Gilbert Gottfried, worth eight million dollars was an American stand-up comedian, actor, and voice artist. He was arguably best recognized for his parts in the Disney animated flicks "Aladdin," the PBS Kids Go! Show "Cyberchase," "Problem Child," and "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles," among others. For decades, he was a successful stand-up comedian who also provided his notably shrill voice to a number of video games and advertisements. Gilbert On February 28, 1955, Jeremy Gottfried was born in Brooklyn, New York. His mother, Lillian (née Zimmerman), was a stay-at-home mom, while his father, Max Gottfried, co-owned a hardware business with his father. The family did, in fact, reside above the hardware business. At age 15 years, Gilbert began his stand-up comedy career. After performing stand-up in New York City for a period and earning a reputation as "the comedian's comic," he was discovered by producers of "Saturday Night Live" in 1980, when the program was changing with new personnel and comedians. He was cast as a part of Season 6's cast. However, he earned relatively little exposure and seldom featured in skits throughout his 12 appearances on the program. He did have a few recurrent characters, including Leo Waxman on the talk show spoof "What's It All About?" and celebrity impersonations of David A. Stockman and the controversial filmmaker Roman Polanski. Unfortunately for Gottfried, his one season on "Saturday Night Live" was a tremendous flop. Though few, his performances were very impressive, and he and the program parted ways at the end of the year. Gottfried had a great break not long after quitting "Saturday Night Live" when the newly founded MTV network recruited him to do a series of improvised promos. The brief advertisements were a great success for the network's nascent audience and helped Gottfried get on their radar. His second major break came from Bill Cosby, who saw the MTV commercials and asked Gottfried to audition for a part on his NBC comedy, "The Cosby Show." Gottfried appeared on the successful program multiple times during the following several years. Furthermore, Gottfried, who had made shrieking and squinting his signature by this point, appeared on "Late Night With David Letterman," "Hollywood Squares," "The Howard Stern Show," and "The Tonight Show With Jay Leno" on a regular basis. He also presented his own late-night movie program, "USA Up All Night," for numerous years. He also gave the voice for the Aflac duck in a number of television commercials. Although he did not stay long on "Saturday Night Live," he has since gone on to have a successful career in the entertainment industry. He has played himself in many films, including "The Lindabury Story" (2009), "Beecher Baby Bouncer" (2013), "The Comedian's Guide to Survival" (2016), "Life, Animated" (2016), and "Gilbert" (2017). The latter is a film about his own life and work. "Gilbert Gottfried: Dirty Jokes," his own comedy special, was also a success (2008). His other job has been to do voice work for a lot of different projects and films. After "Aladdin" and "The Return of Jafar," he also voiced "Aladdin and the King of Thieves," "Mickey and the House of Bad Guys," and "Mickey and the House of Good Guys; Berkeley Beetle in "Thumbelina" (1994); Compulsive Dog in "Dr. Dolittle" (1998) (2017). He has also appeared alongside Donald J. Trump on reality television series such as "Celebrity Wife Swap" and "Celebrity Apprentice." Several times over his career, the often arrogant Gottfried drew criticism, such as when he made less-than-humanitarian jokes about the 9/11 attacks on New York City and the Japanese earthquake calamity. Gottfried met his wife during the Academy Awards party in the late 1990s. They married in 2007 and have two children: Lily, a girl, and Max, a boy.
