Just who is Jonah Hill? – The curious rise of the Oscar-nominated actor
He was the Brillo-headed, big-toothed scene-stealer-among-scene-stealers in Martin Scorsese’s The Wolf of Wall Street (pictured) this winter; he’s been nominated for two Oscars (one for Wolf, the other for his role as the awkward, eggheaded statistics analyst in 2011’s Moneyball); he acts; he produces; and he’s only 30.
Next year he’ll reteam with his Wolf star Leonardo DiCaprio when he portrays Atlanta Olympics security guard Richard Jewell, the man who was christened a hero for finding the bomb at the 1996 games and initiating the evacuation that saved so many lives, then torn to shreds as the investigation’s top suspect, all before dying prior to his name being cleared of the crime. It’s the kind of true-life role the Academy loves to reward. And they just might.
Now, he doesn’t look like a celebrity, or even particularly act like one—unless you believe half of his farcical self-portrayal in the tongue-crudely-in-cheek ensemble comedy This is the End—and yet, he’s incredibly well-respected in Hollywood and probably get’s “Yo, Superbad!” yelled at him every day when all he wants to do is pick up his Starbucks.
So, who exactly is Jonah Hill?
Here are five facts you probably didn’t know about the actor, and clips from five of his best roles so far:
1. Hill’s father was a tour accountant for Guns’n’Roses—because apparently, that’s a thing.
2. The Santa Monica native received his first film role, a bit part in David O. Russell’s quirky 2004 comedy I Heart Huckabees, because he was friends with Dustin Hoffman’s children, and the veteran actor and Huckabees star secured him an audition for the movie.
3. In 2006, Hill appeared in an episode of the Oxygen network’s short-lived series Campus Ladies with Justin Long. The actors became fast friends and roommates, and that same year both starred in the college comedy Accepted. Two years later they worked together again in Strange Wilderness.
4. Producers Judd Apatow and Seth Rogen originally thought the then-23-year-old Hill looked too old to play a high school senior in Superbad, but changed their minds after the head of Sony said he loved Hill’s audition tape.
5. Though he hasn’t had a screenplay make it to the big screen, Hill has always wanted to be a writer. He co-wrote the treatment for 21 Jump Street, in which he also starred, and it’s been rumored that he and his Funny People co-star Jason Schwartzman have written a film together, though it has yet to see the light of day.
The five most Jonah Hill moments:
1. Jonah just wants some boots.
2. Jonah is a hot dog.
3. Jonah embraces the bro-mance.
4. Jonah talks with his fist.
5. Jonah is here to make money.
(OK, this is several scenes, but, really, there’s no boiling his massive character from Wolf of Wall Street into one clip.)
Hill can be seen in theaters now starring in the New Orleans-filmed 22 Jump Street, and will next portray a journalist opposite James Franco in the FBI drama True Story.
