Danny DeVito
Diminutive actor Danny DeVito grew up in New Jersey, the son of a small-business owner father and a homemaker mother. He got his start in theatrical productions off-Broadway, including the first run of the stage adaptation of “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.” When the film made the transition to the big screen in 1975, produced by DeVito’s former New York roommate Michael Douglas, DeVito reprised his role as the mental patient Martini.
DeVito first gained widespread notoriety playing gruff cab company dispatcher Louie De Palma in the TV sitcom “Taxi.” The series ran from 1978 to 1983 and earned DeVito an Emmy and a Golden Globe. More film work followed, including an on-screen teaming with Douglas and Kathleen Turner in the adventure film “Romancing the Stone” (1984) and its sequel, “The Jewel of the Nile” (1985).
In 1987, DeVito began directing feature films. His first, the black comedy “Throw Momma From the Train,” in which he costarred with Billy Crystal, earned an Oscar nomination for actress Anne Ramsey. He followed that up with another re-teaming of his “Romancing” costars Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner in another black comedy, “The War of the Roses.”
DeVito has also become a film and TV producer, with notable credits that include Oscar winners “Pulp Fiction” and “Erin Brockovich” and the TV series “Reno 911.”
DeVito currently appears on the FX comedy series “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.”
In 1982, DeVito married actress Rhea Perlman. The couple has three children and lives in Beverly Hills and New Jersey.
DeVito is also politically active in the Democratic Party and lends his efforts to the nonprofit organization OneVoice, which attempts to find a peaceful end to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
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