Born Jan. 20, 1966, Wilson grew up in Seattle, WA, but attended high school in Illinois. He attended college at Tufts University and the University of Washington before studying acting at New York University's graduate acting program. He joined The Acting Company and Arena Stage, performing off-Broadway in "Titus Andronicus," "Twelfth Night" and "Venus," as well as on Broadway in "London Assurance" and "The Tempest." He also co-created and directed the sketch comedy/clown show "The New Bozena" in New York, later directing a short film version of the stage show and creating an unsold pilot presentation to the Fox network.

One of Wilson's first acting jobs was on the soap opera "One Life to Live" (ABC, 1968-2012) and he followed that gig with appearances in a handful of feature films, including "Galaxy Quest" (1999), "Almost Famous" (2001), and Steven Soderbergh's "Full Frontal" (2002). Later big screen appearances included the action adventure comedy "Sahara" (2004) opposite Matthew McConaughey, Steve Zahn and Penelope Cruz. He also made a slew of appearances on network television, including bit parts on "Dark Angel" (Fox, 2000-02), "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation," (CBS, 2000- ), "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" (NBC, 1999- ) and "Numb3rs" (CBS, 2005-2010)," but Wilson's biggest television breakthrough ended up being on HBO's "Six Feet Under" (2001-05) where he made a tremendous impression playing the odd mortician Arthur Martin, an unlikely romantic interest for series lead Frances Conroy. He also had a memorable one-episode stint on HBO's comedy "Entourage" (2004-2011) in 2005, playing a Harry Knowles-esque Internet journalist who uses his clout with the fan-boy fringe to influence how star Vincent Chase (Adrian Grenier) is required to deal with him.

Wilson's role of the delightfully self-important Dwight Schrute on the American version of the British cult favorite series "The Office" (NBC, 2005 - ), where he is an unwitting recipient of antagonism by his Dunder-Mifflin co-workers, was patterned after the character of Gareth, played by Mackenzie Keenan in the original BBC production