Adam Sandler

Adam Sandler was born in Brooklyn, New York, the son of Judy, a nursery school teacher, and Stanley Sandler, an electrical engineer. Sandler is Jewish. When he was five, his family moved to Manchester, New Hampshire, where he attended Manchester Central High School. He found he was a natural comic, and nurtured his talent while at New York University by performing regularly in clubs and on campuses. He graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in 1991.

Later in his career, he would often draw on his earliest memories for material for his comedy and movies. The song "Lunchlady Land" is dedicated to Emalee, the lunchlady at Hayden Dining Hall at New York University. In the movie Click, Sandler goes to Lake Winnipesaukee, the largest lake in New Hampshire, where he went to summer camp.

In the mid to late 1980s, Sandler played Theo Huxtable's friend, Smitty, on The Cosby Show (1987–1988). He was a performer for the MTV game show Remote Control, on which he made appearances as the characters "Trivia Delinquent" or "Stud Boy". Early in his career, Sandler performed in comedy clubs, taking the stage at his brother's urging when he was only 17. He was discovered by comedian Dennis Miller, who caught Sandler's act in Los Angeles. Miller recommended him to Saturday Night Live producer Lorne Michaels. Sandler was hired as a writer for SNL in 1990 and became a featured player the following year, making a name for himself by performing amusing original songs on the show, including "The Chanukah Song". He left the show in 1995 to focus on his film career.
Sandler reads 'An Ode to Bob' during a Price is Right appearance

Sandler's first starring role was in 1989, in the film Going Overboard. Although his earlier films did not receive critical praise, his more recent films, beginning with Punch-Drunk Love (2002), have received almost uniformly positive reviews. Some critics concluded that Sandler possessed considerably more acting ability that they believed had been previously wasted on poorly written scripts and characters with no development. Audiences have remained faithful to Sandler's slapstick humor to the tune of US$100-million-plus grossing movies. Sandler has moved outside the genre of goofball humor to take on more serious parts such as the aforementioned Punch-Drunk Love (for which he was nominated for a Golden Globe), Spanglish (2004) and Reign Over Me (2007). He played a loving father figure in Big Daddy (1999). During filming, he met Jacqueline Samantha Titone - his future wife and mother of his daughter - who was cast as the waitress from The Blarney Stone Bar. He returned to more dramatic fare with Mike Binder's Reign Over Me (2007).

Sandler recently starred in Bedtime Stories (2008), a fantasy film directed by Bringing Down the House director Adam Shankman, about a stressed real estate developer whose bedtime stories he reads to his niece and nephew begin to come true. This marked Sandler's first family film and first film under the Walt Disney banner. Keri Russell and English comedian Russell Brand co-starred.

His next film will be Judd Apatow's third directorial feature Funny People. Sandler stars as a very successful stand up comedian who finds out he has a terminal illness and he takes a young inexperienced comic, played by Seth Rogen, under his wing. Other co-stars include Eric Bana and Apatow's wife, Leslie Mann. The film will contain more dramatic elements than Apatow's previous efforts. Filming began in October of 2008 with a tentative release date of July 31, 2009. At one point, Sandler was in talks to star in Quentin Tarantino's World War II film Inglourious Basterds, which he confirmed, but he said he will not be in it due to a scheduling conflict with Funny People. In June 2007, it was announced that his production company, Happy Madison, had made a preemptive acquisition for Mitch Albom's screenwriting debut.

Sandler formed his film production company, Happy Madison Productions, in 1999, first producing fellow SNL alumi Rob Schneider's film, Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo.  SNL contemporary Kevin Nealon has appeared in nine Happy Madison productions or Sandler films, including Happy Gilmore, The Wedding Singer, Little Nicky, Joe Dirt, Eight Crazy Nights, Anger Management, Grandma's Boy, You Don't Mess with the Zohan and the Dana Carvey vehicle, The Master of Disguise. Others who frequently appear in Sandler films include Steve Buscemi, John Turturro, Jon Lovitz, Clint Howard, Norm MacDonald, and longtime Sandler pals Allen Covert, Peter Dante, and Jonathan Loughran.

On June 22, 2003, Sandler married actress Jacqueline Samantha Titone, and they are the parents of two daughters, Sadie Madison Sandler, born May 6, 2006, at Cedars-Sinai in Los Angeles, and Sunny Madeline Sandler, born November 2, 2008. Sandler lives with his family in Los Angeles, though he also has a home in New York.