Tom Scharpling was born on 9th of February in Dunellen, New Jersey in 1969. He grew up being obsessed with the show, Saturday Night Live, and SCTV. He studied at Middlesex Community College, Middlesex High School, and Trenton State College. He has a degree in English. From 1979 to 1999, he worked in Summit, New Jersey at a music shop called World of Music.
The director is mostly influenced by Saturday Night Live, Martin Short and Chris Elliott. In the early 1990s, he used to volunteer at the freeform station WFMU and was the publisher of 18 Wheeler fanzine but left the station in the late 1990s due to his family problems. He also ran independent record label named 18 Wheeler fanzine.
In 1992, Portastatic’s first 7 single was released by Scharpling’s label. He also contributed in the liner notes, in The Electrifying Conclusion sung by Guided By Voices. On October 10, 2000, he hosted the first episode of The Best Show on WFMU. He did not make any money from the show but encouraged people to donate to the station. Most of the episodes have collaborated with Superchunk drummer Jon Wurster. As a duo, they have released six albums of comedy segments from The Best Show. They have never performed live except in 2010, they hosted Matador Records 21st Anniversary Festival in Las Vegas.
The director has also been listed at no. 11 as Never Not Funny comedians by GQ magazine and titled him The funniest men you haven’t heard of yet. Scharpling announced that the final episode of The Best show was to be aired on December 17, 2013, on October 29, 2013. On October 10, 2014, he announced through Twitter that The Best Show would return again in November 2014. The first episode of The Best Show in its new format was aired via thebestshow.net. For your kind information, he is even considered as the godfather of podcasting.
In early 2006, it began podcasting without music and was offered as downloadable files for audiences to spread the show in the wider range. For the series, Monk he was the first writer to be hired. He has also been a writer for Saturday Night Live, NBC’s Celebrity Apprentice, GQ, Harp and SLAM Magazine, Tom Goes to the Mayor and Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job! He has also given his voice to many series like Adventure Time, Aqua Teen Hunger Force (The Shaving), for an animated series Steven Universe and Adventure Time and ), Aqua Teen Hunger Force Volume 3 DVD.
The talented director has also directed a number of music videos including for the Green Day’s American Idiot musical and Bottled in Cork for Ted Leo. He has also directed a video for "The New Pornographers" but was unable to appear in short so as a solution to it, he created a short fake biopic about "The New Pornographers with many comedy celebrities portraying the various members of the band. He has directed video for Aimee Mann as well for a song, Labrador.
Tom has also worked with many other artists like The Ettes, The Stepkids, Wild Flag, Real Estate and Titus Andronicus. Scharpling has directed and co-written the web trailer aired on Funny or Die and for John Hodgman’s book, That is All in 2011. He has also starred as the guest in A Room With a Feud in Judge John Hodgeman, the comedy show hosted by John Hodgman.
Moving on to his personal life, he does not talk much about it. There’s not much news about his wife and no news about his children. Tom Scharpling is married to WFMU DJ Terre T. He has been a pescatarian since 1994. He almost never consumes alcohol. His career is bright as he has shown his talent through many shows and magazines. Being a multi-talented person, he knows how to maintain his level of work along with being responsible towards a family.
No physical information about him is available so his exact height and weight are unknown. His net worth and salary are unknown. But looking at his work, we can say that he is living very comfortably with his family. His bio is on many wiki sites including Wikipedia and IMDb.
Talking about his Twitter, he has over 900 followers and on Instagram, he has over 8 thousand followers. He is also active on Facebook.
by Bchrome, 08 Jul, 2016
