 2005, he co-starred with castmate Chris Parnell in the Digital Short show "Lazy Sunday", a hip hop song about a quest to see the film The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. The short became an Internet phenomenon and garnered Samberg significant media and public attention. Acclaim continued, especially for "Dick in a Box", a duet with Justin Timberlake that won a Creative Arts Emmy for Outstanding Original Music and Lyrics.[3] The video for his comedy troupe's collaboration with T-Pain, "I'm on a Boat", had over 56 million views on YouTube, after debuting on February 7, 2009. The song was nominated for a Grammy Award. Another digital short, "Motherlover", also featuring Timberlake, was released on May 10, 2009, to commemorate Mother's Day. Outside of his prerecorded segments, he participated in recurring live segments, such as his Blizzard Man sketch.[31] On June 1, 2012, Samberg's spokesperson announced that Samberg had left the show.[32][33] He returned to the show to host the Season 39 finale in 2014[34] and to host the 40th anniversary special's Digital Short. He later returned in Season 50 to portray Doug Emhoff in the run up to the 2024 election, as well as providing some additional Digital Shorts.
Other pursuits
In November 2023, the first issue of Holy Roller, a comic written by Samberg, Rick Remender, Joe Trohman and illustrated by Roland Boschi, was released and published by Image Comics. It is about a pro bowler who is forced to quit his dream job and return to his hometown, which he soon discovers has been overrun by Neo-Nazis, leading him to become a trick bowling ball-wielding Jewish superhero.[35]
Samberg co-hosts The Lonely Island and Seth Meyers Podcast alongside Schaffer, Taccone and Seth Meyers, which discusses the Lonely Island's SNL Digital Shorts.[36]
Personal life
Samberg is married to musician Joanna Newsom. He once described himself as a "superfan", and they met at one of her concerts.[37][38] After five years of dating, Samberg proposed to her in February 2013, and they married on September 21, 2013, in Big Sur, California,[39][40][41] with Saturday Night Live co-star Seth Meyers serving as Samberg's groomsman.[42]
In March 2014, Samberg and Newsom purchased the Moorcrest estate in the Beachwood Canyon area of Los Angeles, California,[43] which was associated with various historical figures: in the 1920s, it was owned by the parents of actress Mary Astor; and, prior to that Charlie Chaplin rented it. The couple also owns a home in Manhattan's West Village.[44] They announced the birth of their daughter on August 8, 2017.[45] The birth of their second child, a boy,[46] was announced by the Lonely Island's Jorma Taccone in February 2023.[47]
^Miller, James Andrew; Shales, Tom (2014). Live From New York: The Complete, Uncensored History of Saturday Night Live as Told by Its Stars, Writers, and Guests. New York: Little, Brown and Company. p. 2026. ISBN978-0-316-29507-9.
^ abcdefghijklmnop"Andy Samberg (visual voices guide)". Behind The Voice Actors. Retrieved May 7, 2024. A green check mark indicates that a role has been confirmed using a screenshot (or collage of screenshots) of a title's list of voice actors and their respective characters found in its credits or other reliable sources of information.
