Mr. Simons was born Ronald Keith Simons in Detroit, Michigan, November 30, 1960. He was an only child to a single mom, and was primarily raised by his grandparents. Mr. Simons did not set out to pursue theatre. He initially pursued business, graduating from Columbia Business School in 1989 with an MBA in marketing and international business. He was soon hired at Microsoft as a product manager in San Francisco, California. Then, when he was 39 years old, he decided to quit his tech job. He had gotten into tech in order to support his family, but in his heart, he wanted to be an actor.