5

Harris began his career as a child actor. His first significant roles came in 1988, when he starred in two movies: the film Clara's Heart, a drama with Whoopi Goldberg that won him a Golden Globe nomination, and Purple People Eater, a children's fantasy. The following year he won the lead in Doogie Howser, M.D., for which he was again nominated for a Golden Globe. After Doogie Howser's four-season run ended in 1993, Harris played a number of guest roles on television series, before taking his first film role as an adult in 1995 in the little-seen shocker Animal Room. Since then his film work has included supporting roles in Starship Troopers, The Next Best Thing, Undercover Brother, and Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle, in which he played a drug-crazed, lecherous parody of himself.

From 1999 to 2000, Harris starred with Tony Shalhoub in the sitcom Stark Raving Mad, which lasted twenty-two episodes. He has taken lead roles in a number of made-for-television features, including Snowbound: The Jim and Jennifer Stolpa Story in 1994, A Christmas Wish in 1998, The Christmas Blessing in 2005, The Wedding Dress in 2001, Joan of Arc in 1999, and My Antonía in 1995, as well as series guest roles.

In 2004, he performed a dual role of the Balladeer and Lee Harvey Oswald on Broadway in the controversial musical revival of Stephen Sondheim's Assassins. He also sang the role of Charles (first played by Anthony Perkins) on the Nonesuch recording of Sondheim's Evening Primrose. He has also portrayed Mark Cohen in the musical RENT.

Harris' current role is in the CBS ensemble sitcom How I Met Your Mother, playing a serial womanizer in a performance that earned him a 2007 Emmy nomination. The show debuted in the fall of 2005 and wrapped up its second season on May 14th, 2007. The sitcom is currently in its third season on CBS.

(wikipedia.org)