Mark Ruffalo

Mark Ruffalo
Mark Alan Ruffalo is an American actor, director, humanitarian, social activist, and film producer. He made his screen debut in an episode of CBS Summer Playhouse, followed by minor film roles. He was part of the original cast of This Is Our Youth, for which he was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award. Following was his roles in 13 Going on 30, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Zodiac, and What Doesn't Kill You. In 2010, he starred in the...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionMovie Actor
Date of Birth22 November 1967
CityKenosha, WI
CountryUnited States of America
I have a very dear family and very dear friends. They're my rock. These are people who knew me from the beginning, you know, as a loser in a 1972 Dodge Dart with the bumper literally duct-taped to the body.
I did grow up in Kenosha, Wisconsin, around a lot of my mom's family. I had a lot of cousins and aunts and uncles around me, and my sisters and my brother. Probably the most formative part of it was that we grew up on the edge of a forest. It wasn't a big forest, but it was enough. When you're a kid, it feels gigantic.
You really can have your dreams and at the same time have a family. But it has to be a really deliberate practice.
I was an introverted kid; I liked my time alone. And the rest of my family is pretty extroverted, so I felt like a bit of an oddball. They're very gregarious and charming and charismatic people. I always felt like I was struggling as a young person. I think everyone was very surprised to hear that I wanted to be an actor.
I didn't like the distance between my family and myself that I was experiencing from having to work all the time.
I have two hammocks, one Mayan and one Guatemalan, both family size because I like to lie in them perpendicular. When I'm working on a character, I lie in them and daydream. They're the best tools for working that I have.
It was a bunch of young girls, ... They were standing in close proximity. I said, 'Hi. How are you?' One of them asked (he puts on a high girly voice), 'Are you Matt from 13 Going on 30 ?' They were nice and everything. But I usually like to be low-key and private.
I started out in Los Angeles doing plays and bartending. I did at least 30 plays that nobody saw before I got Ride With the Devil.
I've been having a lot of fun with the Hulk motion-capture stuff, actually. The only distinction that I hold is that I am the only actor to ever play Banner and the Hulk.
The sculptor Frosty Myers and I met when we were bidding against each other at an auction. He's an eccentric, a liberal with a collection of rifles, and his stuff is big art. We share a love of tractors. I'm trading him one for a piece of art.
I've been able to hide behind the character in Eternal Sunshine . People don't recognize me from Collateral . But this feels more exposed.
Sometimes, as an actor, you're so deeply immersed in a part that you lose control of it. If you're really lucky, a few times in your life it'll take you somewhere you never expected to go. It really blows the top off your understanding of your craft.
Sometimes I catch her looking at me a bit more amorously than usual. It certainly is the type of thing that doesn't hurt a love life. She keeps me in check when 13-year-old girls come running up to me.
You get sick and s- goes wrong and you're bonked - you don't know where you're going to end up, how it's gonna turn out, ... That sort of thing changes you, the way you live your life. It teaches you to take less and less for granted.