Charlie Day

Charlie Day (birthname: Charles Peckham Day) is a comic actor/writer/producer/director, best known for his role as Charlie Kelly on the long-running show that he co-created, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia (2005-present), and who has steadily alternated between his television work as an actor, writer, and show creator with feature movies, in which he’s mainly acted. Day has also broken out into writing-directing, with the 2023 satire, Fool’s Paradise, starring Day, Ken Jeong, Ray Liotta, Kate Beckinsale, Adrien Brody, Common, Jason Sudeikis, Edie Falco, and John Malkovich, and released by Roadside Attractions.

An early feature for Day (in support) was writer-director Mo Perkins’ A Quiet Little Marriage (2009), the best narrative feature at the Slamdance film festival and released by IFC Films. The first studio movie for Day (in support) was Going the Distance (2010), directed by Nanette Burstein and starring Drew Barrymore and Justin Long, grossing a modest $42 million. Day’s first co-starring feature role and first recurring role (as Dale) was in the hit comedy, Horrible Bosses (2011), directed by Seth Gordon and co-starring Jason Bateman, Sudeikis, Jennifer Aniston, Colin Farrell, Kevin Spacey, Donald Sutherland, and Jamie Foxx and grossing a robust $209.6 million on a $37 million budget; followed by Horrible Bosses 2 (2014), co-written and directed by Sean Anders with new cast mates Chris Pine and Christoph Waltz.

The day was part of the large vocal ensemble in Disney/Pixar’s successful prequel (to 2001’s Monsters, Inc.), Monsters University (2013), with Billy Crystal, John Goodman, Steve Buscemi, Helen Mirren, Peter Sohn, Joel Murray, Sean Hayes, and Dave Foley, and grossing over $743 million worldwide, over three times $200 million costs. One of Day’s recurring roles has been Dr. Newton Geiszler in Universal Pictures’ Pacific Rim (2013) and the sequel, Pacific Rim: Uprising (2018), the former directed by Guillermo del Toro, the latter directed by Steven S. DeKnight, both grossing a total of over $700 million.

Day’s next franchise casting was as the voice of Benny in Phil Lord’s and Christopher Miller’s brilliant The Lego Movie (2014) and The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part (2019), joining the voice cast of Chris Pratt, Elizabeth Banks, Will Arnett, Tiffany Haddish, Nick Offerman, Liam Neeson, Morgan Freeman, and Maya Rudolph, and taking in a combined $660 million global box office.

Charlie Day’s next project with Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley was their written-and-directed road comedy, Vacation (2015), starring Ed Helms, Christina Applegate, Leslie Mann, Beverly D’Angelo, and Chevy Chase, earning over triple its $31 budget with a $107.2 million worldwide gross.

Day co-starred in the well-received but commercially inert indie comedy-drama, The Hollars (2016), directed by John Krasinski and co-starring Sharlto Copley, Richard Jenkins, Anna Kendrick, Krasinski, and Margo Martindale, and earning only $1 million box office after its Sundance film festival premiere. For producers New Line Pictures/Village Roadshow, Day was both co-star and an executive producer on the comedy, Fist Fight (2017), co-starring Ice Cube, Tracy Morgan, and Jillian Bell, and topping $41 million gross on a $22 million budget for Warner Bros.

Charlie Day was part of the talented ensemble of writer-director-star Louis C.K.’s extremely controversial comedy-drama, I Love You, Daddy (2017), with Chloe Grace Moretz, Rose Byrne, Edie Falco, Pamela Adlon, Helen Hunt, and John Malkovich, but was yanked from theatrical distribution globally after The New York Times reported about numerous allegations of sexual misconduct against C.K. Day joined the notable ensemble of writer-director Drew Pearce’s futuristic Hotel Artemis (2018), starring Jodie Foster, Sterling K. Brown, Sofia Boutella, Jeff Goldblum, Brian Tyree Henry, Jenny Slate, Zachary Quinto, and Dave Bautista, but commercially tanking with a global take of $13 million on a $15.5 million budget.

Day appeared in a supporting role in co-writer/co-directors Daryl Wein’s and Zoe Lister-Jones’ comedy-drama, How It Ends (2021), which incorporated COVID-19 protocols into its stylistic vision, starring Lister-Jones, Finn Wolfhard, Nick Kroll, Fred Armisen, Bradley Whitford, Olivia Wilde, Helen Hunt, and Colin Hanks, premiering at the Sundance film festival.

Day was a co-star in another vocal role, as Luigi in The Super Mario Bros. Movie (2023), with Chris Pratt, Anya Taylor-Joy, Jack Black, Keegan-Michael Key, Seth Rogen, and Fred Armisen. Day was again part of an impressive vocal ensemble in the stop-motion animated feature adaptation of Colin Meloy’s children’s fantasy novel, Wildwood (2011), with Carey Mulligan, Mahershala Ali, Jacob Tremblay, Awkwafina, Angela Bassett, Tom Waits, and Richard E. Grant.