Matthew Broderick

Matthew Broderick is an American actor known for his work across stage, film, and television. Throughout his career, he has received two Tony Awards, alongside nominations for two Primetime Emmy Awards, a Grammy Award, a Golden Globe Award, and a Screen Actors Guild Award. In recognition of his contributions to the performing arts, he was inducted into the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2006 and the American Theater Hall of Fame in 2017.

Broderick was born on March 21, 1962, in Manhattan, New York. He is the son of Patricia, a playwright, actress, and painter, and James Broderick, an actor and World War II veteran. He attended the City and Country School for grade school and the Walden School for high school in Manhattan, later receiving formal acting training at HB Studio.

His acting career began with a role in an HB Studio workshop production of On Valentine's Day alongside his father, followed by an off-Broadway appearance in Torch Song Trilogy. Broderick achieved a major stage breakthrough in Neil Simon's Brighton Beach Memoirs, winning the Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Play. He transitioned to film with early roles in Max Dugan Returns (1983), WarGames (1983), and Ladyhawke (1985). He gained wider feature film acclaim in 1986 playing the title character in Ferris Bueller's Day Off, which earned him a Golden Globe Award nomination. His late-1980s film credits include Project X (1987), Torch Song Trilogy (1988), and Glory (1989).

In the 1990s and 2000s, Broderick performed as the voice of adult Simba in Disney's animated film The Lion King (1994) and appeared in films including The Freshman (1990), The Cable Guy (1996), Godzilla (1998), Election (1999), Inspector Gadget (1999), You Can Count on Me (2000), Deck the Halls (2006), and Tower Heist (2011). He also directed and starred in the 1996 film Infinity and provided voice work for Bee Movie (2007) and The Tale of Despereaux (2008). On stage, he won a second Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical for How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying (1995) and earned another nomination for starring in the musical adaptation of The Producers (2001).

Broderick's subsequent theater credits include Nice Work If You Can Get It (2013), It's Only a Play (2014), Sylvia (2015), his West End debut in The Starry Messenger (2019), and Plaza Suite (2022). On television, he starred in the television film The Music Man (2003), the series Daybreak (2018), and the Netflix miniseries Painkiller (2023). He has also guest-starred in series such as 30 Rock and Only Murders in the Building, earning a Primetime Emmy Award nomination for the latter.

Broderick married actress Sarah Jessica Parker in May 1997, and the couple has three children. In August 1987, while vacationing in Northern Ireland, Broderick was involved in a fatal head-on automobile collision in which two individuals died, resulting in his conviction on a charge of careless driving.