Biography

Eric Dane

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Overview

Born
November 9, 1972 · San Francisco, California, USA
Died
February 19, 2026 · Los Angeles, California, USA (complications from ALS)
Birth name
Eric William Dane
Nickname
- Dr. McSteamy
Height
6′ 1″ (1.85 m)

Mini bio

Eric Dane was born on November 9, 1972, in San Francisco, California, the older of two brothers. His father is an architect and interior designer based in San Francisco. His mother, Leah (Cohn), was a homemaker. His ancestry includes English, German, Finnish, Russian Jewish, and Austrian Jewish, and he had a Bar Mitzvah ceremony.

He was a good athlete in high school. There, he started amateur stage work by playing Joe Keller in Arthur Miller's "All My Sons", and realized that this was all he wanted to do.

He moved to Los Angeles and made his television debut in 1993 on The Wonder Years (1988). In his early career, he also played bit parts on the TV series Married... with Children (1987) (1995), Silk Stalkings (1991) (1996) and Roseanne (1988) (1996). He played medical doctors more than once, first appearing as a Dr. Cooper in Gideon's Crossing (2000). He was also recurring as Jason Dean in the hit show Charmed (1998). From 2006 until 2012, he appeared as handsome Dr. Mark Sloan, the plastic surgeon on the show Grey's Anatomy (2005). He is also starring as Tom Chandler on The Last Ship (2014).

He landed his first leading role on the big screen in the German-made feature, Open Water 2: Adrift (2006). He was also a co-star in Marley & Me (2008) and Valentine's Day (2010). In X-Men: The Last Stand (2006) he played the character of Jamie Madrox, the Multiple Man.

On October 29, 2004, in Las Vegas, Eric Dane married actress Rebecca Gayheart. They have two daughters.
- IMDb mini biography by: Steve Shelokhonov

Family

Spouse
Children
Parents
Relatives

Trivia

Had voluntarily checked himself into an L.A. rehab clinic to battle an addiction to painkillers [July 20, 2011].
He and his wife, Rebecca Gayheart, became the parents of a girl, Billie Beatrice Dane, on March 3, 2010, in Los Angeles.
Passed away on the 20th anniversary of his first appearance on Grey's Anatomy as Dr. Mark Sloan.
Best friends with Balthazar Getty and is the godfather of Getty's son, Cassius.
Birth of his second child, a daughter, Georgia Geraldine Dane on December 28, 2011.

Quotes

My skin is very sensitive.
Sometimes I feel like I'm lacking a playfulness. I envy guys who are consistently able to maintain a playful, optimistic perspective on things.
I do like to cook. But I only cook a few things, but those few things I do really well.
With a pilot, there's a lot of information that gets packed into 46 minutes or whatever it is. Usually what happens is that, throughout the season, you get to spend a little more quality time with the characters and get to know them a bit better, whether it's based on circumstance or relationships they've created with other characters.
Some of the greatest actors on the planet are the most insecure people. Now I don't know if that insecurity necessarily equates to a lack of confidence. Some people are just very shy individuals. You give them a character to play and a script, and you put them in front of a camera or on a stage, and they just go.