Half of arguably the second most-famous brother act in filmmaking (after the Coens), Peter Farrelly developed his comic chops competing for laughs around the family dinner table in Cumberland, Rhode Island. Together with his equally underachieving brother Bobby, he lived the slacker life to the hilt before moving to Los Angeles in 1985, landing a development deal with writing partner Bennett Yellin soon after. Bobby joined the process, and the brothers remained constantly employed, going from one deal to the next, though none of the movies ended up getting made. Peter did score a credit and some valuable insight to comedy writing with the Zucker brothers (among others) for the 1987 NBC special "Our Planet Tonight" before seeing his first novel, "Outside Providence", published the following year. The brothers' first big break, however, came when they scripted two 1992 episodes of NBC's wildly popular "Seinfeld". Having seen so many projects go down the developmental drain, he opted to direct his first feature, "Dumb and Dumber" (1994, written with Yellin and Bobby, who also served as a co-producer), despite the daunting fact that neither brother had ever picked up a camera.

Farrelly, who credits Mel Brooks' "Blazing Saddles" (1974), John Landis' "Animal House" (1978) and the breakthrough Abraham-Zucker brothers collaboration "Airplane!" (1980) as inspirations, had grown tired of smart aleck comic heroes who are wiser than everyone else. The brothers instead presented two doofus buddies and benefited from the hot streak of Jim Carrey, riding his coattails to improbable grosses, ultimately in excess of $300 million on an investment of $16 million. The low-brow "Dumb and Dumber" showcased Carrey (dumb) and Jeff Daniels (dumber) as they traveled cross-country to return a briefcase which, unbeknownst to them, contains a fortune in ransom money. Along the way, the stunts included the very politically incorrect selling of a dead bird to a crippled, blind kid and inadvertently giving a cop who has stopped them for speeding a beer bottle containing urine to drink. Though critics looked askance, the laid-back Farrellys had definitely cultivated a fun atmosphere in which their actors could work, and that real enjoyment translated to the screen, putting their careers on firm footing.

The brothers did less well with "Kingpin" (1996), which they co-directed but did not write, barely managing to recoup its $25 million budget. The fault may well have been with MGM's lackluster marketing (as Peter has claimed) since many critics (i.e., Roger Ebert) who had not exactly warmed to "Dumb and Dumber" came onboard, howling at the Farrellys' audacious vulgarity. Establishing their working method of Peter directing the actors from behind the camera while Bobby positioned himself at the monitor, they elicited first-rate performances from Woody Harrelson as a former bowling champion who bottoms out after losing his hand, Randy Quaid as the Amish prodigy he discovers and manages, and Bill Murray as the smug Ali of pro bowling, sporting an hilarious comb-over from hell. There were prosthesis jokes, bad-teeth jokes, ugly-women jokes and sight gags involving vomiting, not to mention throwaway jokes in the background, such as the performance of "The Jeffersons on Ice." In a nod to Don Knotts, another comic inspiration, an unseen person at the bowling tournament yells "Attaboy, Luther!", which also rang out in "The Ghost and Mr. Chicken" (1965) every time Knotts spoke in public. If they erred, the Farrellys erred on the side of tastelessness as they had intended.

Taking gross-out jokes to a whole new level in "There's Something About Mary" (1998), they struck box office gold again, delivering some truly outrageous gags that managed not to cross the line. (The Farrellys test their material on many audiences and cut the bits that fail the laugh-out-loud test.) First up was the magnificent money shot of Ben Stiller's private parts caught in a zipper, one which they milked relentlessly for every drop of humor available. There was silly slapstick involving the handicapped and lampooning of gay sex and serial murder, not to mention Matt Dillon's ludicrous overbite and two memorable scenes with a dog, one on sedatives, the other on speed. Perhaps best of all was that seminal film moment when Stiller answers the door with an egregious gob of ejaculate hanging from his ear, and Cameron Diaz mistakes it for styling mousse and puts it on her tresses, setting up the tremendous, sticky-hair follow-up. The Farrellys, who had geared their first two movies to sixteen-year-old males, had women splitting their sides with this questionable entry to the romantic comedy genre, proving that a picture can be far from perfect as long as it delivers in its big scenes.

For "Outside Providence" (1999), which they adapted from Peter's 1988 novel, the brothers stayed behind the scenes as producers, turning the reins over to fellow Rhode Islander Michael Corrente. Missing, however, from this coming-of-age story set during the 70s was the Farrellys' trademark zaniness, and Miramax's marketing campaign put the brothers in an awkward position. Miramax president Mark Gill defended his company's position to the LOS ANGELES TIMES (August 30, 1999): "The first job is to get an audience in . . . Every time we've done a screening for this movie, we've told audiences it's the outrageous new comedy from the Farrelly brothers . . . They see the movie and, far from being disappointed, they really like it. This is what gets them through the door and then once they see it, they're really satisfied. Is it a little bit different than we told them? Sure, but that's common." The studio's disingenuousness backfired, and the picture suffered at the box office, though it did manage to recoup its investment. The Farrellys then returned behind the camera for "Me, Myself and Irene" (2000), reteaming with the zany Carrey--as a multiple personality competing with himself for the love of a woman (Renee Zellweger) for more high art of the low brow, but while amusing the reteaming lacked the magic frission of the initial collaboration.

The brothers' critically drubbed half-animated outing "Osmosis Jones" (2001)--which followed the adventures of anhropomorphic germs and microbes inside the body of an ailing Bill Murray--ignited little interest at the box office, and their follow-up "Shallow Hal" (2001), which cast Jack Black as a cad who can suudenly only see the beautiful person inside of his obese girlfriend (Gwyneth Paltrow), was neither particularly funny nor especially offensive--the wan comedy failed to click on any level. Faring slightly better was "Stuck On You" (2003), with Matt Damon and Greg Kinnear cleverly cast as a set of conjoined twins, but the film's underperformance at the box office suggested that the novelty of the Farrelly's brand of comedy had grown stale. However, the siblings rebounded strongly when they set aside a lot of the slapstick and gross-out jokes and directed the warm romantic comedy "Fever Pitch" (2005), based on the Nick Hornby novel, which cast Drew Barrymore as a corporate climber whose idyllic romance with a sweet-natured school teacher (Jimmy Fallon) is threatened by his obsessive devotion to the Boston Red Sox. Even after having to change the ending when the Sox actually won the World Series during production, the film was an appealing and effective date film.