Mark Ruffalo is one of the most talented actors of his generation, having been nominated for an Academy Award a whopping 3 times. He has brought to life some of the most memorable characters in cinema and has been lauded for his work by critics and audiences alike.
Having starred in everything from the Oscar-winning movie Spotlight to Hollywood blockbusters such as Avengers Assemble, it is clear that Ruffalo’s career has gone from strength to strength.
However, behind the scenes, his personal life has been marked by many heartbreaking tragedies, from financial troubles to family deaths.
Although you may have assumed the Shutter Island star grew up wealthy, that is far from the truth. In fact, he told Men’s Journal that his family went bankrupt when he was just out of high school.
“Within six months, we went from normal to bankrupt and eliminated as a family,” he revealed, per Nicki Swift, after they moved from Virginia to San Diego. Then, his father packed his bags and headed back East to Wisconsin, leaving Ruffalo behind with his mum and brothers.
He has also revealed in the past that he dealt with anger issues in his subsequent years.
“You should have seen me in my 20s,” he shared when discussing the similarities between himself and his Hulk character. “I was the poster definition of an angry young man with a persecution complex … I was struggling as a young actor, suffering through imagined or real slights from other people’s hands. So it wasn’t too hard to revisit those places.”
But then, in 2001 after wrapping up work on The Last Castle, the actor was dealt another blow when he was diagnosed with a brain tumour.
Although the tumour was benign, the surgery required to remove it left Ruffalo with multiple issues, including facial paralysis and loss of hearing. The paralysis eventually subsided a year later, but he still remains deaf in one of his ears.
One of the most tragic episodes of the Foxcatcher actor’s life was the death of his brother, Scott.
In 2008, Scott was found dead in his Beverly Hills apartment, the victim of a gunshot wound. The death of the thirty-nine-year-old hairdresser was ruled a homicide by the Los Angeles County Coroner’s Office, but it remains unsolved to this day.
“You never get over it; you just get used to it,” the fifty-five-year-old actor said in reference to his brother’s tragic death, per Us Magazine. “You get calloused, a little bit harder maybe, so be on guard for that. But take these tragic things and turn them into something meaningful and worthy of the loss. Make it count.”
