Charlie Day’s Commencement Speech

Sunny
Charlie Day (PeekYou profile here), one of the creators and stars of FX‘s long-running and hilarious It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, spoke at this year’s graduation ceremony of Massachusetts’ Merrimack College, his alma mater.

Bestowed upon Day at the ceremony was an honorary doctorate, a distinction he took care to humbly point out he shares with Mike Tyson and Kermit the Frog. A 1998 Merrimack graduate, he kidded about the unlikeliness of his newly acquired Phd status, as someone “who has made a living from pretending to eat cat food.”

The speech, which was by turns funny and inspiring, hammered home — through relaying the example of Day’s own enormously successful, and largely self-made career — the incalculable values of showing up, tenacity, having faith in oneself, and a willingness to fail.

“Don’t wait for your break, make your break,” Day said. “Go make it happen for yourself.”

The links above will lead you to the PeekYou profiles of Day, and all the Sunny cast members; from where social pages, home pages, fan pages, articles, interviews, videos (including Sunny episodes), photos, and much more can be found.

And here’s the speech.