John Mulaney

Early life and education[edit]

Mulaney was born on August 26, 1982,^[7] in Chicago, Illinois, to Ellen Mulaney (née Stanton), a professor at Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law, and Charles "Chip" Mulaney Jr., an attorney and partner at Skadden Arps.^[7][8] His parents are both of Irish Catholic heritage.^{[9][10][11][12]} Mulaney's maternal great-grandparents were George J. Bates, a Republican mayor of Salem, Massachusetts, who also served as a congressman from that state, and Nora Jennings, who moved to the U.S. from Ballyhaunis, County Mayo.^[13] His maternal great-uncle is William H. Bates, who also served as a U.S. congressman.^[14][15] Coincidentally, Mulaney's maternal grandmother, Carolyn Stanton, and Hilary Meyers—mother of Mulaney's future Saturday Night Live coworker Seth Meyers—performed together in a hospital benefit show in Marblehead, Massachusetts, called Pills A-Poppin' directed by Tommy Tune, then 19.^[16][17]


Mulaney's parents attended Georgetown University and Yale Law School. They were at Georgetown and Yale at the same time as future president Bill Clinton (Mulaney has said he met Clinton in 1992).^[18][19] Growing up, Mulaney was an altar boy. He is the third of five children. He has an elder sister, an elder brother, a younger sister, and a younger brother who died at birth.^[20] His confirmation name is Martin, after St. Martin de Porres, to honor his late brother Peter Martin, who died when Mulaney was four.^[21][22]


From watching the lifestyle of the character Ricky Ricardo on the program I Love Lucy, Mulaney knew he wanted to go into show business at age five.^[23] At age seven, he was a member of the Chicago-based children's sketch group "The Rugrats".^[24] Because of this, Mulaney had an opportunity to audition for the role of Kevin in the film Home Alone, but his parents declined.^[10] For junior high, he attended St. Clement School^[25] where, in lieu of doing reports, he and his best friend, John O'Brien, would offer to perform what they had learned as a skit.^[10] At 14, Mulaney played Wally Webb in a production of Our Town.^[26] He also frequented the Museum of Broadcast Communications, where he watched archived episodes of shows such as I Love Lucy and The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson.^[10] He graduated from St. Ignatius College Prep in 2000. Mulaney then enrolled at his parents' alma mater, Georgetown University, where he majored in English and minored in theology.^[8][27] He joined the school's improv group, and met Nick Kroll and Mike Birbiglia.^[23] He later joined Birbiglia on his stand-up tour, which Mulaney cited as helping him overcome his stage fright.^[23]