Actor Steve Zahn’s roots were on the dramatic stage, which might have seemed surprising considering his big screen comedy career playing inept sidekicks in films like “Out of Sight” (1998), “Happy, Texas” (1999), and “Riding in Cars with Boys” (2001). But the appeal of Zahn’s comic relief was the realism and vulnerability he lent his oddball misfits, and as he aged into new territory with Werner Herzog’s “Rescue Dawn” (2007) and the epic Western “Comanche Moon” (CBS, 2007), it became clear that his light touch belied an actor with a much wider range than “stoner bud.”

Steve Zahn was born on