Early life, family, educational background
American comedian and actor Anthony Russel ‘Tony’ Hale was born on 30 September 1970, in West Point, New York State USA, making him a Libra; he’s of white ethnicity. He was born to Rita Hale (née Garnett) State Representative Katy Ashe’s staff assistant, and Mike Hale, who served in the military before he taught atomic and nuclear physics. Mike and Rita raised Tony in Tallahassee, Florida, where he joined the Young Actors Theatre and appeared in a number of musical and theatrical productions. Tony has a sister named Kim and a brother, Mike Jr.
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In 1988 Tony matriculated from Leon High School before studying journalism in Birmingham, Alabama at Samford University. , where he was part of the Sigma Chi fraternity until graduating in 1992. In 1995, he completed his graduate studies in Virginia at the School of Communication and the Arts of Regent University.
Tony is best known for portraying Buster Bluth in “Arrested Development,” David Mortimer in “Justified,” Gary Welsh in “Veep” and most recently, Mr. Benedict and Mr. Curtain in “The Mysterious Benedict Society.”
Career
Tony began his acting career by appearing in an MCI Inc. commercial that was never aired. In 2001, he guest appeared as minor characters in television series such as “Sex and the City,” “Dawson’s Creek” and “The Sopranos”.
After he graduated, Tony moved to New York City and lived there for the next eight years, where he co-founded a community of arctic Christians named The Haven, who met up weekly. He then enrolled in William Esper Studio’s Professional Actor Training Program and The Barrow Group to study acting. In 1999 he acted in a television commercial for Volkswagen, which became quite famous – in it, Tony danced to “Mr. Roboto,” and the commercial was spoofed in “Arrested Development,” a Fox sitcom. From 2003 to 2006 Tony portrayed Buster Bluth in “Arrested Development,” his character known for being a neurotic son with mommy issues. In one scene, Buster blows up and shares his feelings about his mother, ‘[There was] so much pent-up anger… and that was his opportunity to let it rip’; he reprised his role in 2013, 2018 and 2019. In 2005, Tony appeared in episode 21 of season 10 of “MADtv”, a parody series of “COPS.”
He played the minor role of Dave in the 2006 comedy fantasy film entitled “Stranger Than Fiction”, and the following year Tony portrayed Stuart in the rom-com “Because I Said So.” He played Simon, the owner of a video store from March to April 2007 in “Andy Barker P.I.,” an NBC detective sitcom starring Andy Richter; the series was co-created by Conan O’Brien and Jonathan Groff. In 2007, he voiced Pope Nicholas III in “Dante’s Inferno”, and then Furlough in the 2008 animated children’s fantasy film, “The Tale of Despereaux.” From October 2008 to January 2010, he appeared in “Chuck” in the recurring role of Emmett, after which he began starring in “Ctrl,” an NBC web series. He then went on to guest appear in season one, episode two of “United States of Tara,” a Showtime drama comedy, portraying Oral Gershenoff, an English teacher.
In 2009 and ’10, he played Professor Russell Lazlo in two episodes of “Numbers”, also in 2009 he played Wade in “The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard.” In 2010 he was Chad in “Sironia” and Ben in “In My Sleep”, before in 2012 starring as Stefan Lane in the drama comedy film “Not That Funny” then Tony had a cameo as Rick Simms in “Law & Order: SVU”, a teacher accused of behaving inappropriately with one of his students and is thereby fired. That year, he was also cast as Gary Walsh in HBO’s comedy “Veep”, who is the personal assistant to Selina Meyer, the Vice President-turned-President. On 22 September 2013, Tony won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series for his work in season two of “Veep”, and was nominated again the following year, but Ty Burrell won for his portrayal of Phil Dunphy in “Modern Family.” Tony was once again nominated in 2015, his third nomination and second win. “Veep” also celebrated its Outstanding Comedy Series win that night.
In 2015 he played Air Marshal James Suggs in “Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Road Chip,” Agent Petey Douglas in “American Ultra,” and voiced Darwin in “April and the Extraordinary World.” The following year, Tony voiced Mime, Ross, and Cyrus in “The Angry Birds Movie.”
Tony hosted the 9th Annual Shorty Awards in 2017, held at the PlayStation Theater in New York City That year, he played Mr. Mosley in “And Then I Go” and Arrogant JPL Engineer in “Transformers: The Last Knight.” In 2018 he appeared in season two of “A Series of Unfortunate Events” as Jerome Squalor, featuring in a total of four episodes, the first entitled “The Ersatz Elevator: Part One” and “The Penultimate Peril: Part Two.” Tony portrayed Vice Principal Worth in the 2018 film “Love, Simon,” voiced The Joker in “Batman Ninja” and played Bradley in “Sadie.”
Tony voiced Mime in the 2019 sequel “The Angry Birds Movie 2” and Forky in “Toy Story 4,” which was budgeted at $200 million, but grossed an impressive $1.073 billion. He did more voice work in 2020, as Poupelle in the English dub of “Poupelle of Chimney Town.” In 2021 he played Zac Tieran in “Clifford the Big Red Dog,” Jess Oppenheimer in “Being the Ricardos”, and voiced Teeny Tiny Tony in “Arlo the Alligator Boy”, before portraying Jeffry Traske in the highly anticipated sequel, “Hocus Pocus 2.”
The first season of the Disney+ mystery series “The Mysterious Benedict Society” was released on 25 June 2021, adapted from Trenton Lee Stewart’s young adult book series, in which Tony portrays twin brothers Nicholas Benedict and Dr. L.D. Curtain (previously known as Nathaniel Benedict). In a June 2021 interview, Tony told Insider how the sets helped him get into each character – ‘Benedict’s office, when you walk in and you see everything is Earth tones and the fireplace, it’s somewhere you would want to sit back and have a great conversation and cared for… cut to later, Curtain’s office… when you walk in you feel you have to check your posture.’ When playing Benedict, Tony has a thick beard and bushy hair, whereas for Curtain, his beard is trimmed and his hair is shorter. He also admitted that having to play multiple characters could be confusing at times, especially when playing them on the same day. ‘Benedict is so full of joy and empathy and care, I looked at him and hope that those qualities are also in me… with Curtain, I see him as being misunderstood,’ he told Insider, ‘so I guess what I’m saying is instead of looking at him as the evil, one I can look at myself and say, ‘Hey, there’s times in my life where I’ve felt misunderstood.’’
He was also interviewed by Collider, and when asked if he knew about the series beforehand he answered, ‘… I hadn’t read the series, so I dove into that a little bit and saw how beautiful this world was that Trenton created… Their [the children’s] superpower is their intellect, their creativity, and their empathy. And after the year we’ve had, those are superpowers. That is what’s gonna bring change.’
Personal life
On 24 May 2003, Tony married Martel Thompson Hall, an Emmy Award-winning make-up artist; they have a daughter named Loy Ann Hale who was born on 26 February 2006. Tony and Martel met at a Bible study group in New York they were attending. The family practices Christianity, and resides in Los Angeles.
Throughout his career, Tony has not been involved in any controversies.
She’s 16 today and clearly has a faux fisherman father who obviously needs glasses and is allergic to fish. Pray for her. Happy Birthday angel. I love you more than you know. pic.twitter.com/HnLpayORSk
— Tony Hale (@MrTonyHale) February 24, 2022
Hobbies, favorite things, and interesting facts
- Tony enjoys listening to music, and watching NFL.
- He is open about being a Christian.
- Tony engages in meditative prayer.
Appearance
Tony has brown almost black hair and blue eyes, stands at 6ft 1in (185cm) tall, weighs 185lbs (84kg), with vital statistics of 43-34-15. He has a slim, fit build and his complexion is fair. He wears a US size 10 shoe,
Net worth and salary
As of August 2022, his net worth is estimated at over $9 million, having earned his fortune through his work as an actor. Due to “Toy Story 4”’s massive success, he may have garnered even more money from there. His wife Martel’s net worth is estimated at $2 million.
