Early life

Cera was born in Brampton, Ontario. He is the son of Linda (née Cockman) and Luigi Cera, a technician. His father is Sicilian, and his mother has Irish, Dutch, Scottish, and English ancestry. His parents both worked for Xerox. Cera has an older sister, Jordan, and a younger sister, Molly. He became interested in acting after viewing Ghostbusters repeatedly when sick with the chicken pox at the age of three. He memorized all the dialogue and idolized Bill Murray. He enrolled in The Second City Toronto and took improvization classes.

He attended Conestoga Public School, Robert H. Lagerquist Senior Public School and Heart Lake Secondary School until grade nine, but then completed school online through grade twelve.

Acting

His first role was an unpaid appearance in a Tim Hortons summer camp commercial. That eventually led to a Pillsbury commercial in which he poked the Pillsbury Doughboy, his first role with lines.

"Arrested Development never felt safe. Even the first season, we did thirteen episodes, and we thought we'd never do a back nine. So I never thought in a million years we'd get to make three seasons. I was happy we got that far. I thought it was really good, and I'm really proud of it. I don't think we made a bad episode."

—Michael Cera, Esquire (2009)

Cera's career began when he was cast as Larrabe Hicks in the Canadian television series I Was a Sixth Grade Alien in 1999. In 2002, Cera played the young Chuck Barris in Confessions of a Dangerous Mind and he also provided the voice for Brother Bear in the 2002 Berenstain Bears animated series. Also in 2002, he was cast in The Grubbs, a new Fox TV series. It received a poor critical response, including an E! Online review that called it "the worst sitcom ever produced". He also voiced Josh Spitz in the cartoon Braceface. He played George Michael Bluth in the award-winning television series Arrested Development for three seasons before it was cancelled for six years. In 2005, he starred as Harold in the award winning short film Darling Darling, for which he was awarded Best Actor at the San Gio Festival in Verona, Italy. In 2006, he created and starred in a parody of Impossible is Nothing, a video résumé created by Aleksey Vayner. He also guest-starred in an episode of teen noir drama Veronica Mars - in the episode "The Rapes of Graff", which also featured Arrested Development co-star Alia Shawkat - and also in the Adult Swim series Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!.

Cera, along with best friend Clark Duke, wrote and starred in a series of short videos released on their website. The idea came from Duke, who was enrolled at Loyola Marymount University and did it for his film school studies. In 2007, they signed a deal with CBS Television to write, produce, direct, and act in a short-form comedy series entitled Clark and Michael. The show featured guest stars such as David Cross, Andy Richter and Patton Oswalt, and was distributed via CBS's new internet channel, CBS Innertube.

Cera also appeared in a staged comedy video that shows him being fired from the lead role of the film Knocked Up after belittling and arguing with the director, in a scene that mocks the David O. Russell blow up on the set of I Heart Huckabees.

Cera starred alongside Jonah Hill in the film Superbad, which was written by Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg. The film opened in North America on August 17, 2007. In November 2007, he hosted Saturday Night Live on strike, a live staged version of SNL not shown on television due to the 2007 Writers Guild of America Strike. Also in 2007, Cera co-starred in Juno as Paulie Bleeker, a teenager who impregnates his long-time school friend Juno (Ellen Page). For Superbad and Juno, Cera won Breakthrough Artist in the Austin Film Critics Association Awards 2007.

In 2007, Cera appeared in the comedy short "Drunk History", playing Alexander Hamilton in a comedic retelling of Hamilton's duel with Aaron Burr. Cera starred in the independent film Paper Heart. It was written by and co-starred Charlyne Yi, and premiered at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival where it won a screenwriting award. Cera and Yi composed the movie's soundtrack. He also starred alongside Jack Black in the 2009 comedy Year One. In 2009, Cera's first published short story, "Pinecone", appeared in McSweeney's Quarterly. In January 2010, Cera starred in a film adaptation of the novel Youth in Revolt, in the role of the lead character, Nick Twisp, and his destructive "supplementary persona", François Dillinger. Cera played the title character in the film adaptation of the graphic novel Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, released in August 2010.

In 2013, Cera starred in Magic Magic, a film directed by Sebastian Silva and filmed in Chile, for which he spent "five hours a day learning Spanish". He also worked with Silva in another Chilean film released in 2013 titled Crystal Fairy & the Magical Cactus. He played an exaggerated version of himself in the apocalyptic comedy film This Is the End, which was released in summer of 2013. Cera reprised his role of George Michael Bluth for the fourth season of Arrested Development in May 2013, which he was also a consulting producer on. According to press reports, Cera will appear in the Arrested Development film when it eventually goes into production.

Cera, along with Reggie Watts, Tim & Eric, and Sarah Silverman created the web-based comedy YouTube channel known as Jash, where he posts short films which he directs and stars in. Cera is part of the cast of Burning Love, a web spoof of ABC's The Bachelor and The Bachelorette.

In August 2014, Cera began a run of Kenneth Lonergan's This is Our Youth on Broadway, costarring with Kieran Culkin and Tavi Gevinson.

Music

In 2010 Cera contributed mandolin and backing vocals to the Weezer song "Hang On" from their album Hurley. Cera has also established himself as the touring bass player in Mister Heavenly, an indie rock band originating in the American northwest, and is a member of the band The Long Goodbye, along with Clark Duke. Cera also played bass and sang back up during songs in both Scott Pilgrim vs. the World and Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist.

He released his full-length debut album True That on August 8, 2014 through his official Bandcamp page. The album features 19 original tracks, a cover of Roderick Falconer's "Play It Again" as well as a cover of Blaze Foley's "Clay Pigeons."

In early 2015, Canadian musician, Alden Penner released, "Meditate", a track from his upcoming EP, Canada in Space, which features Cera. Penner subsequently announced that the EP would be released on 29 June 2015 on City Slang records, as well as a European tour of the UK, Netherlands, France and Germany, which featured Cera as both co-headliner and member of Penner's backing band.

Filmography

Film

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2000	Frequency	Gordy Hersch Jr. (Age 10)
	Steal This Movie!	America Hoffman (Age 7-8)
	Ultimate G's: Zac's Flying Dream	Young Zac
2002	Confessions of a Dangerous Mind	Chuck Barris (Age 8-11)
2007	Superbad	Evan
	Juno	Paulie Bleeker
2008	Extreme Movie	Fred
	Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist	Nick O'Leary
2009	Paper Heart	Himself
	Year One	Oh
2010	Youth in Revolt	Nick Twisp / François Dillinger
	Scott Pilgrim vs. the Animation	Scott Pilgrim (voice)	Short film
	Scott Pilgrim vs. the World	Scott Pilgrim
2012	The End of Love	Michael
	The Immigrant	Michael	Short film
2013	Arcade Fire in Here Comes The Night Time	Bartender; Grandmaster Mike	NBC Special
	Crystal Fairy & the Magical Cactus	Jamie
	Magic Magic	Brink	Also executive producer
	Brazzaville Teen-Ager	Gunther	Short film; also director and writer
	Failure	Man	Short film; also director and writer
	This Is the End	Himself
	Gregory Go Boom	Gregory	Short film
	Bitch	Himself	Short film; also director and writer
2014	Hits	Bennie
2015	Entertainment	Tommy
	A Very Murray Christmas	Jackie the Talent Agent
2016	Sausage Party	Barry (voice)	Post-production
	Human People		Post-production
2017	Blazing Samurai	Hank (voice)	In production
	The Lego Batman Movie	Robin (voice)	In production

Television

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1999	Twice in a Lifetime	Skateboarder #2	Episode: "The Blame Game"
1999-2001	I Was a Sixth Grade Alien	Larrabe Hicks	44 episodes
1999	Noddy	Butch	Episode: "Big Bullies"
1999	Switching Goals	Taylor	Television film
1999	What Katy Did	Dorry	Television film
2000	La Femme Nikita	Jerome	Episode: "He Came from Four"
2001	Braceface	Josh Spitz (voice)	12 episodes
2001	Doc	Max	2 episodes
2001	The Ripping Friends	Boy Boy (voice)	Episode: "Man Man and Boy Boy"
2001	Stolen Miracle	Brandon McKinley	Television film
2001	My Louisiana Sky	Jesse Wade Thompson	Television film
2001	The Familiar Stranger	Young Ted Welsh	Television film
2001	Walter and Henry	Crying Kid	Television film
2002-2005	The Berenstain Bears	Brother Bear (voice)	40 episodes
2003	Rolie Polie Olie	Little Gizmo (voice)	4 episodes
2003	Pecola	Robbie Rabbit (voice)	26 episodes
2003-2006 2013	Arrested Development	George Michael Bluth	63 episodes Consulting producer (season 4)
2005	Wayside	Todd (voice)	Episode: "Pilot"
2006	Veronica Mars	Dean Rudolph	Episode: "The Rapes of Graff"
2006	Tom Goes to the Mayor	Scrotch (voice)	Episode: "Undercover"
2007	Clark and Michael	Mikey Cera	Also creator, director, writer, producer
2007	Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!	Jamie Stevens	Episode: "Cats"
2008-2016	Childrens Hospital	Sal Viscuso (voice)	63 episodes
2012	The Simpsons	Nick (voice)	Episode: "The Daughter Also Rises"
2012; 2015	Comedy Bang! Bang!	Himself	2 episodes
2013; 2015	Drunk History	John Endicott/Morris Cohen	2 episodes
2014	Saturday Night Live	Surrogate	Episode: "Jonah Hill/Bastille"
2014	How and Why		Pilot
2015	Louie	Young Man	Episode: "Sleepover"
2015	Wet Hot American Summer: First Day of Camp	Jim Stansel	3 episodes
2017	Twin Peaks

Discography

Studio albums

• True That (2014)

Soundtrack

• Scott Pilgrim vs. the World: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (2010)

Awards and nominations

Year	Result	Award	Category	Nominee
2002	Nominated	Young Artist Award	Best Performance in a TV Movie or Special: Supporting Young Actor	My Louisiana Sky
2004	Won	TV Land Award	TV Land Future Classic Award	Arrested Development
2005	Nominated	Screen Actors Guild Award	Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series
2006	Nominated
2007	Won	Chicago Film Critics Association	Most Promising Performer	Juno
	Won	Austin Film Critics Association	Breakthrough Artist Award
	Won			Superbad
2008	Nominated	Critics' Choice Movie Awards	Best Young Actor
	Nominated			Juno
	Nominated		Best Acting Ensamble
	Nominated	Canadian Comedy Awards	Best Performance by a Male: Film	Superbad
	Nominated	MTV Movie Awards	Breakthrough Performance
	Nominated		Best Kiss	Juno
	Nominated		Best Male Performance
	Nominated	Satellite Awards	Best Actor in a Motion Picture: Comedy or Musical	Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist
	Nominated	Teen Choice Awards	Choice Movie Actor: Comedy	Superbad
	Nominated		Choice Movie Breakout: Male
	Nominated		Best Movie Actor: Comedy	Juno
	Nominated		Choice Movie Breakout: Male
	Nominated		Choice Comedian	Himself
2009	Nominated	British Academy Film Awards	Rising Star Award
	Nominated	Teen Choice Awards	Choice Movie Actor: Music/Dance	Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist
2010	Won	Satellite Awards	Best Actor in a Motion Picture: Comedy or Musical	Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
2011	Nominated	Teen Choice Awards	Choice Movie Actor: Action
2014	Nominated	Screen Actors Guild Awards	Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series	Arrested Development

[ Source: Wikipedia ]