Robert John "Bob" Odenkirk is an American actor, comedian, writer, director and producer.
He is best known for being the co-creator and co-star of the HBO sketch comedy series
Mr. Show with Bob and David and for his role as Walter White's lawyer, Saul Goodman on
AMC's Breaking Bad and its upcoming spin-off series Better Call Saul.
In the 1980s and 1990s, he worked as a writer for such television shows as Saturday Night
Live, Get a Life, The Ben Stiller Show, and The Dennis Miller Show.
In the mid-1990s, Odenkirk and David Cross created the Emmy-nominated sketch comedy program
Mr. Show with Bob and David, which ran for four seasons and ultimately became a cult
success.
In the early 2000s, Odenkirk discovered Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim and produced their
television series Tom Goes to the Mayor and Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!.
He has directed three films: Melvin Goes to Dinner, Let's Go to Prison, and The Brothers
Solomon.
Early life Odenkirk was born in Berwyn, Illinois, and
was raised in nearby Naperville.
He is one of seven children of Barbara and Walter Odenkirk, who was employed in the printing
business.
He was raised in a Catholic family, and is of half Irish descent and half German descent.
His parents divorced.
His father's battle with alcoholism would influence Bob's decision to avoid alcohol
almost completely.
He would later say that he grew up "hating" Naperville because "it felt like a dead end,
like Nowheresville.
I couldn't wait to move into a city and be around people who were doing exciting things."
Odenkirk's father died of bone cancer in 1995.
Odenkirk went to Naperville North High School and attended Marquette University in Milwaukee,
WI, then transferred to Southern Illinois in Carbondale, IL, "honing his sketch-writing
and performance skills with live shows on both colleges' radio stations."
He began his foray into comedy writing as a radio DJ for WIDB, his local college station
at SIU-Carbondale.
He worked at WIDB with newsman Greg Weindorf and traffic man Matt "The Agitator" Helser
now of Dirty Laundry Podcast fame.
He created a radio comedy hour, sometimes an hour and a half, called "The Prime Time
Special" with many recurring characters.
"It often had us in stitches" said then WIDB Program Director, Victor Lentini.
After three years of college, Odenkirk decided to try writing and improv in Chicago.
First studying with Del Close, Odenkirk attended "The Players Workshop of the Second City"
where he met Robert Smigel, and they began a collaboration that would last for years
and take Bob to Saturday Night Live.
He also performed at the Improv Olympic alongside notable comedians Chris Farley and Tim Meadows.
Odenkirk has said his strongest comedic influence was Monty Python's Flying Circus, primarily
due to its combination of cerebral and simple humor.
Other influences included radio personality Steve Dahl, SCTV, Steve Martin's Let's Get
Small, Woody Allen, The Credibility Gap, and Bob and Ray.
He visited Chicago's Second City Theater at the age of 14.
His younger brother is comedy writer Bill Odenkirk.
Career Work in television
Saturday Night Live: 1987–1991 Odenkirk was hired as a writer at Saturday
Night Live in 1987 and worked there through 1991.
Working alongside Robert Smigel and Conan O'Brien, he contributed to many sketches they
created, but felt uncertain of the efficacy of his own writing at the show.
He acted in several small roles on the show, most visibly during a 1991 parody commercial
for Bad Idea Jeans.
During his final year at SNL, he worked alongside Adam Sandler, David Spade, Chris Rock, and
Chris Farley, but eventually he decided to leave the show in order to pursue performing.
He has credited SNL with teaching him many lessons about sketch writing, from senior
writers like James Downey and Al Franken, as well as his friends Smigel and O'Brien.
When Saturday Night Live took its 1988 summer break, Odenkirk returned to Chicago to perform
a stage show with Smigel and O'Brien, titled Happy Happy Good Show.
The following summer he did a one-man show, Show-Acting Guy, directed by Tom Gianas.
During his final summer hiatus, he wrote and acted in the Second City Mainstage show, Flag
Burning Permitted in Lobby Only.
In that particular show, he wrote the character "Matt Foley, Motivational Speaker", for Chris
Farley, which would later be reprised on SNL.
Various writing and acting work: 1991–1994 In 1991, Odenkirk was hired to write for the
TV show Get a Life, which starred Late Night with David Letterman alumnus Chris Elliott.
Other notable writers on the show included Adam Resnick and Charlie Kaufman.
The show was short-lived, and in 1992, Odenkirk briefly wrote for The Dennis Miller Show.
Odenkirk's friendship with Ben Stiller, with whom he briefly shared an office at SNL, would
lead to him being hired for the cast of The Ben Stiller Show in 1992.
Working as both a writer and actor on the show, he created and starred in the memorable
sketch "Manson Lassie", and helped the show win an Emmy Award for writing.
However, the show had already been canceled by the time it won the award.
Odenkirk served as a writer on NBC's Late Night with Conan O'Brien for the show's first
two seasons.
Odenkirk met David Cross at Ben Stiller; shortly afterward, the pair began performing live
sketch shows, which eventually evolved into Mr. Show with Bob and David.
In 1993, Odenkirk began a recurring role on The Larry Sanders Show as Larry Sanders' agent,
Stevie Grant.
He would sporadically continue the character through 1998.
Also in 1993, Odenkirk had brief acting roles on Roseanne and Tom Arnold's The Jackie Thomas
Show.
Mr. Show: 1995–1998
Created by Odenkirk and David Cross, Mr. Show ran on HBO for 4 seasons, over 33 episodes.
The show featured a number of comedians in the early stages of their careers, including
Sarah Silverman, Paul F. Tompkins, Jack Black, Tom Kenny, Mary Lynn Rajskub, Brian Posehn
and Scott Aukerman.
While nominated for multiple Emmy awards in writing and generally well liked by critics,
it never broke out of a "cult" audience into larger mainstream acceptance.
After Mr. Show, Bob and David and the writers from the staff wrote the movie Run, Ronnie,
Run.
The film was an extension of a sketch from the first season of the show.
However, the studio took production control away from Cross and Odenkirk during the editing
stages, and the pair disowned the final product.
After Mr. Show: 1999–2008
Since Mr. Show, Odenkirk has acted in numerous television shows and some films.
He has written and produced many TV pilots, including The Big Wide World of Carl Laemke
and David's Situation, but none have made it to air or been picked up as a series.
In 2004, Odenkirk received an unsolicited package including the work of Tim Heidecker
and Eric Wareheim.
Inspired by their unique voice, he connected with them and helped them develop a semi-animated
show for Adult Swim called Tom Goes to the Mayor.
He assisted Tim and Eric with the development of their second series, Tim and Eric Awesome
Show, Great Job.
He has had a number of small featuring roles on TV shows, including Dr. Katz, Professional
Therapist, Seinfeld, NewsRadio, Just Shoot Me!, Joey, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Arrested
Development, Entourage, Weeds, and How I Met Your Mother.
He also appeared in Everybody Loves Raymond as Scott Preeman.
Odenkirk had been selected to be Michael Scott in the pilot of The Office but the producers'
original choice, Steve Carell, became available again and was cast instead.
Odenkirk finally guested in the final season of The Office as a Philadelphia manager strongly
reminiscent of Michael Scott.
Breaking Bad and other work: 2009–2014 In 2009, Odenkirk joined the cast of AMC's
Breaking Bad as corrupt lawyer Saul Goodman.
He appeared as a guest star in three episodes of the second season, and eventually became
a series regular for the seasons after and remained on the show until its final season.
It was announced on September 11, 2013 that AMC greenlit a spin-off series for Odenkirk's
character Saul Goodman from Breaking Bad, a prequel, highlighting Goodman before he
met Walter.
The show, Better Call Saul, is set to consist of one-hour episode formats.
In 2011, Odenkirk wrote and developed Let's Do This! for Adult Swim, starring as Cal Mackenzie-Goldberg
a "two-bit movie mogul and head of Cal-Gold Pictures as he leads a collection of crazy,
fame-hungry strivers chasing Hollywood dreams".
The pilot can be seen on Adult Swim's website.
Odenkirk executive produced the sketch comedy show The Birthday Boys which starred the comedy
group of the same name.
Odenkirk also appeared in and directed a number of the sketches on the show as well.
It premiered on IFC on October 18, 2013.
In 2014, Odenkirk played Police Chief Bill Oswalt in FX's miniseries Fargo.
Work in film Odenkirk's first roles in film were in such
films as Wayne's World 2, The Cable Guy, Can't Stop Dancing and Monkeybone, albeit in very
minor roles.
In 2003, Odenkirk directed Melvin Goes to Dinner and also played the role of Keith.
The film received positive reviews from critics and won the Audience Award at the SXSW Film
and Music Festival.
It was later self-released in five cities, then distributed on DVD by Sundance.
Odenkirk later directed Let's Go to Prison in 2006, written by Tom Lennon and Ben Garant
of The State and Reno 911 fame.
Let's Go to Prison starred Will Arnett, as well as Dax Shepard and Chi McBride.
The film had a negative response from critics, and bombed at the box office.
The following year Odenkirk directed The Brothers Solomon, written by Will Forte.
The film starred Forte, Will Arnett and Kristin Wiig.
The film was met with a similar reception as Let's Go to Prison and did overwhelmingly
badly at the box office.
After starring in Breaking Bad, Odenkirk began to have more prominent roles in critically
successful films such as The Giant Mechanical Man, The Spectacular Now, which received the
Special Jury Award for Acting at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival, and the Alexander
Payne-directed film Nebraska, which was nominated for a Palme d'Or at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival.
He also began to star more prominently in comedy films as well, such as Take Me Home
Tonight, Ass Backwards, Dealin' with Idiots and Hell & Back.
Odenkirk was one of the directors of the 2013 anthology comedy film Movie 43.
Personal life Odenkirk is married to Naomi Yomtov.
The couple has two children.
Filmography Television
Web References
Notes
Further reading Raftery, Brian.
"The Internet Owes Its Sense of Humor to This Man".
Wired.
Retrieved October 18, 2013.
External links Bob Odenkirk – official site
Bob Odenkirk at the Internet Movie Database