31 Interesting Facts About Jack Black You Probably Didn’t Know

For decades, Jack Black has successfully managed to get the audience of all ages to laugh together. Known, for his infectious energy, be it on the stage as lead singer or in front of the camera, he surely has everyone’s attention only on him. Here are some facts about the actor that will make you love him more:

1. He was born Thomas Jacob ‘Jack’ Black, on August 28, 1969, in Santa Monica, California, United States, to Thomas William Black, a satellite engineer and Judith Love Cohen, Aerospace Engineer and author. He has three older half-siblings through his mother, Neil Siegel, Howard Siegel, and Rachel Siegel.
2. As a son of Jewish mother and father who converted to Judaism, he was raised a Jewish, attended Hebrew School and he got his bar mitzvah in 1982.
3. At the age of 10 his parents separated and he went to live with his father in Culver City, Los Angeles, but maintained contact with his mother. He went over lot of turmoil and by the time he was 14, he was having a lot of troubles with cocaine.
4. He attended ‘Culvert City High School,’ before he was enrolled at the ‘Poseidon,’ a highly regarded private school for troubled youth. He completed his schooling from ‘Crossroads High School for Arts & Science,’ Santa Monica.
5. His interest in drama took him to the University of California, Los Angeles, to study theatre, but dropped out in his sophomore year to pursue a career in entertainment.
6. Black joined his fellow student at UCLA, Tim Robbins’ ‘Actors’ Gang,’ an amateur theatre troupe. It was here, that he was exposed to his initial professional acting experience in its stage production of ‘Carnage,’ at the 1989 Edinburgh Fringe Festival.
7. As a teenager in 1982, Black had had appeared in a commercial for Activision’s video game, ‘Pitfall,’ and subsequently in 1984, he appeared in an episode ‘Old Heroes Never Die,’ as Young Colt’s friend in the TV Series ‘The Fall Guy.’ Later in 1991, he also appeared as a teenage boy in the 1991 TV movie, ‘Our Shining Moment.’
8. A year later in 1992, he made his feature film debut with Robbins’ political mockumentary ‘Bob Roberts,’ as Roger Davis. Their collaboration would continue throughout the 1990s, with Black appearing in two more movies, ‘Dead Man Walking,’ in 1995 and ‘Cradle Will Rock,’ in 1999.
9. He went on to appear in number of TV series such as, ‘The Golden Palace,’ ‘Great Scott!,’ ‘Life Goes On,’ and, in the 1993 TV movie ‘Marked for Murder’ as a Car thief.
10. He was getting noticed by critics and was compared to the comedian John Belushi, with his short and stocky stature, wild-eyed look, devilish grin, and animated eyebrow.
11. Black spent the 90s playing varieties of roll either as support cast or in lead roles, in films like, ‘Airborne,’ ‘Demolition Man,’ as pilot in ‘Waterworld,’ ‘The Cable Guy,’ as best friend of Matthew Broderick’s character, and as a pill popping hospital orderly in ‘Jesus’ Son.’
12. Black played in one of his early roles as school bully, Slip, in 1994 fantasy film, ‘The Never Ending Story III.’ He signed on as a big fan of the story but was so unhappy with how the film turned out that he refused to discuss it in interviews for several years afterwards.
13. His other film with insignificant roll include, as Ian Lamont in ‘The Jackal,’ as Jerry in mystery thriller ‘Johnny Skidmarks,’ as Devlin in black comedy film ‘Bongwater,’ and as Fiedler in ‘Enemy of the State.’
14. Black became famous with his eye catching performance as Barry Judd, the record store clerk, in romantic comedy film ‘High Fidelity,’ directed by Stephen Frears. The scriptwriter John Cusack, wrote the script with Jack Black in mind for this role.
15. He soon gained leading roles starting with films such as ‘Shallow Hal,’ ‘Nacho Libre,’ ‘Tenacious D in The Pick of Destiny,’ ‘Year One,’ and ‘Gulliver’s Travels.’
16. His portrayal of Lemuel Gulliver, in the fantasy adventure comedy film ‘Gulliver’s Travels,’ was a box-office success with juvenile humor and special effect, but fails to inspire. However, he had the distinction of being nominated for both ‘Kids Choice Award,’ and ‘Golden Raspberry Award.’
17. Black received a ‘Golden Globe Award,’ nomination for Best Actor – Comedy or Musical and won the ‘MTV Movie Award for Best Comedic Performance,’ for the film ‘School of Rock,’ in 2004. The idea was conceived by Black’s neighbor, writer Mike White, when he often saw Black running around naked in his house with music blasting.
18. In 2005, he starred in one of his few dramatic roles as the obsessed filmmaker Carl Denham in Peter Jackson’s remake of 1933 ‘King Kong,’ co-starring with Naomi Watts. Black claimed he never wore any makeup at all in the entire movie, after hearing a false rumor that Clint Eastwood did the same in his movie.
19. The 2006 musical fantasy film ‘Tenacious D in The Pick of Destiny,’ is about comedy rock band ‘Tenacious D,’ written and produced by and starring Tenacious D members Black and Kyle Gass. The film performed poorly at the box-office and Black vowed never to write a script again.
20. Black’s work in the 2011 black comedy film ‘Bernie,’ was described as ‘one of the performance of the year.’ His performance as Bernie Tiede, who kills a rich woman was well received by all, and earned him his second Golden Globe for Best Actor nomination.
21. He guest-starred in the first episode of Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim show ‘Tom Goes to the Mayor,’ as well as in an American sitcom television series ‘Community.’ He also appeared alongside Cloris Leachman and Jessica Alba, in the post-Super Bowel episode of ‘The Office.’
22. In October 2001, in the celebrity edition of ‘Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?’ he participated along with Denis Leary and Jimmy Kimme, to take home the prize money of US$ 125,000.
23. Black is one of the notable personalities who has appeared number of time on the ‘untelevised TV network’ short film festival ‘Channel 101,’ with ‘Computerman,’ ‘Time Belt,’ ‘Laser Fart,’ ‘Exposure,’ and ‘Water and Power.’
24. In 1994, he and Kyle Gass, formed the band ‘Tenacious D,’ in Los Angeles, California. They have released four albums, starting with self-titled debut album, ‘Tenacious,’ ‘The Pick of Destiny,’ ‘Rize of the Fenix,’ and ‘Post-Apocalypto.’
25. Black and Kyle Gass, first came to global attention in 1996 comedy film ‘Bio-Dome,’ in which they performed together as Tenacious D on-screen for the first time. The band performed at the House of Blues in Los Angeles, for the benefit of ‘United Mitochondrial Disease Foundation,’ on December 20, 2001.
26. Black was cast as Bethany, in his third adventure film ‘Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle,’ directed by Jack Kasdan, in 2017. He reprised his role as Professor Sheldon Oberon on the film’s 2019 sequel, ‘Jumanji: The Next Level.’
27. On March 14, 2006, he married Tanya Haden, his school mate and daughter of jazz bassist Charlie Haden, in a private ceremony in Big Sur, California. They have two sons, Samuel Jason Black and Thomas David Black.
28. As an out and out critic of President Donald Trump, he and his ‘Tenacious D’ bandmate Kyle Gass, performed the protest song ‘The Government Totally Sucks,’ on the day of Trumps presidential inauguration.
29. In August 2006, Black registered his own production company, ‘Electric Dynamite Production.’ The company produced mockumentary ‘Branson,’ two TV movies, ‘My Life As an Experiment,’ and ‘Shredd,’ apart from a TV series ‘Ghost Ghirls.’
30. On September 18, 2018, Black was inducted into Hollywood’s Walk of Fame. Apart from earning two Golden Globe nominations, he is also the recipient of ‘Best Metal Performance,’ at the 57th Grammy Award, as member of ‘Tenacious D,’ band for the song ‘The Last in Line.’
31. Jack Black Net Worth: $30 Million