Comedians and Comedy Actors who've gone far

[dead-ced-dead]

Does Gervais do much executive work? I can imagine Merchant as being sought after for producing and script editing sort of stuff whereas Gervais gets his pseudo-edgy awards stuff - corporates, pretty much - and does his vanity projects.

Merchant is an co-executive producer/co-creator of the game show Lip Sync Battles, along with John Krasinski; which sounds like the weirdest game of six degrees of separation ever. Steve loves LOVES executive producing. He's far deeper into it than Gervais, who, as you say, enjoys his vanity projects and corporate gigs.

[Famous Mortimer]

Merchant is an co-executive producer/co-creator of the game show Lip Sync Battles, along with John Krasinski; which sounds like the weirdest game of six degrees of separation ever.

I think it was "invented" by Merchant and Krasinski as a diversion on some set they were both on, and they then did it on Jimmy Fallon's show, which then spun off to its own thing.

[badaids]

Can't be arsed to read back through this thread but has Russel Brand been mentioned yet?

He went from patchy obscure C4 sketch show chump and smack addict to become a household name in the 00s and was given a decent shot in Hollywood and doing the Olympics opening ceremony. Pretty big come down from then. A pretty massive rise and decent.

[paruses]

A quick look at his IMDB suggests he only does executive work on stuff he's written or acted in, while Merchant has indeed been very busy as a producer. I can't imagine Gervais greatly enjoys taking a back seat on projects these days. Nowt wrong with that, this is just who he is now and I guess he's just enjoying being in the limelight.

Yes fair enough - can't imagine he would enjoy it or people whose project it is would enjoy having their stuff taken over. Obvs the project would be much better for it like when he tries to read a book....

Edit - just read ded and FM's posts - bit of a fuck my hat on that. I really like Merchant's stuff that I've seen although was a bit disappointed with his stand up based on how great Robin Ince said it was on RHLSTP

[Blue Jam]

Gervais just seems to be having a lot more fun in front of the camera, if he tried producing a show for someone else he'd probably just end up getting bored and wanting a significant role in it. I think he likes to have a lot of control over his work atm so perhaps he'd rather deliver any material he's written himself. Fair enough, aye.

Can't be arsed to read back through this thread but has Russel Brand been mentioned yet?

He went from patchy obscure C4 sketch show chump and smack addict to become a household name in the 00s and was given a decent shot in Hollywood and doing the Olympics opening ceremony. Pretty big come down from then. A pretty massive rise and decent.

I was due to see Russell Brand at the Up The Creek comedy club in Greenwich (in 2003 I think) when it was announced that he'd pulled out and a replacement headliner would be on. As the compere said this someone in the audience shouted "HE'S SHAGGING KATE MOSS!" So yes, what had happened is that he'd achieved a bit of notoriety from recent events (real or just rumoured) and was suddenly in demand on the chat shows and had pulled out to accept a last-minute booking instead.

I don't know if the Kate Moss thing was true but him being married to Katy Perry was a bit mad wasn't it? I guess he slept his way to the top...

Incidentally Up The Creek used to be terrible for that, had tickets to see Daniel Kitson there once and a few days before the gig he won the Perrier Award (as it was known back then) and on the night he was suddenly unavailable, presumably having pulled out to accept a bigger gig elsewhere. I guess that was an unavoidable hazard of a comedy club being based in London and all the TV studios being a short drive away- you don't get comedians pulling out of Embra gigs like that. Still a bit annoying though, on one hand I can't blame them for going where the money is but on the other it's not nice for them to let their fans down.

[willbo]

Steve loves LOVES executive producing

it's money for old rope mate

[George White]

A couple of older examples.
RE:radio comedy.

Stephen Boyd went from being in BBC Radio Northern Ireland's the McCooeys to Ben Hur and Fantastic Voyage... and then ended up in C-rate spaghetti westerns and his last film was NOT The Squeeze with Freddie Starr and Stacy Keach, but a German sexcom as Dracula.

Wilfrid Hyde-White had to leave the Men from the Ministry due to his tax exile status/ubiquity in 60s/70s Hollywood.

[Cold Meat Platter]

Have we had Michael Palin? Because he's gone far, hasn't he? As in around the world and that, haha.

[A Hat Like That]

More so that she was known primarily for being in an Autotrader ad just prior to Peep Show

Bev!
Bev?

[dead-ced-dead]

He's been mentioned upthread, but I just saw Clifford the Big Red Dog movie with a young relative and this is the second Hollywood movie in a few months that Jack Whitehall has started in. Hollywood is really trying to make him "a thing".

Bafflingly, he does an American accent in Clifford (not brilliantly), yet the actress playing his sister is English. There's a throwaway line in the movie, "If I didn't move to the states when I was a kid I'd talk like my sis! (English accent) Spot o' tea, guvnor!"

I wonder if that line was only in there to dismiss his poor accent?

[George White]

His dad must be so proud.

[George White]

Peter Serafinowicz, anyone?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bubble_(upcoming_film)

I'm wondering if this kind of Netflix-produced thing would be the sort of thing his ex-brother-in-law Graham Linehan would be working on if only he hadn't gone insane.

Looks at the credits.
Ah, so, that's where Ross Lee went.

[George White]

It certainly wasn't seen as slumming it at the time. ITV sitcoms were perceived much more favourably than now; from a writing point of view, the main difference for writing for the BBC and ITV was the running time of an episode and the challenge a shorter one posed.

Also, the  series creator/writer, Bob Larbey was hugely respected and had a fantastic track record with his normal writing partner. At the time, they were most associated with ITV sitcoms and pulled off the neat trick of having to two hit shows, Get Some In! and The Good Life running at the same time on ITV and the BBC.

Interestingly, Larbey would later write Dench's later sitcom, As Time Goes By and with Esmonde also wrote, Double First, which starred Williams and criminally only lasted one series.

In any case, however, you're right Dench was already highly thought of and enjoyed much professional success.

This was also the era when big classical types would do sitcoms.
Briers and Wilton in Ever Decreasing Circles.
Sinden in Never the Twain and Two's Company (with Elaine Stritch, queenof Broadway)
Even, John Mills did an ATV sitcom about a Northern pensioner.

[olliebean]

This was also the era when big classical types would do sitcoms.
Briers and Wilton in Ever Decreasing Circles.
Sinden in Never the Twain and Two's Company (with Elaine Stritch, queenof Broadway)
Even, John Mills did an ATV sitcom about a Northern pensioner.

It wasn't so long ago that we had Jacobi and McKellen in Vicious.

[Ignatius_S]

This was also the era when big classical types would do sitcoms.
Briers and Wilton in Ever Decreasing Circles.
Sinden in Never the Twain and Two's Company (with Elaine Stritch, queenof Broadway)
Even, John Mills did an ATV sitcom about a Northern pensioner.

Briers is not the strongest example given that he made his name as an actor by starring in radio and TV sitcoms in the 1960s, such as Marriage Lines.

[George White]

Yes, he went the other way.

[George White]

The thing is, British comics have always been in Hollywood.
Most of the character actors/bit parters in Brit-oid Hollywood films of the 30s to the 50s had music hall/variety backgrounds.
Quick change artiste Owen McGiveney, who was variety's "Protean Entertainer" who toured halls for decades with a one-man digest act of Oliver Twist where he played all the characters moved to LA in his 60s and had a twenty year career popping up in various MGM period cobblers and the likes of Batman and the Outer Limits.

Here's his son (who was originally his dad's stand-in) doing the act.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ca8pvzS_pF0
THen doing it again on Paul Daniels - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78UWpDr5v8Y

Norma Varden, who was the ill-fated Ms. French in Witness for the Prosecution, the old dowager in Sound of Music and myriad other films began stooging the likes of Will Hay and Sandy Powell.
And indeed, Richard Haydn, Uncle Max in the Sound of Music was a regular on BBC radio as 'fish impressionist' Edwin Carp before bringing this character with him when he moved to the US during the war.

I remember someone on twitter asking was Torin Thatcher the only person to be in both an Old Mother Riley film and a Star Trek? (No, David Hurst - a Kossoff/Alfie Bass-via-Clive Swift-type did both).

[Glitch King]

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