Versatile actor who plays the dimwitted Harry Dunne in the 1994 comedy Dumb and Dumber and stars as Will McAvoy on the HBO series The Newsroom, which earned him an Emmy Award for Best Actor in 2013. He has also earned praise for his roles in such films as Terms of Endearment, The Squid and the Whale, and Pleasantville. In 2009, he was nominated for a Tony Award for his role in the 2009 play God of Carnage.
He dropped out of Central Michigan University to pursue a film career. He then played a role in the 1979 Second Stage Theatre production The Shortchanged Review.
In 1991, he founded a nonprofit company called The Purple Rose Theatre Company in Michigan. The company trains in acting and writing and holds performances at The Purple Rose Theatre in Chelsea, Michigan.
He married his high school sweetheart on Friday the 13th, 1979. They had three children named Benjamin, Lucas, and Nellie.
He and Jim Carey formed a popular duo in the 1994 comedy Dumb and Dumber and they reunited to film a sequel, Dumb and Dumber To, in 2014.
