Vincent Anthony Vaughn was born on March 28, 1970, in Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA, and was raised in Lake Forest, Illinois. His parents,
Vernon Vaughn (a salesman and character actor), and
Sharon Vaughn, née Sharon Eileen DePalmo (a real-estate agent and stockbroker) divorced in 1991. He has two older sisters,
Victoria Vaughn and
Valeri Vaughn. His recent ancestry includes Lebanese (from his paternal grandmother), Italian (from his maternal grandfather), English, Irish, German and Scottish. His mother was born in Brantford, Ontario.
Vince was interested in theater early on and grabbed a spot in a Chevy commercial. In 1988 he moved to Hollywood. He managed to hit a few spots on television, but his real goal was to make it to the big screen. He made his first credited role in the film
Rudy (1993) where he met his friend
Jon Favreau, who was writing a script detailing his life as an out-of-work actor. Vince was written into
Swingers (1996) by Jon to play the character of "Trent". He signed on just as a favor to his buddy, not
realizing it would be a career changing role. Though not a commercial success, it was a critical success in which
Steven Spielberg saw him and cast him in the big budget sequel
The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997). This role gave Vince the exposure he needed to become a movie star and, for the first time, choose the roles he wanted to take.
A Cool, Dry Place (1998) put him as a loving father,
Return to Paradise (1998) cast him as a man having to make a life or death decision to save a friend, and
Clay Pigeons (1998) cast him as an interesting serial killer. Since then his roles have been primarily in comedies such as
Old School (2003),
Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story (2004),
Wedding Crashers (2005), and
Couples Retreat (2009).