| Brad Garrett  AKA Brad H. Gerstenfeld
Born: 14-Apr-1960
Birthplace: Woodland Hills, CA
Gender: Male
Religion: Jewish
Race or Ethnicity: White
Sexual orientation: Straight
Occupation: Actor Nationality: United States
Executive summary: Robert on Everybody Loves Raymond Brad Garrett won $100,000 on Star Search, a TV talent show in 1984. He was only 23, and had spent several years performing stand-up and improv comedy at Los Angeles area clubs after dropping out of college. Winning Star Search got him a shot on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show, where his comedy went over well enough to get Garrett offers from Liza Minnelli Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis, Jr., and the Beach Boys -- as a young comic, he was the opening act for all of them. But after his initial success, Garrett was banned from The Tonight Show for several years -- punishment for joking that Carson's saxophone player, Tommy Newsom, was smaller than Garrett's sperm.
In his first sitcom, First Impressions, Garrett was the star, but the premise was familiar and painfully unfunny -- he played a widowed father, with a nosy neighbor and wacky co-workers. The show ran for about a month in 1988, before being cancelled. Seven years later he landed his second sitcom, The Pursuit of Happiness, a legal comedy with Garrett in a sidekick role as an unscrupulous and fabulously gay lawyer. It lasted four weeks.
In his third sitcom and his most famous role, he played Ray Romano's goofy brother on Everybody Loves Raymond. The show was originally focused on Romano, his wife, and his bickering parents who lived across the street, with Garrett's character far in the background, but as the role grew larger and funnier, Garrett eventually took home three Emmys for Outstanding Supporting Actor. He refused to report for work at the beginning of the 2003 season until his pay was brought up to par with his castmates.
With his deep, distinctive voice, Garrett's first break as an actor came voicing cartoons. Among his dozens of voice credits, he spoke for the animated Hulk Hogan, played Trypticon, the Decepticons' merciless machine on Transformers, and as Wizard Whitebeard he peppered Waldo with riddles on Where's Waldo? After Everybody Loves Raymond made him a celebrity, he voiced Fatso the ghost in Casper, Dim the beetle in A Bug's Life and Bloat the blowfish in Finding Nemo.
He won Celebrity Poker Showdown in 2005, outbluffing Jason Alexander, Bonnie Hunt, Colin Quinn, and Malcolm-Jamal Warner. He also made his debut on Broadway that year, playing Murray the cop in The Odd Couple, and understudying Nathan Lane as Oscar Madison, opposite Matthew Broderick as Felix Unger. After leaving the play to film a small part for a movie, he was called back three weeks later, when Lane was bedridden with a flu, and played Oscar for three nights.
Garrett and his wife, one-time waitress Jill Diven, divorced in 2005, but maintain that they are still best friends, and are raising their children almost together. She keeps a bedroom in Garrett's house, he has a bedroom in her home, and she has contributed story ideas for his sitcom about the travails of marriage, 'Til Death with Joely Fisher. Father: Al Gerstenfeld (hearing aid salesman)
Mother: Barbara Gerstenfeld (housewife)
Brother: Jeff Gerstenfeld (b. 1952, music promoter)
Brother: Paul Gerstenfeld (b. 1955, salesman)
Wife: Jill Diven (cocktail waitress, dated 1998-99, m. 18-May-1999, sep. 2005, div. 2-Nov-2007, one son, one daughter)
Son: Maxwell Bradley Garrett (b. 14-Oct-1998 with Diven)
Daughter: Hope Garrett (b. Jan-2000 with Diven)
High School: El Camino Real High School, Woodland Hills, CA (1978)
University: UCLA (dropped out)
Emmy 2002 for Everybody Loves Raymond
Emmy 2003 for Everybody Loves Raymond
Risk Factors: Alcoholism
TELEVISION
'Til Death Eddie Stark (2006-10)
Everybody Loves Raymond Robert Barone (1996-2005)
The Pursuit of Happiness Alex Chosek (1995)
Transformers Trypticon (1984-87)
Celebrity Poker Showdown Contestant (2005)
FILMOGRAPHY AS ACTOR
Ralph Breaks the Internet (5-Nov-2018) [VOICE]
Gloria Bell (7-Sep-2018)
Christopher Robin (30-Jul-2018) [VOICE]
Finding Dory (8-Jun-2016) [VOICE]
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows (22-May-2016) [VOICE]
Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb (17-Dec-2014) [VOICE]
Planes: Fire & Rescue (15-Jul-2014) [VOICE]
Planes (9-Aug-2013) [VOICE]
The Incredible Burt Wonderstone (8-Mar-2013)
Not Fade Away (6-Oct-2012)
Delhi Safari (Jun-2012) [VOICE]
Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil (29-Apr-2011) · The Giant [VOICE]
Tangled (24-Nov-2010) · Hook Hand Thug [VOICE]
Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian (14-May-2009) · Easter Island Head [VOICE]
Unstable Fables: 3 Pigs & a Baby (Mar-2008) [VOICE]
Underdog (3-Aug-2007) [VOICE]
Ratatouille (28-Jun-2007) [VOICE]
Music and Lyrics (9-Feb-2007)
Night at the Museum (21-Dec-2006) [VOICE]
Tarzan II (14-Jun-2005) [VOICE]
The Pacifier (1-Mar-2005)
The Amateurs (6-Feb-2005) · Wally
Garfield (11-Jun-2004) · Luca [VOICE]
Finding Nemo (18-May-2003) · Bloat [VOICE]
Gleason (13-Oct-2002)
The Country Bears (21-Jul-2002) · Voice of Fred [VOICE]
Stuart Little 2 (14-Jul-2002)
Bleacher Bums (7-Apr-2002)
Club Land (Jan-2001)
An Extremely Goofy Movie (29-Feb-2000) [VOICE]
Sweet and Lowdown (4-Sep-1999)
A Bug's Life (14-Nov-1998) [VOICE]
The Batman/Superman Movie (18-Aug-1998) [VOICE]
Pocahontas II: Journey to a New World (4-Aug-1998) [VOICE]
Don King: Only in America (15-Nov-1997)
Suicide Kings (6-Sep-1997)
Spy Hard (24-May-1996) · Short Rancor Guard [VOICE]
Casper (26-May-1995) · Fatso [VOICE]
Porco Rosso (18-Jul-1992)
Jetsons: The Movie (6-Jul-1990) · Additional Voices [VOICE]
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