Overview

Ricky Dene Gervais, born June 25, 1961, is an English comic writer and performer from Reading, Berkshire.

Gervais found mainstream fame with his BBC Two television programme The Office, which he co-wrote and co-directed with his friend and collaborator Stephen Merchant. Besides writing and directing the show, Gervais played the lead role of David Brent.

In 2005, Gervais returned to BBC Television with his sitcom, Extras.

Background

Gervais's father grew up in the Francophone Canadian province of Québec and came to the UK on duty during the Second World War, where he met his wife, hence Ricky's French last name. Raised as the youngest of four siblings, Gervais has described his childhood as nice and "normal". He grew up in Reading's southern suburb of Whitley, on a council estate.

Gervais received his early education at Reading's Ashmead School. He then went on to University College London in 1979 to study biology, later switching to philosophy where he graduated with a 2:2. During the early 1980s Gervais remained in London and met his long-term partner Jane Fallon. He was also the lead singer of the New Romantic group Seona Dancing. The group released two singles that failed to break the top 40 in the UK: "Bitter Heart", and "More To Lose", which became a massive hit in the Philippines in 1985. This came as a great surprise to the band, who had broken up the previous year.

Career

Radio

After various odd jobs, including working in an office, a stint as events manager at the University of London Union followed in the early 1990s. Through this, Gervais went on to briefly manage the British rock group Suede in their pre-record contract days before taking a job at London radio station Xfm in 1996, though he was fired when the station was taken over by the Capital Radio group in 1998. He was also music advisor for the popular BBC drama This Life at this time thanks to the show's producer Jane Fallon. It was during his time at Xfm that he met Merchant, who would later become his collaborator in much of his later work.

Gervais and Merchant returned to Xfm for a Saturday radio show that first went on the air in November 2001 and ran intermittently until January 2004 with breaks ranging between 1-3 months between new shows. They both also worked for the first time with Karl Pilkington, who produced the shows and later collaborated with their series of podcasts. After that, Gervais took 18 months off to work on his new television show Extras , write Flanimals, and perform his live show Politics. He returned to the airwaves on 28 May 2005 to host the show once again with Pilkington and Merchant. He was also heard on BBC Radio 2 during Christmas 2005, sitting in for Jonathan Ross for 2 weeks.

Television

Gervais' mainstream TV debut came in September 1998 as part of Channel 4's "Comedy Lab" series of pilots. His one-off show, Golden Years, focused on a David Bowie-obsessed character called Clive Meadows. He then came to much wider national attention with an obnoxious, cutting persona featured in a topical slot which replaced Ali G's segments on the satirical Channel 4 comedy programme The 11 O'Clock Show in early 1999 where his character used as many expletives as was possible. Gervais later went on to present his own comedy chat show for Channel 4 called Meet Ricky Gervais two years later which was poorly received and has since been mocked by Gervais himself.

Throughout this time, Gervais also wrote for BBC sketch show Bruiser and cameoed in Channel 4's sitcom Spaced. A home-made pilot for The Office, made with Xfm cohort Stephen Merchant, surfaced in 1999/2000, and was bought up by the BBC. After that, Extras first aired from 21 July 2005 with an appearance by Ben Stiller. It features cameos from Patrick Stewart, Kate Winslet (who is also from Reading), Ross Kemp, Vinnie Jones, Les Dennis and Samuel L Jackson. Gervais's main character, Andy Millman, is more self-aware and intentionally humorous than David Brent, and the programme has not been made in the style of a mockumentary, as was The Office (although it is filmed in a similar style without a laughter track).

In 2006, Gervais became the first guest star on The Simpsons to also write the episode on which he guest-starred, "Homer Simpson, This Is Your Wife", which aired on March 26, 2006 (April 23, 2006 in the UK).

The Office

The first, six-episode series of The Office aired in the UK in July/August 2001 to little fanfare or attention [2], but word-of-mouth, repeats and DVDs helped spread the word [3], building up huge momentum and anticipation for the second series, also made up of six episodes, in September 2002. The second series topped the BBC Two ratings, and the show then switched to the larger BBC One channel in December 2003 for its final two special episodes.

Extras

A six-episode sitcom about background artists working on movies. Written and directed by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, it aired in the UK in July 2005 on BBC and in the US in September 2005 on HBO. It starred Ross Kemp, Les Dennis, Patrick Stewart, Vinnie Jones, Samuel L Jackson, Ben Stiller, Kate Winslet and Francesca Martinez A second series began on 14 September 2006 in the UK, featuring Daniel Radcliffe, Orlando Bloom, Sir Ian McKellen, Chris Martin, Keith Chegwin, Robert Lindsay, Warwick Davis, Ronnie Corbett, Sophia Myles, David Bowie, Robert De Niro, and Jonathan Ross.

Stand-up

Gervais also toured the UK in 2003 with his stand-up show Animals. The Politics tour then followed a year later. Both of these shows were recorded for release on DVD and television broadcast. The third part of the themed live trilogy, Fame, will hit the road in 2007. It will start in Glasgow in January and is due to end in Bournemouth in March. Tickets were so popular that one venue reported selling out of tickets within 45 minutes of them going on sale [4].

Books

Gervais released a children's book in 2004, entitled Flanimals. After the success of this book, he released its sequel More Flanimals in 2005. In late 2006, the third Flanimals book Flanimals of the Deep was released, as well as The World of Karl Pilkington presented by Gervais.

Boxing

In 2002 Gervais took part in a charity boxing match against entrepreneur Grant Bovey - known largely by the public due to his relationship with TV personality Anthea Turner. On his Saturday afternoon Radio show on Xfm London, Gervais and partners Stephen Merchant and Karl Pilkington had discussions on both Ricky's attitude towards boxing and training in general, as well as his likelihood of victory against Bovey. Initially, writing partner Stephen Merchant had questions as to why Gervais was participating in the event, due to his dislike of slight pain and his inexperience with fitness in general.

According to Merchant, the majority of Gervais' effort was solely involved in his attire and moniker for the large event. Originally, Gervais jokingly told a BBC official that he would like to be named "Ricky the Gippo Gervais", in full knowledge of its position in the sphere of Political Correctness. He was only later, unsurprisingly denied the use of this name after further research. Other names supplied by Gervais were "Ricky Balboa Gervais", "Ricky Marciano Gervais" -- both being questioned by his trainer, who suggested "Ricky Martin". This name was also to be supplied to the backing track "California" by Snoop Dogg, but this was later changed to Mama Said Knock You Out by LL Cool J, likely from suggestions from Stephen Merchant.

In the weeks before the event was scheduled to take place, both Merchant and Pilkington voiced their doubts as to his fitness due to illness which he had sustained weeks before the event, somewhat comedically by stating that both they, and Gervais' family had written up a petition to the BBC stating "please do not allow this man to box".

Gervais was trained for the three-round contest by famous boxing trainer brothers Frank and Eugene Maloney, at their Fight Factory gymnasium. It was the second televised charity boxing match, the first being Bob Mortimer against Les Dennis, for Comic Relief. The fight was televised by BBC, and Gervais managed to come out on top by a split decision verdict. Turner later claimed the only reason Gervais was awarded victory was because of his relationship with the BBC. Gervais later said that the experience was the 'most difficult thing' he had ever done. He donated his £5,000 prize money to the training of a Macmillan nurse.

Podcast

In 2005, Gervais produced a run of 12 episodes of The Ricky Gervais Show, using a format similar to his Xfm radio show, and including Karl Pilkington and Stephen Merchant. The show, produced in conjunction with the Guardian Unlimited website (the website of The Guardian newspaper), is available exclusively online as weekly thirty minute podcasts, without music. The first episode was made available on December 5, 2005. By January 2006, it had become the world's most downloaded podcast [5], as certified by the Guinness Book of World Records. With over 8 million downloads, the podcast became overwhelmingly popular. The general basis of the podcast is Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant interrogating Karl Pilkington, who "plays the part of the village idiot" according to an AP article on the subject. Ricky Gervais refuted these claims saying "He's really not playing the part, he actually is the village idiot". Some recurring segments in the show are Monkey News (stories about monkeys who do extraordinary things) and Karl's Diary (where Pilkington's personal journal recording many tedious aspects of his daily life are read aloud and laughed at by Merchant and Gervais) All podcasts are available for purchase from iTunes and Audible.com. Ricky returned to Guardian Unlimited in late 2006 for three more free podcasts together called "The Podfather Trilogy" and airing on Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas, which he said would be the last for a while.

Accolades

In 2003, Gervais was listed in The Observer as one of the 50 funniest acts in British comedy.

In a 2005 poll to find The Comedian's Comedian, he was voted amongst the top 50 comedy acts ever by fellow comedians and comedy insiders.

Gervais has received a plethora of awards for his work on The Office, most notably two Golden Globes (one for acting, one for the show itself), as well as numerous British Academy Television Awards and British Comedy Awards, amongst others. His rise in the USA is largely attributed to his success at the Golden Globes. The show missed out on what was considered to be a definite Emmy Award nomination because there were not enough episodes broadcast in the USA before the deadline for consideration. [6]

On March 15, 2006, it was announced that Gervais would receive an honorary award at the annual Rose d'Or ceremony in Switzerland on April 29, 2006. The award is given to "an individual who has made an exceptional contribution to the global entertainment business."

Other work

Gervais wrote and guest-starred in an episode of The Simpsons entitled "Homer Simpson, This Is Your Wife", which aired on March 26, 2006 in the United States, on April 23, 2006 in the United Kingdom, and on July 18, 2006 in Australia. The episode was the highest rated in Sky One's history, arguably due to its extensive promotion. Criticisms of the episode include its blatant promotion of high definition television (Sky has just launched a HD service) as well as the alleged mediocrity of the script. This was not his first appearance in an animation, as he had provided the voice of "Bugsy" in the 2005 animated feature film, Valiant.

He also guest-starred in Alias (the season three episode "Façade") as an Irish terrorist. He has also appeared several times on The Late Show With David Letterman, making him the British comedian with the most appearances on the show.

At one point, Gervais was even tapped for a role in the Tom Cruise movie Mission: Impossible III, but it never came to fruition - Gervais cited reasons for this, on Friday Night with Jonathan Ross: "It was a bigger part than I first thought." He added: "I did an episode of Alias, and I can't watch it. Me being serious. I can't watch it."

On 2 July 2005, Gervais appeared at the Live 8 event held in Hyde Park. He produced a series of short films for the cause and also introduced the group R.E.M.. On 5 January 2006, he interviewed Larry David, in a one off special, Ricky Gervais Meets... Larry David. On 25 December and 26 December of the same year, Channel 4 aired similar specials where he interviewed Christopher Guest and Garry Shandling respectively. There are plans for further episodes of "Meets..." with John Cleese, Matt Groening and Michael Richards.

On February 6, 2006, it was announced that Gervais and Merchant were to write an episode for the third season of the US version of The Office. [7] The episode, entitled "The Convict", aired on November 30, 2006 in the United States.

On 20 February 2006, after performing twelve free podcasts with Stephen Merchant and Karl Pilkington, it was announced that all future episodes would be available from Audible.com at a "nominal fee". The reason for the commercialisation of the podcast was due to the significant cost of producing and online hosting for a weekly half hour show, and because Pilkington is currently unemployed after leaving his job as a production manager at UK station Xfm.[citation needed]

Gervais also appears in the Christopher Guest film, For Your Consideration [8]. He is currently adapting his book Flanimals for ITV1, collaborating with Aardman to create a six-part series [9]. This is despite Gervais suggesting that he had been in negotiations to turn Flanimals into a feature film. Gervais also appeared as the museum director in Night at the Museum with Ben Stiller.

Gervais has also voiced a character in the video game Scarface: The World Is Yours.

Gervais is planning a project with JJ Abrams as well[10], as well as possible plans for a Drama series.

Gervais is set to appear on the latest DVD boxset of 24, he has recorded an extra feature and his co-writing partner Stephen Merchant is filming a cameo in an episode of 24. Ricky turned down a role in the show.

Controversy

In September 2005 Gervais caused controversy by recording a radio advert for a prostate cancer charity which was only allowed to be broadcast from 9pm to 6am because of its content [11]. However, on October 3, 2005, the Radio Advertising Clearance Centre made a U-turn and announced that the advert could be broadcast before 9pm, but stipulated that a "squish" noise should be removed.

Trivia

Gervais stated in an interview on Fresh Air that if he had become a musician, he would have liked to be like David Bowie.

Gervais is an atheist. In an interview given to John Humphrys he said, "Being an atheist makes someone a clearer-thinking, fairer person... They [atheists] are not doing things to be rewarded in heaven; they're doing things because they're right, because they live by a moral code". He also added that, although he doesn't believe, God (if he exists) would like him [13][2].

He cannot drive, as stated in his radio show and his Politics DVD commentary.

Soon they were given their own slot on Sunday evenings. During one show, Gervais and Merchant attempted to bleep the Super Furry Animals song "Man Don't Give A Fuck" live by pulling down the fader and making a noise in place of each of the fifty-plus mentions of the word "fuck" in the song. However, the pressure became too much for Gervais, who messed up and swore in frustration. [citation needed]

He lived in Bloomsbury, London. [citation needed]

He has a second-floor office in Tottenham Court Road, London. This is where he records his podcasts with Stephen Merchant and Karl Pilkington[14].

He has a pet cat, named Ollie (given to him by Jonathan Ross), and a salamander named Tel [15]

He achieved a brown belt in karate, stating he was "one away from black" on his radio show. [citation needed]

It is said that because Gervais is from Reading, people automatically assume he supports Reading FC. In fact, he is not a fan of football; the last match he watched was England's World Cup exit to Brazil in 2002. [citation needed]

He has admitted plagiarising Extra's format of celebrities making fools of themselves/subverting their public personas from Curb Your Enthusiasm and The Larry Sanders Show[16]. Perhaps aptly, he has interviewed their creators, Larry David and Garry Shandling on Ricky Gervais Meets....

A gang of criminals stole £200,000 from his bank account by pasting a picture of him from his Office DVD onto a dead man's passport and using an insider from the bank to transfer the funds. When they tried to use the money to buy gold bullion, they were apprehended by police, and subsequently arrested. They were later sentenced to between two and two and a half years in prison. [17]

He was voted #30 in ITV's TV's 50 Greatest Stars.

A composite photograph of 176 photographs from the top 20 British comedians show a striking resemblance to Ricky Gervais. [18]

He recently bought a £2.5 million mansion in the Hampstead neighborhood of north London, which happens to be near good friend Jonathan Ross, on his fame tour he claims it cost £3.5 million. [19]

Very good friends with comedian Jon Stewart and is a frequent and popular guest on his show.