Donal Logue

Combining low-key, average-Joe charisma with a bottomless capacity for shrewd comic timing, Donal Logue earned a reputation in the late '90s as one of the decade's most compelling -- and prolific -- character actors. First winning notice and a dedicated cult following for his portrayal of Jimmy McBride, a cab driver featured in a series of MTV promos, Logue went on to work in a string of films good, bad, and ugly before finally landing his first major starring role in Jenniphr Goodman's 2000 Sundance favorite The Tao of Steve.

The son of Irish immigrants, Logue was born in Ottawa, Canada, on February 27, 1966. Raised largely in the Southwestern United States, he went on to attend Harvard, where he studied history and began to nurture an interest in theater. Although Logue had long aspired to be a writer, a stint at the British-American Drama Academy in London strengthened his dedication to acting, and after graduating from college, he began performing on the stage.

Logue got his first break in the early '90s, when he began doing the notorious Jimmy the cab driver segments for MTV and won a small role in Robert Redford's Sneakers (1992). Supporting work in films ranging from Little Women (1994) to 3 Ninjas Knuckle Up (1995) to the American remake of Diabolique (1996) followed, as did work on several TV series. In 1999, film audiences were finally given a greater opportunity to see what Logue was capable of when he turned in a scene-stealing performance as a slobby L.A. limo driver with half-baked acting ambitions in The Big Tease, Kevin Allen's light-hearted hairdressing mockumentary. Full-blown appreciation finally came the actor's way the following year, when he starred as the title character of Goodman's The Tao of Steve. A wry comedy about a late-twentysomething slacker whose savvy dating philosophy allows him to win over the ladies despite a gut whose bounty is matched only by the amount of pot he consumes, the film was a great success at the 2000 Sundance Festival, where Logue was awarded a Special Jury Prize for Outstanding Performance.

The growing appreciation that surrounded Logue's work was reflected in the number of projects the actor was involved with that same year. Appearing in no less than six movies, including the summer blockbuster The Patriot, Logue was soon being touted as one of the industry's more promising -- to say nothing of hard-working -- talents. - Rebecca Flint Marx, All Movie Guide