Mike Myers

Michael John Myers, OC (born May 25, 1963) is a Canadian actor, comedian, director, producer and screenwriter. He is known for his run as a performer on Saturday Night Live from 1989 to 1995 and for portraying the title roles in the Wayne's World, Austin Powers, and Shrek film franchises. Myers made his directorial debut with the documentary Supermensch: The Legend of Shep Gordon (2013). He slowed down his acting in 2012, though he eventually returned with supporting roles in Terminal and Bohemian Rhapsody (both 2018). He is set to appear in an Untitled David O. Russell project and headline a series for Netflix titled The Pentaverate, both of which are still in the works.

Michael John Myers was born in the Scarborough district of Toronto on May 25, 1963, the son of data processor Alice "Bunny" E. (née Hind) and insurance agent Eric Myers. His parents were English immigrants from the Old Swan area of Liverpool. Both were World War II veterans, his mother having served in the Royal Air Force and his father in the British Army. He has two older brothers: Paul, a musician, and Peter, who worked for Sears Canada. He grew up in Scarborough and North York, where he attended Sir John A. Macdonald Collegiate Institute. He graduated from Stephen Leacock Collegiate Institute in 1982.

Myers began performing in commercials at two years old. At the age of 10, he made a commercial for British Columbia Hydro, with Gilda Radner playing his mother. At 12, he made a guest appearance as Ari on the TV series King of Kensington. At 16, he was the guest star of the season 1 episode "Boy on Wheels" of the TV series The Littlest Hobo.

After graduating from high school, Myers was accepted into The Second City Canadian touring company. He moved to the United Kingdom, and in 1985 he was one of the founding members of The Comedy Store Players, an improvisational group based at The Comedy Store in London.

The next year, he starred in the British children's TV program Wide Awake Club, parodying the show's normal exuberance with his own "Sound Asleep Club", in partnership with Neil Mullarkey.

He returned to Toronto and The Second City in 1986 as a cast member in The Second City's Toronto main stage show, Second City Theatre. In 1988, he moved from Second City in Toronto to Chicago. There, he trained, performed and taught at the Improv Olympic.

Myers made many appearances, including as Wayne Campbell, on Toronto's Citytv in the early 1980s, on the alternative video show City Limits hosted by Christopher Ward; Myers also made several appearances after the launch of MuchMusic, for which City Limits was essentially the prototype. Myers also appeared as Wayne Campbell in the music video for Ward's Canadian hit "Boys and Girls".

The Wayne Campbell character was featured extensively in the 1986 summer series It's Only Rock & Roll, produced by Toronto's Insight Production Company for CBC Television. Wayne appeared both in-studio and in a series of location sketches directed and edited by Allan Novak. Myers wrote another sketch, "Kurt and Dieter", co-starring with Second City's Dana Andersen and also directed by Novak, which later became the popular "Sprockets" sketch on Saturday Night Live.

Myers began appearing on Saturday Night Live on January 21, 1989 and eventually became the first repertory player added to the show's cast in over two years. "He quickly became one of the show's biggest draws thanks to his talent for creating oddball characters with memorable catchphrases," according to Entertainment Weekly. In addition to "Wayne's World" and "Sprockets", Myers starred in the recurring sketches "Lothar of the Hill People", "Stuart Rankin, All Things Scottish", "Lank Thompson", "Middle-Aged Man", "Simon", "Coffee Talk with Linda Richman", "Theatre Stories", "Phillip the Hyper Hypo", and "Scottish Soccer Hooligan Weekly". Myers's last episode as a cast member aired on January 21, 1995 (exactly six years to the day after his first episode aired). He returned to host in 1997 and made an appearance as his movie character Dr. Evil in 2014.