Harland Williams Canadian Actor From Toronto

Early life

Harland Michael Williams was born on 14 November 1962 in Toronto, Ontario. His mother, Lorraine Mary (nee O'Donnell), was a social worker and writer, and his father, John Reesor Williams, was a lawyer who sat in the Ontario legislature. Williams grew up in the Willowdale area of Toronto with four sisters. His brother Steve "Spaz" Williams works as a special effects artist, and the Barenaked Ladies keyboard player Kevin Hearn is his cousin.

He attended Senator O'Connor College School and then enrolled at Sheridan College in 1983, where he studied animation and media arts. During this period he sometimes worked as a forest ranger at Fort Frances. He later became an American citizen, around 2009, and is described as both a Canadian and an American performer.

Career

Williams began performing stand-up comedy in 1984 while still a student at Sheridan. He worked the Toronto circuit for seven years and then moved to Los Angeles in 1992. He has pointed to an appearance on Late Night with David Letterman in 1993 as a turning point. Jim Carrey drew the attention of the Farrelly brothers to him, and they cast him as a police officer in Dumb and Dumber (1994), his first film role. His stand-up has since been shown on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Late Night with Conan O'Brien, HBO and Comedy Central.

After Dumb and Dumber he starred in the short-lived sitcom Simon (1995) and appeared in Down Periscope (1996). He then starred in the Disney comedy RocketMan (1997), and had a part in Wag the Dog the same year. In 1998 he co-starred in Half Baked and played a hitchhiker in There's Something About Mary, the film that reached the largest worldwide box office of any title in his credits, at about 370 million dollars. Later film work includes Superstar (1999), Becoming Dick (2000), The Whole Nine Yards (2000), Freddy Got Fingered (2001), Sorority Boys (2002), Back by Midnight (2004), Because of Winn-Dixie (2005), Lucky 13 (2005), Employee of the Month (2006), Bachelor Party 2: The Last Temptation (2008), My Life in Ruins (2009) and Back in the Day (2014). Superstar and Freddy Got Fingered both feature Tom Green, with whom he has also appeared on Green's own internet show.

His voice has been used in a number of animated projects, including Gary & Mike, Robots (2005), Meet the Robinsons (2007), The Haunted World of El Superbeasto (2009) and Sausage Party (2016). He voiced the character Monster in Nickelodeon's Robot and Monster, and he played Warwick the Warlock in the Disney direct-to-video film Spooky Buddies (2011). Slacker Cats (2007) is among his television credits, and in August 2012 he started filming Package Deal, a thirteen-part comedy series for Citytv in Vancouver in which he stars. In 2019 he is credited as a writer on the film Trouble.

Williams also created the Disney Junior animated series Puppy Dog Pals, which began in 2017 and ran until 2023. He is the author and illustrator of several children's books, among them a series about a dinosaur called Lickety Split, as well as books for adults. His weekly podcast, The Harland Highway, is free, and he has been a frequent guest on the Adam Carolla Podcast, where he is known for imitating birds. His YouTube channel had about 193,000 subscribers in September 2025.

Recognition

In 2007 he won the award for best improviser on an episode of the NBC series Thank God You're Here.

Personal life

Williams was married to Wendi Kenya from 1993 until their divorce in 2001.