Richard Topping started his career as a bar manager at the Beacon Hotel, Tunbridge Wells, and then went on-stage as a stand-up comedian

Stand-up comedy

Stand-up comedy is a comedic art form. Usually, a comedian performs in front of a live audience, speaking directly to them. Their performances are sometimes filmed for later release via DVD, the internet, and television...

 on the London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

 club circuit in the late 1980s. He moved into television in the 1990s, co-hosting several shows including BBC

BBC

The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

's This Multimedia Business, The Technophobe's Guide To The Future and ITV

ITV

ITV is the major commercial public service TV network in the United Kingdom. Launched in 1955 under the auspices of the Independent Television Authority to provide competition to the BBC, it is also the oldest commercial network in the UK...

's The Web Review. He moved to Sky Television

British Sky Broadcasting

British Sky Broadcasting Group plc is a satellite broadcasting, broadband and telephony services company headquartered in London, United Kingdom, with operations in the United Kingdom and the Ireland....

's computer channel (.tv) as host of Masterclass, which ran for over 500 episodes, and was a regular guest presenter on Chips with Everything, Blue Chip and Buyer's Guide.

Topping is also the author of several books on television

Television

Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...

 and film

Film

A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...

 including Kevin and Perry, Monty Python

Monty Python

Monty Python was a British surreal comedy group who created their influential Monty Python's Flying Circus, a British television comedy sketch show that first aired on the BBC on 5 October 1969. Forty-five episodes were made over four series...

: A Celebration and Kenny and Me, the ghostwritten

Ghostwriter

A ghostwriter is a professional writer who is paid to write books, articles, stories, reports, or other texts that are officially credited to another person. Celebrities, executives, and political leaders often hire ghostwriters to draft or edit autobiographies, magazine articles, or other written...

 autobiography

Autobiography

An autobiography is a book about the life of a person, written by that person.-Origin of the term:...

 of actress Cleo Rocos

Cleo Rocos

Cleo Rocos is a UK-based comedy actress and television/theatre producer and presenter, best known for appearing on The Kenny Everett Television Show. She is of Greek and English descent...

. His first children's book

Children's literature

Children's literature is for readers and listeners up to about age twelve; it is often defined in four different ways: books written by children, books written for children, books chosen by children, or books chosen for children. It is often illustrated. The term is used in senses which sometimes...

, Magical Uncle Urlich was published by m2f Books in 2005.

In 2001, Topping moved to the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 to pursue a career in acting. Recent films include Lie Detector (for release 2008) Cathedral Park, Punk Love, Come Hell or Highwater (for release 2008) and The Astonished Man (for release 2008). In 2010, Topping was the voice actor of Daniel for Frictional Games

Frictional Games

Frictional Games is an independent video game company located in Helsingborg, Sweden. The developer comprises a small core team and is led by Thomas Grip and Jens Nilsson. Certain key roles such as Music and Narrative Design are performed by external staff like Mikko Tarmia and Tom Jubert,...

's Amnesia: The Dark Descent

Amnesia: The Dark Descent

Amnesia: The Dark Descent is a survival horror video game by Frictional Games, who previously developed the Penumbra series. Released for Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux platforms, the game features an unarmed protagonist exploring a dark and foreboding castle, while avoiding monsters and other...

.

He is represented by Ryan Artists, in Portland, Oregon

Portland, Oregon

Portland is a city located in the Pacific Northwest, near the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers in the U.S. state of Oregon. As of the 2010 Census, it had a population of 583,776, making it the 29th most populous city in the United States...

, USA.