Stephen Merchant
Encyclopedia
Stephen James Merchant (born 24 November 1974) is an English writer, director, radio presenter, comedian, and actor. He is best known for his collaborations with Ricky Gervais
, as the co-writer and co-director of the popular British sitcom The Office
, as the co-writer, co-director and a co-star of Extras
, and as the co-host of The Ricky Gervais Show
in its radio, podcast, audiobook and television-show forms. The Ricky Gervais Show in radio form has won a bronze Sony Award. He currently appears in the new BBC
TV series Life's Too Short
in which he co-wrote and co-directed. He also voiced the character Wheatley
in the popular 2011 video game Portal 2
and co-developed Sky
TV travel series An Idiot Abroad
.
Merchant more recently began a UK sell out stand-up comedy tour 'Hello Ladies' which is available on both DVD
and Blu-ray.
, England, the son of Jane Elaine (née Hibbs), a nursery nurse, and Ronald John Merchant, an insurance representative. He attended Hanham High School
. As he has described in Xfm London
shows and podcasts, Merchant was a very shy child, tending to focus more on school work as opposed to sport. His school yearbook predicted that he would enjoy success.
Merchant is a graduate of the University of Warwick
, and a former film reviewer on the student radio station, Radio Warwick
, where he began his broadcasting career. The station's 1995/96 yearbook tipped him for great things:
Members of Merchant's "posse" included film critic James King
, Dan Warren, Neil the Maskell and Geraint the Welshman. Recently, a number of tapes of "The Steve Show", recorded at the time, have been rediscovered and are being distributed on various Merchant fansites. He graduated with a 2:1 in Film and Literature in 1996.
.
Merchant met Ricky Gervais
for the first time in 1997, when Gervais (then in the position of "Head of Speech" at the London radio station Xfm
) hired Merchant as his assistant. (Gervais said later that he had called Merchant for an interview simply because it was the first CV handed to him.) Merchant and Gervais hosted a Saturday afternoon radio show together from January through to August 1998, when both of them left XFM as it was bought by the Capital Radio Group. In the same year, Merchant was a finalist at the Daily Telegraph Open Mic Award
s.
Merchant did a total of 7 years on XFM 104.9. The Saturday show never had a large audience; Gervais says "It's a tin pot radio station... It's not even the biggest radio station in the building." Merchant created the features 'Hip Hop Hooray', 'Make Ricky Gervais laugh' and 'Song for the Ladies.'
After leaving XFM, Merchant began a production course at the BBC. As part of his coursework, he enlisted Gervais to perform in a 30-minute short film, "Seedy Boss," which became the earliest inspiration for their sitcom The Office
. They collaborated on a sitcom pilot called Golden Years featuring a manager suffering a mid-life crisis; the pilot aired on Channel 4's Comedy Lab
series in September 1998, but failed to find further success.
aired the first series of The Office, co-written and co-directed by Merchant and Gervais and starring the latter as paper sales office manager David Brent
; the show initially received low ratings. Beginning in September, Merchant and Gervais returned to Xfm as co-hosts of The Ricky Gervais Show
, another Saturday afternoon programme, which led to their fruitful relationship with producer Karl Pilkington
.
They took a break from the radio show in mid-2002 in order to film the second series of The Office, which aired that year; in addition to writing and directing the show, Merchant made a cameo performance in the episode "Charity" as a friend of Gareth Keenan
's character known by the name Oggy or Oggmonster. (Merchant's father also appears in multiple episodes as an office handyman named Gordon.) Merchant also directed a sitcom pilot called The Last Chancers
, which aired on Comedy Lab in November 2002 and became a five-part series broadcast in December on E4.
Merchant and Gervais continued to host The Ricky Gervais Show through 2003, taking another break to film the Office Christmas special, which aired that December. The radio show went off the air indefinitely in January 2004. During 2004, Merchant appeared in a recurring role as a chef on Garth Marenghi's Darkplace
and in a cameo on Green Wing
, and served as a script associate on the Chris Morris
and Charlie Brooker
sitcom Nathan Barley
. The same year, The Office aired in the U.S to critical acclaim. It went on to win the Golden Globe Award for Best Television Series – Musical or Comedy which both Merchant and Gervais accepted.
This was followed in 2005 by a 4th series of the radio show, consisting of six episodes.
", and Merchant would direct the fifth-season episode "Customer Survey
".
, Merchant, Gervais and Pilkington began recording a weekly podcast (also called The Ricky Gervais Show
). Throughout its first series (through 20 February 2006), the podcast was consistently ranked the most popular in the world, and was certified as the most-downloaded of all time by Guinness World Records
. Two more series and three special instalments (the "Podfather Trilogy") were recorded in 2006, with the final episode released on Christmas Eve. In late 2008, they recorded four more podcasts and began a series of audiobooks examining Pilkington's perspective on various subjects.
), Gervais and Merchant's new sitcom Extras premiered on BBC2. The series features Merchant in a supporting role as Darren Lamb, the incompetent agent to struggling actor Andy Millman, played by Gervais. Series 2 of Extras aired in late 2006, followed by a Christmas special in December 2007; all three instalments aired on HBO in the United States. Merchant won a 2006 British Comedy Award for Best TV Actor for his performance as Lamb.
, airing weekly on Sunday afternoons. Instead of comedy, The Steve Show focused on music and particularly "new music," defined by Merchant as "music you've not heard before." Many of the songs on the show were suggested by listeners or co-presenters. In addition to Merchant, the show featured several of his friends, including his housemate Dan, his childhood friend Harry, and actor Rufus Gerrard-Wright (who also appeared in an episode of Extras). A spring search for a "she-J" resulted in the addition of former Byker Grove
actor Sammy T. Dobson joining the ensemble. "The Steve Show" aired for four seasons and concluded in May 2009.
(2007), Run Fatboy Run
(2007), and The Invention of Lying
(2009), the latter starring Ricky Gervais. He has a supporting role in the 2009 film Tooth Fairy
. On television, Merchant made a cameo appearance in a non-speaking role on the sixth season premiere of 24
; he also starred as a sports commentator in the unaired pilot No Skillz. Additionally, Merchant has provided the voice-over
since 2009 of advertisements for Barclays and Waterstone's
.
In 2009, Merchant and Gervais collaborated on the film Cemetery Junction
, set in working-class England in the 1970s. The film was released in April 2010 to generally mixed to positive reviews.
In September 2010, Merchant produced a television show alongside Ricky Gervais
starring Karl Pilkington
called An Idiot Abroad
.
In July 2010, filming finished for the pilot of Life's Too Short
, written by Ricky Gervais
and Merchant, who will both cameo alongside the show's star, Warwick Davis
. In 2011, he lent his voice to the CGI film Gnomeo and Juliet
, and had a role in the Farrelly brothers'
comedy Hall Pass.
In January 2011, Merchant appeared at the 'Free Fringe Benefit' at the Bloomsbury Theatre, London. A show of stand-up to benefit the Free Fringe at the Edinburgh Comedy Festival, alongside comedians Jeremy Hardy
, Michael Legge
, Robin Ince
, Mitch Benn
, Isy Suttie
, Bennett Arron
, Andy Zaltzman
and founder Peter Buckley Hill
. He also stated on the recent free podcast The Ricky Gervais Guide to...Comic Relief that he will be touring his first solo stand up tour later in the year.
On Film 2011
s Questionnaire feature, broadcast on 2 March 2011, Merchant described his favourite film as The Apartment
(1960), his guilty pleasure as Con Air
(1997), the film he cried at as The Bridges of Madison County
, and the film he didn't get as The Lord of the Rings
film trilogy.
Merchant provides the voice of Wheatley
in Valve
's 2011 video game Portal 2
, a role which earned him widespread acclaim among reviewers. While he states his work on the project as "exhausting", Merchant is also "very pleased by the response people have had to it. What I was really pleased by how people seemed to respond to it in the way they do with a movie they've enjoyed, or a TV show they've enjoyed."
, playing a character nicknamed the Ogg-Monster, whom David Brent
called "a big lanky goggle-eyed freak". His height, and also dance moves, have attracted comments from several sources. The Daily Mail
newspaper described him as a "giant albatross
hopping on stilts
" as he danced in a London pub (although Merchant denied this during an episode of the Ricky Gervais Show, stating that he did not take to the dance floor on that occasion). While discussing what the Daily Mail had said on the show, friend and collaborator Ricky Gervais
has likened him to an "upright lizard
being given electro-shock treatment" and a "stick insect with glasses" or Beaker
from The Muppet Show. Radio producer and co-host of Merchant, Karl Pilkington
, has described his moves as a "bit of weird art" in the past, while British comic and broadcaster Russell Brand
has likened him to a "graceful grasshopper
". Merchant has commented that he prefers to liken himself to fellow tall man and English football player, Peter Crouch
who is also six foot seven inches. Merchant impersonated Crouch in a BBC sketch broadcast as part of the pre-match build-up to England's opening game at the 2006 World Cup.
Ricky Gervais
Ricky Dene Gervais is an English comedian, actor, director, radio presenter, producer, musician, and writer.Gervais achieved mainstream fame with his television series The Office and the subsequent series Extras, both of which he co-wrote and co-directed with friend and frequent collaborator...
, as the co-writer and co-director of the popular British sitcom The Office
The Office (UK TV series)
The Office is a British sitcom television series that was first broadcast in the United Kingdom on BBC Two on 9 July 2001. Created, written, and directed by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, the programme is about the day-to-day lives of office employees in the Slough branch of the fictitious...
, as the co-writer, co-director and a co-star of Extras
Extras (TV series)
Extras is a British sitcom about extras working on TV and film sets and in theatre. The series was co-produced by the BBC and HBO, and is created, written, and directed by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, both of whom also star in it...
, and as the co-host of The Ricky Gervais Show
The Ricky Gervais Show
The Ricky Gervais Show is a comedy audio show in the UK starring Ricky Gervais, Stephen Merchant, and Karl Pilkington, later adapted into an animated televised version debuting for HBO and Channel 4 in 2010. The show started in November 2001 on Xfm, and aired in weekly periods for months at a time...
in its radio, podcast, audiobook and television-show forms. The Ricky Gervais Show in radio form has won a bronze Sony Award. He currently appears in the new 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...
TV series Life's Too Short
Life's Too Short
Life's Too Short is an observational sitcom series, created and written by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, from an idea by Warwick Davis, and is described by Gervais as being about "the life of a showbiz dwarf", with Davis playing a fictionalised version of himself. Gervais and Merchant appear...
in which he co-wrote and co-directed. He also voiced the character Wheatley
Wheatley (Portal)
Wheatley is a fictional artificial character in the 2011 video game Portal 2. He is voiced by British comedian Stephen Merchant and created in part by Portal 2s designer Erik Wolpaw. To date, he only appears in Portal 2....
in the popular 2011 video game Portal 2
Portal 2
Portal 2 is a first-person puzzle-platform video game developed and published by Valve Corporation. The sequel to the 2007 video game Portal, it was announced on March 5, 2010, following a week-long alternate reality game based on new patches to the original game...
and co-developed Sky
Sky
The sky is the part of the atmosphere or outer space visible from the surface of any astronomical object. It is difficult to define precisely for several reasons. During daylight, the sky of Earth has the appearance of a pale blue surface because the air scatters the sunlight. The sky is sometimes...
TV travel series An Idiot Abroad
An Idiot Abroad
An Idiot Abroad is a travel documentary television series broadcast on Sky1, as well as a spin-off book published by Canongate Books, created by and featuring Karl Pilkington and his former radio show colleagues Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant....
.
Merchant more recently began a UK sell out stand-up comedy tour 'Hello Ladies' which is available on both DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
and Blu-ray.
Early life
Merchant was born in BristolBristol
Bristol is a city, unitary authority area and ceremonial county in South West England, with an estimated population of 433,100 for the unitary authority in 2009, and a surrounding Larger Urban Zone with an estimated 1,070,000 residents in 2007...
, England, the son of Jane Elaine (née Hibbs), a nursery nurse, and Ronald John Merchant, an insurance representative. He attended Hanham High School
Hanham High School
Hanham High School is a school of more than 1,000 pupils, situated on the outskirts of Bristol, England. The school is a Specialist School for the Performing Arts, has achieved the Artsmark Gold Award, Sportsmark, the Healthy Schools Award, International Schools Award, IiP, ICT and Basic Skills...
. As he has described in Xfm London
Xfm London
Xfm London is a commercial radio station in the United Kingdom owned by Global Radio and broadcasts on 104.9 FM in London, on digital radio via 30 DAB multiplexes across the country, Sky, TalkTalk TV and Virgin Media....
shows and podcasts, Merchant was a very shy child, tending to focus more on school work as opposed to sport. His school yearbook predicted that he would enjoy success.
Merchant is a graduate of the University of Warwick
University of Warwick
The University of Warwick is a public research university located in Coventry, United Kingdom...
, and a former film reviewer on the student radio station, Radio Warwick
Radio Warwick
Radio Warwick or RaW is the student radio station at the University of Warwick and winner of the 2000 and 2003 BBC Radio 1 Student Radio Association Best Station awards....
, where he began his broadcasting career. The station's 1995/96 yearbook tipped him for great things:
Members of Merchant's "posse" included film critic James King
James King (film critic)
James King is a British movie critic who presents a weekly film review show The Movie Show on ITV2 and also appears regularly on ITV London Tonight on Friday evenings and on Sky News as the channel's movie critic. He also appeared as the resident entertainment expert on Sky One's Angela and...
, Dan Warren, Neil the Maskell and Geraint the Welshman. Recently, a number of tapes of "The Steve Show", recorded at the time, have been rediscovered and are being distributed on various Merchant fansites. He graduated with a 2:1 in Film and Literature in 1996.
Pre-2001
Merchant began his career performing stand-up comedy at Bristol's Comedy Box, where, he recalls, "The first week I did really well ...The second week I died on my arse. I realised that stand-up was not that easy after all." He also appeared as a contestant on a 1997 episode of the TV game show Blockbusters and worked for a short time as a DJ for Radio CarolineRadio Caroline
Radio Caroline is an English radio station founded in 1964 by Ronan O'Rahilly to circumvent the record companies' control of popular music broadcasting in the United Kingdom and the BBC's radio broadcasting monopoly...
.
Merchant met Ricky Gervais
Ricky Gervais
Ricky Dene Gervais is an English comedian, actor, director, radio presenter, producer, musician, and writer.Gervais achieved mainstream fame with his television series The Office and the subsequent series Extras, both of which he co-wrote and co-directed with friend and frequent collaborator...
for the first time in 1997, when Gervais (then in the position of "Head of Speech" at the London radio station Xfm
Xfm London
Xfm London is a commercial radio station in the United Kingdom owned by Global Radio and broadcasts on 104.9 FM in London, on digital radio via 30 DAB multiplexes across the country, Sky, TalkTalk TV and Virgin Media....
) hired Merchant as his assistant. (Gervais said later that he had called Merchant for an interview simply because it was the first CV handed to him.) Merchant and Gervais hosted a Saturday afternoon radio show together from January through to August 1998, when both of them left XFM as it was bought by the Capital Radio Group. In the same year, Merchant was a finalist at the Daily Telegraph Open Mic Award
Daily Telegraph Open Mic Award
The Daily Telegraph Open Mic Award was a competition for comedians. It ran from 1994 to 2002 when it was discontinued due to sponsorship running out. Despite its short lifespan, its winners and finalists boast some of the UK's most notable comedy talent, including Noel Fielding, Jimmy Carr,...
s.
Merchant did a total of 7 years on XFM 104.9. The Saturday show never had a large audience; Gervais says "It's a tin pot radio station... It's not even the biggest radio station in the building." Merchant created the features 'Hip Hop Hooray', 'Make Ricky Gervais laugh' and 'Song for the Ladies.'
After leaving XFM, Merchant began a production course at the BBC. As part of his coursework, he enlisted Gervais to perform in a 30-minute short film, "Seedy Boss," which became the earliest inspiration for their sitcom The Office
The Office (UK TV series)
The Office is a British sitcom television series that was first broadcast in the United Kingdom on BBC Two on 9 July 2001. Created, written, and directed by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, the programme is about the day-to-day lives of office employees in the Slough branch of the fictitious...
. They collaborated on a sitcom pilot called Golden Years featuring a manager suffering a mid-life crisis; the pilot aired on Channel 4's Comedy Lab
Comedy Lab
Comedy Lab is a British television series which showcases pilots of experimental comedy shows. Series have been aired irregularly on Channel 4 and E4 since 1998....
series in September 1998, but failed to find further success.
2001–03 (The Office and return to XFM)
In mid-2001, BBC TwoBBC Two
BBC Two is the second television channel operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It covers a wide range of subject matter, but tending towards more 'highbrow' programmes than the more mainstream and popular BBC One. Like the BBC's other domestic TV and radio...
aired the first series of The Office, co-written and co-directed by Merchant and Gervais and starring the latter as paper sales office manager David Brent
David Brent
David Brent is a fictional character in the BBC television mockumentary The Office, as well as a recurring character in the NBC series of the same name, portrayed by co-writer and director Ricky Gervais. Brent is a white-collar office middle-manager and the principal character of the BBC series...
; the show initially received low ratings. Beginning in September, Merchant and Gervais returned to Xfm as co-hosts of The Ricky Gervais Show
The Ricky Gervais Show
The Ricky Gervais Show is a comedy audio show in the UK starring Ricky Gervais, Stephen Merchant, and Karl Pilkington, later adapted into an animated televised version debuting for HBO and Channel 4 in 2010. The show started in November 2001 on Xfm, and aired in weekly periods for months at a time...
, another Saturday afternoon programme, which led to their fruitful relationship with producer Karl Pilkington
Karl Pilkington
Karl Pilkington is a British podcaster, author, television personality and former radio producer. He is best known for the Sky travel series, An Idiot Abroad, which was also presented in the United States on the Science Channel, in Canada on Discovery Channel and in Australia on One HD, and The...
.
They took a break from the radio show in mid-2002 in order to film the second series of The Office, which aired that year; in addition to writing and directing the show, Merchant made a cameo performance in the episode "Charity" as a friend of Gareth Keenan
Gareth Keenan
Gareth Keenan is a fictional paper salesman on BBC's comedy The Office. He is portrayed in the series by Mackenzie Crook as a gaunt, self-important team leader proud of his alleged lieutenant status in the Territorial Army...
's character known by the name Oggy or Oggmonster. (Merchant's father also appears in multiple episodes as an office handyman named Gordon.) Merchant also directed a sitcom pilot called The Last Chancers
The Last Chancers
The Last Chancers was originally a one-off television sitcom, screened under the Comedy Lab banner at 11:40pm on Thursday 21 November 2002. This show was later developed into a five part series which was broadcast on E4 in December 2002...
, which aired on Comedy Lab in November 2002 and became a five-part series broadcast in December on E4.
Merchant and Gervais continued to host The Ricky Gervais Show through 2003, taking another break to film the Office Christmas special, which aired that December. The radio show went off the air indefinitely in January 2004. During 2004, Merchant appeared in a recurring role as a chef on Garth Marenghi's Darkplace
Garth Marenghi's Darkplace
Garth Marenghi's Darkplace is a British dark comedy show made for Channel 4 by Matthew Holness and Richard Ayoade. Following on from Garth Marenghi's Netherhead, which won the 2001 Perrier Awards, the show revolves around fictional horror author Garth Marenghi and his publisher Dean Learner...
and in a cameo on Green Wing
Green Wing
Green Wing is a British sitcom set in the fictional East Hampton Hospital. It was created by the same team behind the sketch show Smack the Pony, led by Victoria Pile, and stars Tamsin Greig, Stephen Mangan and Julian Rhind-Tutt....
, and served as a script associate on the Chris Morris
Chris Morris (satirist)
Christopher Morris is an English satirist, writer, director and actor. A former radio DJ, he is best known for anchoring the spoof news and current affairs television programmes The Day Today and Brass Eye, as well as his frequent engagement with controversial subject matter.In 2010 Morris...
and Charlie Brooker
Charlie Brooker
Charlton "Charlie" Brooker is a British journalist, comic writer and broadcaster. His style of humour is savage and profane, with surreal elements and a consistent satirical pessimism...
sitcom Nathan Barley
Nathan Barley
Nathan Barley is a Channel 4 sitcom written by Charlie Brooker and Chris Morris, starring Nicholas Burns, Julian Barratt and Claire Keelan. The series of six weekly episodes began broadcasting on 11 February 2005 on Channel 4...
. The same year, The Office aired in the U.S to critical acclaim. It went on to win the Golden Globe Award for Best Television Series – Musical or Comedy which both Merchant and Gervais accepted.
This was followed in 2005 by a 4th series of the radio show, consisting of six episodes.
US series of The Office
In March 2005, the American version of The Office premiered, with Merchant and Gervais credited as executive producers. They would later co-write the third-season episode "The ConvictThe Convict
"The Convict" is ninth episode of the third season of The Office . It aired on November 30, 2006 on NBC. It was written by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant specifically for the U.S. series...
", and Merchant would direct the fifth-season episode "Customer Survey
Customer Survey
"Customer Survey" is the seventh episode of the fifth season of the television series The Office, and the show's seventy-ninth episode overall. The episode aired in the United States on November 6, 2008 on NBC...
".
Podcast series
In December 2005, with sponsorship by The GuardianThe Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
, Merchant, Gervais and Pilkington began recording a weekly podcast (also called The Ricky Gervais Show
The Ricky Gervais Show
The Ricky Gervais Show is a comedy audio show in the UK starring Ricky Gervais, Stephen Merchant, and Karl Pilkington, later adapted into an animated televised version debuting for HBO and Channel 4 in 2010. The show started in November 2001 on Xfm, and aired in weekly periods for months at a time...
). Throughout its first series (through 20 February 2006), the podcast was consistently ranked the most popular in the world, and was certified as the most-downloaded of all time by Guinness World Records
Guinness World Records
Guinness World Records, known until 2000 as The Guinness Book of Records , is a reference book published annually, containing a collection of world records, both human achievements and the extremes of the natural world...
. Two more series and three special instalments (the "Podfather Trilogy") were recorded in 2006, with the final episode released on Christmas Eve. In late 2008, they recorded four more podcasts and began a series of audiobooks examining Pilkington's perspective on various subjects.
Extras
In July 2005, following a brief return of the XFM radio show (filling in for Adam and JoeAdam and Joe
Adam Buxton and Joe Cornish are British comedy performers known together as Adam and Joe. They are best known for presenting Adam and Joe on BBC 6 Music, and The Adam and Joe Show on Channel 4 from 1996 to 2001.-History:...
), Gervais and Merchant's new sitcom Extras premiered on BBC2. The series features Merchant in a supporting role as Darren Lamb, the incompetent agent to struggling actor Andy Millman, played by Gervais. Series 2 of Extras aired in late 2006, followed by a Christmas special in December 2007; all three instalments aired on HBO in the United States. Merchant won a 2006 British Comedy Award for Best TV Actor for his performance as Lamb.
The Steve Show
In January 2007, Merchant began hosting his own radio show on BBC 6 MusicBBC 6 Music
BBC 6 Music is one of the BBC's digital radio stations, was launched on 11 March 2002 and originally codenamed Network Y. It was the first national music radio station to be launched by the BBC in 32 years....
, airing weekly on Sunday afternoons. Instead of comedy, The Steve Show focused on music and particularly "new music," defined by Merchant as "music you've not heard before." Many of the songs on the show were suggested by listeners or co-presenters. In addition to Merchant, the show featured several of his friends, including his housemate Dan, his childhood friend Harry, and actor Rufus Gerrard-Wright (who also appeared in an episode of Extras). A spring search for a "she-J" resulted in the addition of former Byker Grove
Byker Grove
Byker Grove was a British television series which aired between 1989 and 2006 and was created by Adele Rose. The show was broadcast at 5.10pm after Newsround on CBBC on BBC One...
actor Sammy T. Dobson joining the ensemble. "The Steve Show" aired for four seasons and concluded in May 2009.
Stand-up
Merchant began his first nationwide tour of the UK, Hello Ladies..., in September 2011, with a stop in New York as well. He did standup comedy in the late 1990s. He was going to do it at university, but they cancelled the gig.Other work
Merchant has played small roles in the films Hot FuzzHot Fuzz
Hot Fuzz is a 2007 British action dark comedy film written by Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright, and starring Pegg and Nick Frost. The three had previously worked together on the 2004 film Shaun of the Dead as well as the television series Spaced...
(2007), Run Fatboy Run
Run Fatboy Run
Run Fatboy Run is a 2007 British comedy film directed by David Schwimmer, written by Michael Ian Black and Simon Pegg, and starring Pegg, Dylan Moran, Thandie Newton, Harish Patel, India de Beaufort, and Hank Azaria...
(2007), and The Invention of Lying
The Invention of Lying
The Invention of Lying is a 2009 fantasy romantic comedy film that is written and directed by Ricky Gervais and Matthew Robinson. This film is the directorial debut of Gervais. The film stars Ricky Gervais as the first human with the ability to lie...
(2009), the latter starring Ricky Gervais. He has a supporting role in the 2009 film Tooth Fairy
Tooth Fairy (film)
For other uses, see Tooth Fairy .Tooth Fairy is a 2004 short film about a father who forgets to leave money for his daughter from the "tooth fairy"...
. On television, Merchant made a cameo appearance in a non-speaking role on the sixth season premiere of 24
24 (TV series)
24 is an American television series produced for the Fox Network and syndicated worldwide, starring Kiefer Sutherland as Counter Terrorist Unit agent Jack Bauer. Each 24-episode season covers 24 hours in the life of Bauer, using the real time method of narration...
; he also starred as a sports commentator in the unaired pilot No Skillz. Additionally, Merchant has provided the voice-over
Voice-over
Voice-over is a production technique where a voice which is not part of the narrative is used in a radio, television production, filmmaking, theatre, or other presentations...
since 2009 of advertisements for Barclays and Waterstone's
Waterstone's
Waterstone's is a British book specialist established in 1982 by Tim Waterstone that employs around 4,500 staff throughout the United Kingdom and Europe....
.
In 2009, Merchant and Gervais collaborated on the film Cemetery Junction
Cemetery Junction (film)
Cemetery Junction is a coming-of-age comedy-drama film written and directed by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant. The film was released in the United Kingdom on 14 April 2010.-Plot:...
, set in working-class England in the 1970s. The film was released in April 2010 to generally mixed to positive reviews.
In September 2010, Merchant produced a television show alongside Ricky Gervais
Ricky Gervais
Ricky Dene Gervais is an English comedian, actor, director, radio presenter, producer, musician, and writer.Gervais achieved mainstream fame with his television series The Office and the subsequent series Extras, both of which he co-wrote and co-directed with friend and frequent collaborator...
starring Karl Pilkington
Karl Pilkington
Karl Pilkington is a British podcaster, author, television personality and former radio producer. He is best known for the Sky travel series, An Idiot Abroad, which was also presented in the United States on the Science Channel, in Canada on Discovery Channel and in Australia on One HD, and The...
called An Idiot Abroad
An Idiot Abroad
An Idiot Abroad is a travel documentary television series broadcast on Sky1, as well as a spin-off book published by Canongate Books, created by and featuring Karl Pilkington and his former radio show colleagues Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant....
.
In July 2010, filming finished for the pilot of Life's Too Short
Life's Too Short
Life's Too Short is an observational sitcom series, created and written by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, from an idea by Warwick Davis, and is described by Gervais as being about "the life of a showbiz dwarf", with Davis playing a fictionalised version of himself. Gervais and Merchant appear...
, written by Ricky Gervais
Ricky Gervais
Ricky Dene Gervais is an English comedian, actor, director, radio presenter, producer, musician, and writer.Gervais achieved mainstream fame with his television series The Office and the subsequent series Extras, both of which he co-wrote and co-directed with friend and frequent collaborator...
and Merchant, who will both cameo alongside the show's star, Warwick Davis
Warwick Davis
Warwick Ashley Davis is an English actor. He is most notable for playing the title characters in Willow and the Leprechaun film series, as well as for his roles in Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi and the Harry Potter movies. Davis currently stars in the sitcom Life's Too Short, written...
. In 2011, he lent his voice to the CGI film Gnomeo and Juliet
Gnomeo and Juliet
Gnomeo & Juliet is a 2011 computer-animated family comedy film based on William Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet. The film is directed by Kelly Asbury, and the two main characters are voiced by James McAvoy and Emily Blunt. The film was released on , 2011.-Plot:Mrs. Montague and Mr. Capulet are...
, and had a role in the Farrelly brothers'
Farrelly brothers
Peter John Farrelly and Robert Leo "Bobby" Farrelly, Jr. , professionally known as the Farrelly Brothers are screenwriters and directors of ten comedy films, including There's Something About Mary; Dumb and Dumber; Kingpin; Hall Pass; Me, Myself & Irene; Shallow Hal; Stuck on You; Osmosis Jones;...
comedy Hall Pass.
In January 2011, Merchant appeared at the 'Free Fringe Benefit' at the Bloomsbury Theatre, London. A show of stand-up to benefit the Free Fringe at the Edinburgh Comedy Festival, alongside comedians Jeremy Hardy
Jeremy Hardy
Jeremy James Hardy is a British alternative comedian who is also known for his socialist politics.-Career:Hardy was born in Farnborough, Hampshire. He attended Farnham College and studied Modern History and Politics at the University of Southampton...
, Michael Legge
Michael Legge (comedian)
Michael Legge is a Northern-Irish stand-up comedian and television host. He has written for the BBC, ITV, Channel 4, MTV, VH1 and other media, and has appeared in numerous venues throughout the UK as well as in Australia, USA, Canada, Singapore, Holland, Germany and Dubai...
, Robin Ince
Robin Ince
Robin Ince is an English stand-up comedian, actor and writer. He is best known for presenting the BBC radio show The Infinite Monkey Cage .-Stand-up comedy:...
, Mitch Benn
Mitch Benn
Mitch Benn is a British musician and stand-up comedian known for his humorous songs performed on BBC radio. He is a regular contributor to BBC Radio 4's satirical programme The Now Show, and has hosted other radio shows.Benn has performed at several music festivals, and at the Edinburgh Festival...
, Isy Suttie
Isy Suttie
Isobel "Isy" Suttie is an English stand up comedian, actress, writer, and musician. She is best known for playing the role of Dobby in the British sitcom Peep Show.-Career:...
, Bennett Arron
Bennett Arron
Bennett Chico Arron is an award-winning Welsh writer and stand-up comedian. In 1997 he was a finalist of the BBC New Comedy Awards, alongside Peter Kay and Justin Lee Collins...
, Andy Zaltzman
Andy Zaltzman
Andrew "Andy" Zaltzman is a British comedian and author who largely focuses on political material. He has worked extensively with John Oliver; their work together includes Political Animal, The Department and The Bugle.-Early life:...
and founder Peter Buckley Hill
Peter Buckley Hill
Peter Buckley Hill is a musical comedian and head of the Free Fringe at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, for which he was, in 2009, awarded the Panellists' Edinburgh Comedy Award...
. He also stated on the recent free podcast The Ricky Gervais Guide to...Comic Relief that he will be touring his first solo stand up tour later in the year.
On Film 2011
The Film programme
The Film programme is a British film review television programme, broadcast weekly on BBC One, presented by Claudia Winkleman and Danny Leigh. The title of the show changes each year to incorporate the year of broadcast, with the current series being Film 2011, but when referring to successive...
s Questionnaire feature, broadcast on 2 March 2011, Merchant described his favourite film as The Apartment
The Apartment
The Apartment is a 1960 American comedy-drama film produced and directed by Billy Wilder, and starring Jack Lemmon, Shirley MacLaine, and Fred MacMurray. It was Wilder's follow-up to the enormously popular Some Like It Hot and, like its predecessor, was a commercial and critical hit, grossing $25...
(1960), his guilty pleasure as Con Air
Con Air
Con Air is an Academy Award–nominated 1997 American action-thriller film directed by Simon West and produced by Jerry Bruckheimer. It stars Nicolas Cage, John Cusack and John Malkovich...
(1997), the film he cried at as The Bridges of Madison County
The Bridges of Madison County (film)
The Bridges of Madison County is a 1995 American romantic drama film based on the best-selling novel of the same name by Robert James Waller. It was produced by Amblin Entertainment and Malpaso Productions, and distributed by Warner Bros. Entertainment...
, and the film he didn't get as The Lord of the Rings
The Lord of the Rings film trilogy
The Lord of the Rings is an epic film trilogy consisting of three fantasy adventure films based on the three-volume book of the same name by English author J. R. R. Tolkien. The films are The Fellowship of the Ring , The Two Towers and The Return of the King .The films were directed by Peter...
film trilogy.
Merchant provides the voice of Wheatley
Wheatley (Portal)
Wheatley is a fictional artificial character in the 2011 video game Portal 2. He is voiced by British comedian Stephen Merchant and created in part by Portal 2s designer Erik Wolpaw. To date, he only appears in Portal 2....
in Valve
Valve Corporation
Valve Corporation is an American video game development and digital distribution company based in Bellevue, Washington, United States...
's 2011 video game Portal 2
Portal 2
Portal 2 is a first-person puzzle-platform video game developed and published by Valve Corporation. The sequel to the 2007 video game Portal, it was announced on March 5, 2010, following a week-long alternate reality game based on new patches to the original game...
, a role which earned him widespread acclaim among reviewers. While he states his work on the project as "exhausting", Merchant is also "very pleased by the response people have had to it. What I was really pleased by how people seemed to respond to it in the way they do with a movie they've enjoyed, or a TV show they've enjoyed."
Film
| Year | Film | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2007 | Hot Fuzz Hot Fuzz Hot Fuzz is a 2007 British action dark comedy film written by Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright, and starring Pegg and Nick Frost. The three had previously worked together on the 2004 film Shaun of the Dead as well as the television series Spaced... |
Peter Ian Staker | |
| 2007 | Run Fatboy Run Run Fatboy Run Run Fatboy Run is a 2007 British comedy film directed by David Schwimmer, written by Michael Ian Black and Simon Pegg, and starring Pegg, Dylan Moran, Thandie Newton, Harish Patel, India de Beaufort, and Hank Azaria... |
Man with Broken Leg | |
| 2009 | The Invention of Lying The Invention of Lying The Invention of Lying is a 2009 fantasy romantic comedy film that is written and directed by Ricky Gervais and Matthew Robinson. This film is the directorial debut of Gervais. The film stars Ricky Gervais as the first human with the ability to lie... |
Man at the Door | |
| 2010 | Tooth Fairy Tooth Fairy (film) For other uses, see Tooth Fairy .Tooth Fairy is a 2004 short film about a father who forgets to leave money for his daughter from the "tooth fairy"... |
Tracy | |
| 2010 | Cemetery Junction Cemetery Junction (film) Cemetery Junction is a coming-of-age comedy-drama film written and directed by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant. The film was released in the United Kingdom on 14 April 2010.-Plot:... |
Dougie Boden | Also Writer/Director |
| 2010 | Jackboots on Whitehall Jackboots on Whitehall Jackboots on Whitehall is a satirical film portraying an alternate history of the Second World War, in which Nazi Germany has seized London, causing the British to band together at Hadrian's Wall if they are to thwart the German invasion... |
Tom | Voice Only |
| 2010 | Burke and Hare Burke and Hare (film) Burke and Hare is a British black comedy film, loosely based on the Burke and Hare murders. Directed by John Landis, the film stars Simon Pegg and Andy Serkis as William Burke and William Hare respectively. It was Landis's first feature film release in twelve years, the last being 1998's Susan's... |
Holyrood Footman | |
| 2011 | Hall Pass | Gary | |
| 2011 | Gnomeo and Juliet Gnomeo and Juliet Gnomeo & Juliet is a 2011 computer-animated family comedy film based on William Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet. The film is directed by Kelly Asbury, and the two main characters are voiced by James McAvoy and Emily Blunt. The film was released on , 2011.-Plot:Mrs. Montague and Mr. Capulet are... |
Paris | Voice Only |
| 2012 | Movie 43 | Donald |
Television
| Year | Show | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2000 | Meet Ricky Gervais Meet Ricky Gervais Meet Ricky Gervais was a chat show written and hosted by the comedy writer and performer Ricky Gervais. It was produced by Talkback for Channel 4 in 2000 and ran for one series on Friday nights.... |
Studio Employee | |
| 2002 | The Office The Office The Office is a popular mockumentary/situation comedy TV show that was first made in the UK and has now been re-made in many other countries, with overall viewership in the hundreds of millions worldwide. The original version of The Office was created by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant. It... |
The Ogg Monster | Writer/Director |
| 2004 | Garth Marenghi's Darkplace Garth Marenghi's Darkplace Garth Marenghi's Darkplace is a British dark comedy show made for Channel 4 by Matthew Holness and Richard Ayoade. Following on from Garth Marenghi's Netherhead, which won the 2001 Perrier Awards, the show revolves around fictional horror author Garth Marenghi and his publisher Dean Learner... |
Chef | Episode 2 – Cameo |
| 2004 | Green Wing Green Wing Green Wing is a British sitcom set in the fictional East Hampton Hospital. It was created by the same team behind the sketch show Smack the Pony, led by Victoria Pile, and stars Tamsin Greig, Stephen Mangan and Julian Rhind-Tutt.... |
Lab Technician | Episode 6 – Cameo |
| 2005 | Extras | Darren Lamb | Writer/Director |
| 2007 | 24 24 Year 24 was a leap year starting on Saturday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Cethegus and Varro... |
CTU Technician | |
| 2010– | An Idiot Abroad An Idiot Abroad An Idiot Abroad is a travel documentary television series broadcast on Sky1, as well as a spin-off book published by Canongate Books, created by and featuring Karl Pilkington and his former radio show colleagues Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant.... |
Himself | |
| 2010– | The Ricky Gervais Show The Ricky Gervais Show (animated series) The Ricky Gervais Show is an American cartoon series produced for and broadcast by HBO. The series is an animated version of the popular British audio podcasts and audiobooks of the same name, which feature Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant , along with colleague and friend Karl Pilkington,... |
Himself | |
| 2011 | Life's Too Short Life's Too Short Life's Too Short is an observational sitcom series, created and written by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, from an idea by Warwick Davis, and is described by Gervais as being about "the life of a showbiz dwarf", with Davis playing a fictionalised version of himself. Gervais and Merchant appear... |
Version Of Himself | Writer/Director |
| 2011 | Ronnie Corbett's Comedy Britain | Himself | Guest |
Game
| Year | Game | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2011 | Portal 2 Portal 2 Portal 2 is a first-person puzzle-platform video game developed and published by Valve Corporation. The sequel to the 2007 video game Portal, it was announced on March 5, 2010, following a week-long alternate reality game based on new patches to the original game... |
Wheatley Wheatley (Portal) Wheatley is a fictional artificial character in the 2011 video game Portal 2. He is voiced by British comedian Stephen Merchant and created in part by Portal 2s designer Erik Wolpaw. To date, he only appears in Portal 2.... |
Voice Only |
Awards
| Awarding Body/Event | Awarded |
|---|---|
| BAFTA Awards |
|
| British Comedy Award |
|
| Broadcasting Press Guild Broadcasting Press Guild The Broadcasting Press Guild is a British association of journalists who specialise in writing and broadcasting about television, radio and the media generally.... |
The Office The Office is a popular mockumentary/situation comedy TV show that was first made in the UK and has now been re-made in many other countries, with overall viewership in the hundreds of millions worldwide. The original version of The Office was created by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant. It... The Office The Office is a popular mockumentary/situation comedy TV show that was first made in the UK and has now been re-made in many other countries, with overall viewership in the hundreds of millions worldwide. The original version of The Office was created by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant. It... |
| Emmy |
The Office The Office is a popular mockumentary/situation comedy TV show that was first made in the UK and has now been re-made in many other countries, with overall viewership in the hundreds of millions worldwide. The original version of The Office was created by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant. It... |
| WGA Award |
The Office The Office is a popular mockumentary/situation comedy TV show that was first made in the UK and has now been re-made in many other countries, with overall viewership in the hundreds of millions worldwide. The original version of The Office was created by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant. It... |
Personal life
Merchant spent two years dating digital advertising producer Claire Jones, although their relationship reportedly ended in 2009. Merchant is an atheist.Appearance
Merchant's considerable height (6ft 7in; 2.01 m) has been a source of humour and teasing throughout his life. He made a cameo appearance in The OfficeThe Office (UK TV series)
The Office is a British sitcom television series that was first broadcast in the United Kingdom on BBC Two on 9 July 2001. Created, written, and directed by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, the programme is about the day-to-day lives of office employees in the Slough branch of the fictitious...
, playing a character nicknamed the Ogg-Monster, whom David Brent
David Brent
David Brent is a fictional character in the BBC television mockumentary The Office, as well as a recurring character in the NBC series of the same name, portrayed by co-writer and director Ricky Gervais. Brent is a white-collar office middle-manager and the principal character of the BBC series...
called "a big lanky goggle-eyed freak". His height, and also dance moves, have attracted comments from several sources. The Daily Mail
Daily Mail
The Daily Mail is a British daily middle-market tabloid newspaper owned by the Daily Mail and General Trust. First published in 1896 by Lord Northcliffe, it is the United Kingdom's second biggest-selling daily newspaper after The Sun. Its sister paper The Mail on Sunday was launched in 1982...
newspaper described him as a "giant albatross
Albatross
Albatrosses, of the biological family Diomedeidae, are large seabirds allied to the procellariids, storm-petrels and diving-petrels in the order Procellariiformes . They range widely in the Southern Ocean and the North Pacific...
hopping on stilts
Stilts
Stilts are poles, posts or pillars used to allow a person or structure to stand at a distance above the ground. Walking stilts are poles equipped with steps for the feet to stand on, or straps to attach them to the legs, for the purpose of walking while elevated above a normal height...
" as he danced in a London pub (although Merchant denied this during an episode of the Ricky Gervais Show, stating that he did not take to the dance floor on that occasion). While discussing what the Daily Mail had said on the show, friend and collaborator Ricky Gervais
Ricky Gervais
Ricky Dene Gervais is an English comedian, actor, director, radio presenter, producer, musician, and writer.Gervais achieved mainstream fame with his television series The Office and the subsequent series Extras, both of which he co-wrote and co-directed with friend and frequent collaborator...
has likened him to an "upright lizard
Lizard
Lizards are a widespread group of squamate reptiles, with nearly 3800 species, ranging across all continents except Antarctica as well as most oceanic island chains...
being given electro-shock treatment" and a "stick insect with glasses" or Beaker
Beaker (Muppet)
Beaker is a Muppet character from The Muppet Show. He is the shy, long-suffering assistant of Dr. Bunsen Honeydew, and is likewise named for a piece of laboratory equipment, although his shape more closely resembles an Erlenmeyer flask....
from The Muppet Show. Radio producer and co-host of Merchant, Karl Pilkington
Karl Pilkington
Karl Pilkington is a British podcaster, author, television personality and former radio producer. He is best known for the Sky travel series, An Idiot Abroad, which was also presented in the United States on the Science Channel, in Canada on Discovery Channel and in Australia on One HD, and The...
, has described his moves as a "bit of weird art" in the past, while British comic and broadcaster Russell Brand
Russell Brand
Russell Edward Brand is an English comedian, actor, columnist, singer, author and radio/television presenter.Brand achieved mainstream fame in the UK in 2004 for his role as host of Big Brother spin-off, Big Brother's Big Mouth. His first major film role was in the 2007 film St Trinians...
has likened him to a "graceful grasshopper
Grasshopper
The grasshopper is an insect of the suborder Caelifera in the order Orthoptera. To distinguish it from bush crickets or katydids, it is sometimes referred to as the short-horned grasshopper...
". Merchant has commented that he prefers to liken himself to fellow tall man and English football player, Peter Crouch
Peter Crouch
Peter James Crouch is an English footballer who plays as a striker for Premier League club Stoke City and the England national team.Crouch started his career as a trainee with Tottenham Hotspur...
who is also six foot seven inches. Merchant impersonated Crouch in a BBC sketch broadcast as part of the pre-match build-up to England's opening game at the 2006 World Cup.
External links
- Official website
- Interviewed on BBC Radio Five Live
- Xfm: Biography
- Tall man, taller success story – interview in The TelegraphThe Daily TelegraphThe Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...
– 8 August 2005 - Interview with Barbara Ellen in The ObserverThe ObserverThe Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-Origins:The first issue,...
Magazine – 5 November 2006 - Radar Online interview – 11 January 2007
- An Englishman abroad
- Stephen Merchant interview
- Stephen Merchant interviewed by Sophie Elmhirst on New StatesmanNew StatesmanNew Statesman is a British centre-left political and cultural magazine published weekly in London. Founded in 1913, and connected with leading members of the Fabian Society, the magazine reached a circulation peak in the late 1960s....
.