Donnie Wahlberg

Donnie Wahlberg Headshot

Singer • Actor

Birth Date: August 17, 1969

Age: 54 years old

Birth Place: Dorchester, Boston, Massachusetts

Spouses: Jenny McCarthy

Siblings: Mark Wahlberg, Paul Wahlberg

A teen idol in the late 1980s and early 1990s as one-fifth of the boy band, New Kids on the Block, Donnie Wahlberg successfully reinvented himself as an actor years later with gritty and demanding turns in "The Sixth Sense" (1999), "Ransom" (1996), "Band of Brothers" (HBO, 1998) and "Saw II" (2005). The pop group topped the charts for an enormously successful but brief run; after their demise in 1994, he followed his brother Mark Wahlberg's lead and moved into acting, where he quickly defined himself as the screen version of his "bad boy" persona from his New Kids tenure. But an astonishing turn as an unhinged mental patient in "Sixth Sense" showed that Wahlberg was more than just another pop star flirting with acting, and he was soon an in-demand character actor in numerous projects in which he frequently played cops and other tough types who suffered in silence. A surprise reunion of the New Kids proved a hit in 2008, but Wahlberg kept his feet firmly planted in acting, predominately in television. In doing so, he joined the short but substantive list of former musicians whose talent carried over to other mediums.

Born Donald Edmond Wahlberg, Jr. in the predominately white and Irish Boston suburb of Dorchester, MA, he was the eighth of nine children born to teamster Donald Wahlberg, Sr., and his wife, Alma, a bank clerk and nurse's aide. Music was part of his life from an early age. At 12, he started his first band, and was a staple of the drama club and other performance-based activities in high school. All served well to distract Wahlberg from the turmoil of his home life; his parents divorced when he was 12, and he, along with younger brother Mark, went to live with his mother, while other siblings moved in with their father. While in high school, Wahlberg was persuaded to audition for a new singing group that local impresario Maurice Starr was organizing; Starr had previously struck pay dirt with an all-black R&B group called New Edition, and was looking to repeat the same success with a white lineup. Wahlberg immediately impressed Starr with his abilities, which included singing, rapping, dancing and a stage presence that was well beyond his teenage years. Wahlberg would form the core of what would eventually become New Kids on the Block by recruiting the other members - brother Mark, his friend Danny Wood, classmate Jordan Knight and his brother Jonathan, and Joey McIntyre, who ultimately replaced Mark Wahlberg - and providing the band with its name.

After a slow start, the New Kids eventually became a massive hit with preteen female audiences, who responded with a gospel-like fervor to their squeaky-clean pop harmonies and clean-cut appearances. They would amass three Top Five albums and 10 Top 20 singles over the course of their career, as well as merchandise sales in excess of $400 million. Their time at the top, however, was short-lived; by 1994, the group had shifted their focus to a more urban, hip-hop-driven sound which clashed mightily with the heartthrob persona their fan base had grown to adore. Critical reaction, which had never been less than dismissive, grew virulent in its scorn for the group, and by 1994, they had plummeted from stadium tours to club dates. With the writing more than apparent on the wall, New Kids on the Block disbanded in 1994, with each member seeking their solo fortune in a wide variety of mediums.

Though devoted to the New Kids, Wahlberg in particular always seemed to recoil from their bubble gum image, seeking instead to lend some grit to their stage personas. On occasion, he took the wrong tack in attempting to garner street creed - he was charged with attempted arson after setting fire to a hotel hallway in Kentucky in 1991 - but channeled his frustrations in other venues; most notably as producer and co-writer of brother Mark's own music career as Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch, who scored a No. 1 hit with 1991's hit single "Good Vibrations." When Mark Wahlberg eventually switched gears to become a popular model and actor, Donnie followed suit, and made his acting debut in the minor urban crime drama "Bullet" (1996) with Mickey Rourke and Tupac Shakur. Having perfected his stage glower in countless music videos and photo layouts, Wahlberg soon became a go-to for various hoods, street gangsters and other nefarious types.

Most of his early roles were stock characters - a drug dealer in the low-budget horror film "Black Circle Boys" (1997); the repellant, violence-prone Mr. Grey in a TV movie remake of "The Taking of Pelham One Two Three" (ABC, 1998). However, Wahlberg occasionally lent an unexpected wrinkle of vulnerability to these roles. In the Mel Gibson thriller "Ransom" (1996), his small time crook, Cubby Barnes, could not bring himself to go along with a vicious kidnap scheme involving Gibson's son, which in effect, spelled his own doom. That degree of humanity served him well in his breakthrough performance in "The Sixth Sense" (1999).

Many moviegoers were shocked to discover that the emaciated, hysterical figure that threatened Bruce Willis at the beginning of the supernatural thriller was Wahlberg, who lost 43 pounds to play the shell-shocked mental patient, Vincent Grey. He received stellar reviews for his performance, which in turn brought more substantial roles his way. Wahlberg soon settled into a blend of his early screen persona with shades of Vincent Grey: men of action and determination who struggled with psychological and emotional wounds. Some of his characters were out-and-out heroes, like the formidable World War II paratrooper Carwood Lipton, whom he portrayed in the HBO miniseries "Band of Brothers" (1998), while others were adults in training, like his juvenile gem salesman in the critically acclaimed indie "Diamond Men" (2000), in which he held his own against one of the best character actors in the business, Robert Forster. There were even returns to his "Sixth Sense" character in the form of Duddits, a mentally challenged young man who proved to be the final line of defense against a bizarre alien menace in Lawrene Kasdan's disastrous adaptation of Stephen King's "Dreamcatcher" (2003).

For the most part, though, Wahlberg personified an astonishing number of troubled cops in a wide variety of features and on television series. The best of these was perhaps Los Angeles detective Joel Stevens, whose taciturn exterior concealed his agony over his wife's suicide, in the Emmy-nominated drama, "Boomtown" (NBC, 2002-03) Unfortunately, the series failed to find an audience, so Wahlberg's best-known screen cop became the ill-fated Detective Eric Matthews in "Saw II" (2005), "Saw III" (2006) and "Saw IV" (2007). A rule-breaker with a penchant for violence, Matthews' past indiscretions, which included planting false evidence, landed him on the killer Jigsaw's list of individuals needing a hard lesson in morals. Matthews was kept alive as a lure for other police officers before meeting a grisly fate in the fourth film in the franchise. There were also supporting turns as sturdy lawmen in "Righteous Kill" (2008), where he teamed with Robert De Niro and Al Pacino to track a serial killer, and the little seen but well-received "What Doesn't Kill You" (2009), which brought him back to his native South Boston.

Television soon became Wahlberg's main showcase, affording him larger and even leading roles in projects like "Runaway" (The CW, 2006) and "The Path to 9/11" (ABC, 2006). The former cast him as an attorney falsely accused of a crime who then flees the law with his family in tow, while the latter - a controversial depiction of the political intrigue that led up to the tragic events of Sept. 11, 2001 - had Wahlberg as a composite of various government agents who pursued Osama bin Laden. He also starred in Spike TV's first dramatic series "The Kill Point" (2007) as a police negotiator dealing with Iraq War vet John Leguizamo as he held hostages during an attempted bank robbery.

In 2008, Wahlberg reunited with the four original members of New Kids on the Block to record a new album and launch a world tour. Previous attempts to bring the group together in 1999 and 2004 had failed due to scheduling conflicts, but Wahlberg threw himself into reuniting with his bandmates after the collapse of his nine-year marriage to Kim Fey, which had produced two children. The resulting album, 2008's The Block, debuted at No. 1 and prompted a world tour that netted $34 million. Though nowhere near the level of popularity they had achieved in their initial run as pop stars, the New Kids proved to be a modest hit with their diehard fans, who returned for subsequent reunion tours in 2010 and 2011. Meanwhile, Wahlberg remained active on television, appearing in three episodes of "Rizzoli & Isles" (TNT, 2010-16) as police detective Angie Harmon's lieutenant and longtime competition, then segueing into a series regular role on the CBS police drama, "Blue Bloods" (2010- ), as a detective whose father (Tom Selleck) and siblings all work in law enforcement. While continuning his work on that series, Donnie Wahlberg starred with his two brothers on the reality series "Wahlbergers" (A&E 2014- ), about their family-owned fast food restaurant in Hingham, Massachusetts.

Credits

Spellers

Executive Producer
Movie
2023

CBS Mornings

Guest
News
2021

The Kelly Clarkson ShowStream

Guest
Talk
2019

Wahlburgers: Wahl of Fame

Self
Show
2019

Very Scary PeopleStream

Host
Reality
2019

Anything Is Possible: The Story of the 2008 Celtics

Narrator
Show
2018

STEVE on Watch

Guest
Talk
2017

Live with Kelly and Ryan

Guest
Talk
2017

Return of the Mac

Actor
Donnie
Show
2017

Return of the Mac

Executive Producer
Show
2017

Harry

Guest
Talk
2016

Wahlburgers: Extra Helping

Self
Show
2016

The Late Show With Stephen ColbertStream

Guest
Talk
2015

Rock This Boat: New Kids on the Block

Self
Show
2015

Donnie Loves JennyStream

Executive Producer
Reality
2015

Donnie Loves JennyStream

Self
Reality
2015

Frères d'armes

Actor
2nd Lt. C. Carwood Lipton
Show
2014

WahlburgersStream

Executive Producer
Reality
2014

WahlburgersStream

Self
Reality
2014

The Arsenio Hall Show

Guest
Show
2013

Boston's Finest

Executive Producer
Show
2013

Live! With Kelly and Michael

Guest
Talk
2012

CBS This Morning

Guest
Show
2012

LIVE with Kelly

Guest
Talk
2011

The Marilyn Denis Show

Guest
Show
2011

Jordan Knight Feat. Donnie Wahlberg: Stingy

Music Performer
Show
2011

ZookeeperStream

Actor
Shane
Movie
2011
14%

The Talk

Guest
Talk
2010

Blue BloodsStream

Actor
Danny Reagan
Series
2010

Blue BloodsStream

Director
Series
2010

Access Hollywood Live

Guest
Show
2010

Rizzoli & IslesStream

Guest Star
Lt. Joey Grant
Series
2010

30 for 30Stream

Narrator
Series
2009

The Dr. Oz Show

Guest
Talk
2009

Watch What Happens Live With Andy CohenStream

Guest
Talk
2009

Late Night With Jimmy Fallon

Guest
Talk
2009

The Wendy Williams Show

Guest
Talk
2008

In Plain SightStream

Guest Star
Jimmy McCabe / Jimmy Porter
Series
2008

Righteous Kill

Actor
Detective Riley
Movie
2008

What Doesn't Kill YouStream

Actor
Det. Moran
Movie
2008
66%

What Doesn't Kill YouStream

Screenwriter
Movie
2008
66%

The Kill PointStream

Actor
Capt. Horst Cali
Series
2007

Dead Silence

Actor
Det. Lipton
Movie
2007

Kings of South Beach

Actor
Andy Burnett
Movie
2007

Runaway

Actor
Paul Rader/Jim Holland
Show
2006

Rachael Ray ShowStream

Guest
Talk
2006

The Path to 9/11

Actor
Show
2006

etalk

Guest
Show
2006

Annapolis

Actor
Lt. Cmdr. Burton
Movie
2006

Marilyn Hotchkiss' Ballroom Dancing and Charm School

Actor
Randall Ipswitch
Movie
2005

Saw IIStream

Actor
Eric Matthews
Movie
2005
37%

The Insider

Guest
Show
2004

Dreamcatcher

Actor
Duddits
Movie
2003

Boomtown

Actor
Det. Joel Stevens
Series
2002
96%

Triggermen

Actor
Terry Malloy
Movie
2002

UC: Undercover

Guest Star
Show
2001

Band of BrothersStream

Actor
2nd Lt. C. Carwood Lipton
Miniseries
2001
97%

Big Apple

Actor
Chris Scott
Show
2001

Live With Regis and Kelly

Guest
Show
2001

Bullfighter

Actor
Chollo
Movie
2000

Diamond Men

Actor
Bobby Walker
Movie
2000

The Early Show

Guest
Show
1999

The Daily Show With Jon StewartStream

Guest
Talk
1999

Purgatory

Actor
Deputy Glen/Billy The Kid
Movie
1999

The Sixth SenseStream

Actor
Vincent Grey
Movie
1999
86%

The Split

Actor
Booker
Movie
1998

Oscuro Amanecer

Actor
Movie
1998

Body Count

Actor
Booker
Movie
1998

The Taking of Pelham One Two Three

Actor
Mr. Grey
Movie
1998

Butter

Actor
Rick Damon
Movie
1998

Southie

Actor
Danny Quinn
Movie
1998

The View

Guest
Talk
1997

The PracticeStream

Guest Star
Series
1997

Black Circle Boys

Actor
Greggo
Movie
1997

Ransom

Actor
Cubby Barnes
Movie
1996
74%

Entertainment Tonight

Guest
News
1981

Good Morning America

Guest
News
1975

Today

Guest
News
1952

News aboutDonnie Wahlberg

Tom Selleck as Frank Reagan — 'Blue Bloods' Season 13

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‘Blue Bloods’ Celebrates Its 250th Episode & It’s Business as Usual (RECAP)

Tom Selleck as Frank in Blue Bloods
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The ‘Blue Bloods’ Cast Answers Your Burning Questions Ahead of Episode 250

Will Estes and Vanessa Ray on Blue Bloods set with cupcakes
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What to Expect From ‘Blue Bloods’ Episode 250 (and Beyond)

Will Estes, Vanessa Ray, Bridget Moynahan, Tom Selleck, Donnie Wahlberg, Andrew Terraciano, Len Cariou in Blue Bloods

‘Blue Bloods’ Episode 250: Sneak Peek at the Reagans’ Milestone Family Dinner (PHOTOS)

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‘Blue Bloods’: Jimmy Buffett to Guest Star — Get a First Look (PHOTOS)

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Why We Still Love Family Dinners on ‘Blue Bloods’

Tom Selleck as Frank in Blue Bloods

See How the ‘Blue Bloods’ Cast Has Changed Since Their First Seasons (PHOTOS)

Blue Bloods Season 12
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‘Blue Bloods’ Star Will Estes Previews a Threat to Danny: ‘There Is Real Danger’

Donnie Wahlberg as Danny in Blue Bloods
Spoiler Alert

‘Blue Bloods’ Season 12 Premiere: Frank vs. Mayor Chase, Plus a Change for Danny (RECAP)

Tom Selleck as Frank Reagan, Dylan Walsh as Mayor Peter Chase in Blue Bloods
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‘Blue Bloods’ Season 12: Will Frank Retire? Which Guest Stars Are Returning?

Band of Brothers

11 Big Stars Who Appeared in ‘Band of Brothers,’ Now 20 Years Old

The Reagans at Family Dinner in Blue Bloods

‘Blue Bloods’: Frank & Mayor Chase Face Off in the Season 12 Premiere (PHOTOS)

Blue Bloods Season 11 Danny Baez Wahlberg Ramirez

Why You Shouldn’t Expect Danny & Baez to Be the Next ‘Blue Bloods’ Romance

Donnie Wahlberg and Jenny McCarthy in The Masked Singer - Season 5 Cluedle Doo

Donnie Wahlberg Talks Wife Jenny McCarthy Not Recognizing Him on ‘The Masked Singer’

Tom Selleck Blue Bloods Season 11 Finale Frank Reagan
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‘Blue Bloods’ Boss on Joe Hill’s Future, the Reagans’ Tension & Early Plans for Season 12

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‘Blue Bloods’ Season 11 Brings a New Family Member to Sunday Dinner

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Donnie Wahlberg on a ‘More Mindful’ ‘Blue Bloods’ in an Era of Police Brutality Protests

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Donnie Wahlberg on Why We’re Fascinated with Serial Killers

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