D'Elia started acting in high school and had some guest roles on
Chicago Hope. He attended
New York University and studied acting, but dropped out after a year because he did not like college. D'Elia has been performing stand-up comedy since 2006. His first set was at the Ha Ha Café in
North Hollywood. which ran for one season on
TBS. He was initially cast only for the pilot and was later made a series regular. D'Elia was one of three hosts of the
Ten Minute Podcast (2012–2015), along with
Bryan Callen and
Will Sasso. Since February 2017, he has hosted the weekly podcast ''Congratulations with Chris D'Elia'', which has charted in the top 20 comedy podcasts in multiple countries. Listeners of the podcast are often referred to as 'Babies'. Other podcasts have been heavily influenced by his style, including
The Fighter and the Kid. D'Elia also gained over 2 million followers on
Vine. In January 2013, D'Elia released his debut parody rap album, as MC "Chank Smith", called
Such Is Life (produced by
Mr. Green). On December 6, 2013, D'Elia's first one-hour stand-up special,
White Male Black Comic, aired on Comedy Central. He has had three subsequent comedy specials:
Incorrigible (2015),
Man On Fire (2017), and
No Pain (2020), all of which aired on
Netflix. These were directed by his father, D'Elia had a lead role in the 2014–2016 NBC sitcom
Undateable as Danny Burton, a ladies' man whose friends are all in one way or another "undateable". The show often incorporated improvisation, with a cast of stand-up comics who were friends before the show. In 2015, executive producer
Bill Lawrence and comics from the cast (D'Elia,
Brent Morin,
Ron Funches and
Rick Glassman) went on a series of stand-up tour dates to promote the show. In 2016, D'Elia headlined the
Leafly 420 Comedy Tour show in Chicago with special guest
Ron Funches. In March 2019, it was announced that D'Elia had been cast in the recurring role of Henderson on the second season of the
Netflix thriller series
You. On an April 2018 episode of his
Congratulations podcast, D'Elia imitated rapper
Eminem and made fun of Eminem's middle-aged fans, while conceding that Eminem was "one of the best rappers of all time". Positive reaction to that imitation led D'Elia to imitate Eminem's rapping again in videos he posted online in September 2018 (in his car) and January 2019 (in his garage). In February 2019, Eminem posted the garage video on his
Twitter account, writing, "This is INCREDIBLE!!! 4 a second I actually thought it WAS me!!" The May 2019 single "
Homicide" by
Logic featuring Eminem then included an audio clip from the car video at the end of the song. D'Elia said that it was a "huge honor" to be included in the song and that he did not ask for any royalties. D'Elia then had a substantial role in the
music video for the song, released in June 2019, which had each rapper's part performed/lip-synced by someone else: Logic's part was performed by actor
Chauncey Leopardi (in reference to a humorous
internet meme that claimed that the two were the same person), Eminem's part was performed by D'Elia, and D'Elia's part was performed by Eminem, mimicking the appearance of D'Elia in the car video. In August 2020, it was officially announced that D'Elia would be replaced by
Tig Notaro in
Army of the Dead (2021). Trailers for the film were released in April 2021 with Notaro in place of D'Elia. On January 13, 2022,
Brendan Schaub and
Theo Von added D'Elia to their weekly podcast "
King and the Sting", renaming it to "
King and the Sting and Wing". On November 4, 2022, "
King and the Sting and Wing" was officially renamed "
The Golden Hour", with
Workaholics actor
Erik Griffin Replacing Von. Four separate episodes of
The Joe Rogan Experience featuring D'Elia have been removed by Spotify, but no reason was given. ==Personal life==