Adam DeVine

Early life

DeVine was born in Waterloo, Iowa, the son of Dennis and Penny DeVine. He graduated from Millard South High School in Omaha, Nebraska, in 2002.

He attended Orange Coast College, along with friend and fellow cast member Blake Anderson. He later moved to Los Angeles, where he began working as a stand up comedian and actor.

1995 accident

In June 1995, when he was 11 years old, DeVine was walking his bike across 144th and Harrison Street in Omaha, Nebraska with his two friends. One of his friends went first across the street, shouting "come on" to Devine. Devine misconstrued this as meaning "the coast was clear" and began crossing the street. On the road, there were 3 cement trucks going across nearest to Devine up a hill. When Devine waited for the trucks to pass and walked across the street, unbeknownst to him, there were 2 cement trucks coming on the other side of the road going down. Due to the sizes of the three cement trucks, the fourth cement truck was blocked from Devine's view.

He was struck by the 42 ton cement truck and went under the first two wheels of the truck before sliding 500 feet across the street as a result of the force of the hit. The trauma was so severe that it knocked him unconscious, placed him in a coma and caused him to suffer from acute shock. He was rushed to intensive care, where he woke up two weeks later. He broke all the bones in both his legs, had a collapsed lung and developed multiple infections, a rare condition affecting just 1-3% of patients. All in all, he required 26 surgeries over many years. It was a several-year process to walk without the assistance of crutches or walkers, and he spent his majority of recovery in a wheelchair. Due to his extensive injuries, DeVine was at very-high risk of having to have his legs amputated. Miraculously, he regained full mobility, but still has excessive scarring on his legs to this day.

"It was really tough because I had to relearn how to walk, stand up, sit up and everything. The legs were totally mangled. I think that experience helped me realize that anything is possible."

It was later discovered that the only reason that DeVine survived was that his bike was on the right side of his body, and thus took the full force of the truck. He credits the experience in making him realize that he wanted to do comedy.

Career

In 2006, DeVine and friends Blake Anderson, Anders Holm, and Kyle Newacheck formed the sketch-comedy group Mail Order Comedy. Although they toured together live, the group found greater success on websites such as Myspace and YouTube. The G4 series Attack of the Show! featured "Wizards Never Die", a music video by Mail Order Comedy (as The Wizards), in April 2008. Purple Magic, a music album by The Wizards containing 14 tracks, was released on April 1, 2009. Comedy Central's original series Workaholics premiered on April 6, 2011, and stars DeVine, Anderson, and Holm and co-stars Newacheck, all of whom also serve as series creators and executive producers.

DeVine had small roles in Mama's Boy (2007) and National Lampoon's 301: The Legend of Awesomest Maximus (2009). He had a recurring role on the television series Samantha Who?. He also appeared on an episode of the Fox show Traffic Light (2011). In season 4 of Community (2013), he played a small role as William Winger, Jr., Jeff's half-brother. In the first episode of Arrested Development's fourth season, he played an airport ticket attendant alongside his Workaholics co-stars. He co-starred as Bumper Allen in the 2012 musical comedy film Pitch Perfect. For this performance, he won a Teen Choice Award for Choice Movie Villain and earned one nomination for Choice Movie Breakout. He reprised the role of Bumper in the film's sequel Pitch Perfect 2 (2015).

DeVine has appeared in the SimCity video game trailers as The Mayor. DeVine is the voice artist for the character Pizza Steve in the Cartoon Network animated series Uncle Grandpa, which premiered on September 2, 2013. He stars in his own Comedy Central series, Adam DeVine's House Party, which debuted in October 2013. He also appears in a recurring role in seasons 5, 6 and 7 of the ABC network sitcom Modern Family as Andy, the Pritchett family's nanny. In 2016, he starred alongside Zac Efron, playing brothers, in the comedy film Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates. In June 2016, it was announced that Devine, Anderson, Holm and Newacheck are working on a film with Seth Rogen as producer. He later made a cameo appearance in the video for the 2016 Blink-182 song "She's Out of Her Mind".

In May 2016, DeVine was cast as the lead Noah Ashby in a romantic comedy When We First Met, which he also co-wrote. He stars along the film with Alexandra Daddario, Shelley Hennig and Robbie Amell.

On November 2 2016, DeVine was cast as the lead of Walt Disney Pictures family-film Magic Camp, alongside Jeffrey Tambor and Gillian Jacobs. DeVine plays Andy Tuckerman, a failed magician who goes back to the camp of his youth to mentor a rag-tag bunch of magicians. Principal photography began in December, 2016 around Los Angeles. The film is scheduled for release April 6, 2018.

in May, 2017, DeVine was cast alongside Rebel Wilson and Liam Hemsworth in the rom-com Isn't It Romantic. This film marks the fourth time that he and Rebel have played love interests, after Workaholics, Pitch Perfect and Pitch Perfect 2.