David Cross

Executive Producer, Creator

Bliss

Emmy Award winner and Grammy Award nominee David Cross is an inventive performer, writer, and producer on stage and screens both big and small.

Cross returned to the road in January of 2016, six years after his last standup tour. Named one of the Top 100 Stand-Up Comedians of All Time by Comedy Central, Cross launched his Making America Great Again! tour in San Diego, CA and completed the US leg in The Golden State in May 2016, having extended the tour due to popular demand. In the Summer of 2016, Cross took his tour to Europe for the first time ever, and also performed throughout Canada, including at the prestigious Just for Laughs Festival in Montreal.

The April 22, 2016 performance in Austin, TX, as part of the Moontower Comedy Festival, was filmed for a special bearing the tour name and is now currently streaming on Netflix. An audio CD entitled …America…Great, with slightly different material, is now available for pre-order.

Also in January of this year, IFC premiered the long-awaited third season of Todd Margaret, created by and starring Cross as an ill-equipped American who finds himself running the London sales office of the energy drink company for which he works. The original iteration, The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret, aired on IFC from 2010 to 2012. The third season of Todd Margaret premiered on the UK’s Fox TV this past April.

Cross last toured in 2009 with a solo stand-up show in support of his New York Times Bestseller, I Drink for a Reason. That hugely successful comedy show was filmed at Boston's Wilbur Theater for a special, entitled Bigger and Blackerer, which premiered on EPIX in April 2010 before being released on CD and DVD by Sub Pop. His previous comedy special, David Cross: The Pride is Back, aired on HBO in 1999, and was named one of the 25 best stand-up comedy specials and concert films of all time by ROLLING STONE in July 2015.

Cross has released two other comedy albums – the Grammy Award- nominated, Shut Up You Fucking Baby and It's Not Funny. In 2003 he released the DVD, Let America Laugh, a documentary film of his groundbreaking stand up tour of alternative, indie rock clubs.

Cross reteamed with his Mr. Show collaborator and co-creator, Bob Odenkirk, to create Mr. Show with Bob and David, a four-episode revamp of the iconic sketch comedy series, which premiered November 2015 on Netflix. He also had a guest arc on the Netflix breakout comedy Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, as lawyer Russ Snyder, who finds himself in an unlikely relationship with fallen socialite Jacqueline White (Jane Krakowski).

In September 2013, David Cross and Bob Odenkirk released the book, Hollywood Said No! Orphaned Film Scripts, Bastard Scenes, and Abandoned Darlings from the Creators of Mr. Show. Written with friend and fellow Mr. Show alum Brian Posehn, Hollywood Said No! is a collection of never-before-seen scripts, orphaned sketch ideas and reminiscences. In support of the book, Cross and Odenkirk embarked on a multi-city tour, performing their first official stand-up comedy shows together since their sold-out national tour in 2002.

In 2014, Cross released the indie film Hits, which he wrote and directed. A black comedy about the nature of fame in the YouTube era, the film is set in a small town in upstate New York and stars Matt Walsh and Meredith Hagner. It first premiered at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival, and then helped raise funds for its theatrical distribution via a successful Kickstarter campaign. In addition to a traditional theatrical release, the film was also available to fans across the nation on BitTorrent, where they were able to pay what they wanted to view it.

On the big screen, Cross has appeared in the independent features, Kill Your Darlings alongside Daniel Radcliffe and Michael C. Hall, and the dramedy It's a Disaster, opposite Julia Stiles and America Ferrera. Other film credits include Abel, Year One, Christopher Guest’s Waiting for Guffman, Men in Black and Men in Black II, Ghost World, Michel Gondry’s Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Pitch Perfect 2, I’m Not There, and provided his vocal talents for several animated films, including Megamind, the Kung Fu Panda franchise and Curious George.

On television, Cross reprised his beloved role as Dr. Tobias Fünke' on the fourth season of Arrested Development on Netflix. During its original critically acclaimed, Emmy Award-winning run on FOX, Cross was twice-nominated as part of the ensemble cast for a Screen Actors Guild Award. Cross is currently in production on the show’s fifth season.

Cross’s introduction to the TV scene came with The Ben Stiller Show, where Cross honed his comedy writing skills and shared a 1993 Emmy Award for Outstanding Achievement in Writing in a Variety or Music Program.

The original Mr. Show with Bob and David received three Emmy Award nominations for both Writing and Music & Lyrics. Cross also served as a writer and contributor for Tenacious D. He also wrote, produced and starred in the Comedy Central animated series Freak Show, which he co-created with H. Jon Benjamin.

Cross currently resides in Brooklyn, New York.

Speaking at: Comedy Spotlight: Bliss