Mark Alan Ruffalo was born on November 22, 1967, in Kenosha, Wisconsin.[2] His mother, Marie Rose (née Hébert), is a hairdresser and stylist, while his father, Frank Lawrence Ruffalo Jr., worked as a construction painter.[3][4] He has two sisters, Tanya Marie (died 2023) and Nicole, and a brother, Scott (died 2008).[3] His father is of Italian descent, from Girifalco, Calabria,[5] and his mother is of French Canadian and Italian ancestry.[6][7] His father was a Bahai, while his mother was Christian.[8] "I grew up in a household that had three religions in it, (born-again) Christianity, Catholicism and Bahai'ism, so there were different viewpoints and a lot of debate about that, and I immediately began to understand that all these people that I loved very much had very strong feelings about faith, but all of them were valid to me. I felt that none of them, my grandmother, my father or my mother, was better or worse than the other."[9]
Ruffalo attended both Catholic and progressive schools throughout his education. Ruffalo has described himself as having been a "happy kid",[10] although he struggled with undiagnosed dyslexia and ADHD as a child and a young adult.[11]
Ruffalo spent his teen years in Virginia Beach, Virginia, where his father worked. He competed in wrestling in junior high and high school in Wisconsin and Virginia. Ruffalo graduated from First Colonial High School in Virginia Beach in 1986, where he acted for the Patriot Playhouse. He moved with his family to San Diego, California, and later to Los Angeles, where he took classes at the Stella Adler Conservatory and co-founded the Orpheus Theatre Company.[3] With the theater company, he wrote, directed, and starred in a number of plays. He also spent close to a decade working as a bartender.[12]
In 2010, he co-starred in the Martin Scorsese thriller Shutter Island as U.S. Marshal Chuck Aule, the partner of Leonardo DiCaprio's character Teddy Daniels.[26] Also in 2010, he starred in Lisa Cholodenko's The Kids Are All Right, with Annette Bening and Julianne Moore. Ruffalo stated in an interview that he approached Cholodenko after watching High Art and said he would love to work with her. Years later, she called Ruffalo and said she wrote a script and had him in mind for the part. Justin Lowe of The Hollywood Reporter praised all three leads for their chemistry and performances writing, "Moore, Bening and Ruffalo all deliver endearingly quirky comic performances".[27] His role earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor.[28]
Ruffalo at the Toronto premiere of The Avengers in 2012
Ruffalo starred in The Avengers (2012), the sixth installment of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, replacing Edward Norton as Dr. Bruce Banner / The Hulk.[29]Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian praised Ruffalo's work writing, "Ruffalo actually makes Bruce and Hulk interesting, even droll characters (he also plays the monster in mo-cap), superior to the Eric Bana and Edward Norton incarnations, and his version ingeniously locates the big green monster's secret not in the over-rehearsed subject of "anger management" but depression and self-hate."[30] He reprised the role again in Iron Man 3 (2013),[31] and in Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015).[32]
In 2013, he starred in the romantic comedy Begin Again acting alongside Keira Knightley. The film received positive reviews and was a financial success. The following year, Ruffalo starred as Ned Weeks in the HBO television adaptation of Larry Kramer's AIDS-era play, The Normal Heart (2014), his performance earned him an Emmy nomination.[33] He says he has had an outpouring of support for his performance:
I've never had so sincere and vulnerable a response from people for anything that I've ever done. ... And of everything that I've done since I've been on social media, which hasn't been that long, by the way, I haven't had such an overwhelmingly positive response as I have from The Normal Heart directly to me. And it's a blessing, man. If this is it, if I have a piano dropped on me tomorrow, then I would go down thinking, "You know what, I did okay as far as my career goes, because that's a gift. That's rare."[34]
Also in 2015, he portrayed journalist Michael Rezendes in the drama film Spotlight, for which he earned his third Academy Award nomination and a BAFTA Award nomination. Ruffalo acted opposite Michael Keaton, Rachel McAdams, John Slattery, and Liev Schreiber. Ruffalo told The Hollywood Reporter that he met with Rezendes and studied him as research for the film saying, "I spent a lot of time with the real journalist, I had meals with him. I talked with him for hours. I sat next to him at work, I watched him work the phones. I watched him write his stories. I talked to him about his life and his family. I had him give me tours of Boston. As much as I could soak him up seemed to be the most important part.".[36]
The following year he portrayed Agent Dylan Rhoades in Now You See Me 2 (2016) and executive produced the romantic drama Anything (2017). He returned to Broadway in the revival of the Arthur Miller play The Price (2017) at the American Airlines Theatre. Ruffalo acted opposite Danny DeVito and Tony Shalhoub. Marilyn Stasio of Variety wrote, "Ruffalo and DeVito clearly get a kick out of the buying and selling rituals of Victor and Solomon. There is warmth in their tones and mutual respect in their exchange of confidences".[37]
Ruffalo with wife Sunrise Coigney at the red carpet of What Doesn't Kill You in 2008
Ruffalo married Sunrise Coigney in 2000. They have three children.[50][51]
After completing work on the film The Last Castle, Ruffalo was diagnosed with a vestibular schwannoma, a type of brain tumor also known as an acoustic neuroma. The tumor was found to be benign; however, the surgery to remove the mass resulted in partial facial paralysis and affected his hearing.[52] The paralysis subsided after a year, but Ruffalo remains deaf in his left ear.[53]
On December 1, 2008, Ruffalo's younger brother, Scott, was found outside his home on North Palm Drive in Beverly Hills with an execution-style bullet wound to the head.[54][55] Scott was taken to a hospital, but died the following week.[56] The case remains unsolved.[57]
Ruffalo and his family live in Sullivan County, New York, and he describes the Catskills as his "home". Ruffalo also owns two apartments in New York City, one for business and another as an investment.[58] Ruffalo's mother and stepfather live in Boothbay Harbor, Maine, where he and his family occasionally spend their summers.[59]
In May 2022, Ruffalo was sued by residents of Ellenville, New York, for not cleaning up a fire that broke out on the set of a car dealership that was used as a location for I Know This Much Is True.[60] The lawsuit claims that the residents suffered physical and emotional injuries and added that the fire caused damage to their homes and exposed them to toxic fumes.[61]
Ruffalo endorsed Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn in the 2017 UK general election. He tweeted: "Because @jeremycorbyn offers people an alternative to the Corporate status quo, which never ends well for them, I humbly endorse Corbyn."[65][66] Ruffalo signed a letter supporting Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn describing him as "a beacon of hope in the struggle against emergent far-right nationalism, xenophobia and racism in much of the democratic world" and endorsed him for in the 2019 UK general election.[67]
In November 2021, Ruffalo criticized the not guilty ruling in the case of Kyle Rittenhouse in his hometown of Kenosha, Wisconsin and said the people shot by Rittenhouse were murdered.[68][69][70] In April 2022, Ruffalo urged voters to check voter ID requirements in their states through posts to his social media. Ruffalo cited VoteRiders as a source of assistance for voter ID requirements across the United States.[71][72]
In 2008, Ruffalo expressed concern that gas companies were eyeing his family's land in Callicoon, New York. After doing his own investigation, New York magazine wrote, he became "anti-fracking's first famous face".[74] On October 4, 2010, Ruffalo appeared on The Rachel Maddow Show to discuss hydraulic fracturing and the FRAC Act of 2009.[75] He claimed in the December 2010 issue of GQ that after he organized screenings in Pennsylvania of a documentary about natural-gas-drilling called Gasland, he was placed on a terror advisory list.[76] The Pennsylvania Governor's Office of Homeland Security denied the claim.[77]
In March 2016, Ruffalo narrated and produced Dear President Obama: The Clean Energy Revolution Is Now, a documentary by director Jon Bowermaster which looks at President Barack Obama's environmental tenure and legacy concerning the massive expansion of oil and natural gas drilling.[78] In October 2017, Ruffalo actively supported the Standing Rock Indian Reservation in their opposition to the Dakota Access Pipeline project.[79]
In 2019, Ruffalo starred in and co-produced Dark Waters, which spotlighted another one of his environmental concerns with its true-life depiction of a corporate lawyer's relentless pursuit of justice to expose poisonous pollution by chemical behemoth DuPont. In June 2020, Ruffalo appeared in a webinar conference for the Irish Green Party to encourage members to accept the recently negotiated programme for government, agreed between the party, Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil.[80]
In 2020, Ruffalo praised the closure of the Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant, and called for the closure of additional nuclear power plants.[81]
Anti-war activism
In October 2019, Ruffalo tweeted that "until George W. Bush is brought to justice for the crimes of the Iraq War, (including American-led torture, Iraqi deaths & displacement, and the deep scars—emotional & otherwise—inflicted on our military that served his folly), we can't even begin to talk about kindness."[82]
In October 2020, speaking to Mehdi Hasan, Ruffalo condemned what he called Israel's "asymmetrical warfare" against the Palestinians, stating, "There is no reason that an ally of America should not be held to the same standards as any other nation in the world." Ruffalo also related that he had been called an antisemite for his views, saying, "[It's] really tough to hear. And the fact that so many people will take it to that extreme, when you're talking about that kind of inequality, that kind of oppression, that kind of apartheid."[83]
While Ruffalo posted numerous tweets critical of Israel during the 11-day conflict between it and Hamas in May 2021, he ultimately tweeted an apology for suggesting Israel was committing genocide, stating, "It’s not accurate, it’s inflammatory, disrespectful & is being used to justify antisemitism here & abroad."[84][85]
Ruffalo signed an October 2023 open letter of Artists4Ceasefire during the Israeli bombardment of Gaza.[86] In November 2023, Ruffalo criticized the prime minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, for describing the civilian deaths during the Israeli attacks on Gaza as 'collateral damage.'[87] At the 96th Academy Awards, Ruffalo was one of several celebrities wearing an "Artists Call for Ceasefire Now" pin on his lapel, and he called out in support of protestors blocking the red carpet.[88]
In September 2024, Mark Ruffalo, alongside Susan Sarandon, Cynthia Nixon, and Rosie O'Donnell, signed an open letter from SAG-AFTRA and Sister Guild Members calling for a ceasefire and condemning the “industry's McCarthyist repression of members who acknowledge Palestinian suffering.” This letter followed the firing of Melissa Barrera from the Scream franchise in November, due to her comments on the Israel-Hamas War, in which she expressed support for Palestine.[89]
Civil rights
Ruffalo is pro-choice. He has explained his opinion by saying: "I don't want to turn back the hands of time to when women shuttled across state lines in the thick of night to resolve an unwanted pregnancy, in a cheap hotel room."[90] Ruffalo has called for an economic revolution, saying that "capitalism today is failing us, killing us, and robbing from our children's future."[91]
In 2023, Ruffalo sought to block the sale of the West Park Presbyterian Church, a city landmark built in the 1880s, to prevent its demolition and construction of housing in its place. The congregation said it could not afford the cost of maintaining the deteriorating church building and wanted to use the proceeds of the sale for charity work. He lives in the church neighborhood and has started a campaign to raise money for the building.[95]
Conspiracy theories
In 2007, Ruffalo expressed views in line with the 9/11 truth movement when he stated: "I'm baffled by the way all three buildings came down. My first reaction was that buildings don't fall down like that."[96]
February 2016, Ruffalo tweeted a Tech Times article in which a group of Argentinian doctors attributed the cause of a microcephaly outbreak in Brazil to the use of a larvicide chemical added to reservoirs of drinking water to combat dengue fever, rather than the Zika virus.[97]The New York Times described the claim as "dubious" and stated that those "sounding the alarm", did not mention that the larvicide did not work through the central nervous system and that it has been approved by the World Health Organization.[97]
On February 8, 2024, accompanied by his wife Sunrise Coigney as well as the two elder of his three children, Ruffalo received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.[98]
Audiobook
2016: Our Revolution: A Future to Believe In (together with Bernie Sanders, the author), Macmillan Audio, ISBN978-1-4272-8533-1
^"Spotlight – Mark Ruffalo". European Independent Film Festival. May 29, 2015. Archived from the original on September 23, 2015. Retrieved July 28, 2015.
^Goldstein, Gregg (February 4, 2010). "Q&A: Mark Ruffalo". The Hollywood Reporter.
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