Richard Michael "Rik" Mayall (born 7 March 1958)
is an English
actor,
writer and
comedian. He is
known for his
comedy partnership with
Adrian Edmondson, his over the top,
energetic portrayal of characters, and for being one of the
pioneering members of the
alternative
comedy scene in the early 1980s.
In the 2005 poll
The Comedian's Comedian, Mayall was voted
among the top 50 comedy performers of all time.
Early life
Mayall was
born in Harlow
, Essex to Gillian and John Mayall. When he was three
years old, Mayall and his parents — both of whom taught drama — moved to Droitwich Spa
, Worcestershire,
where he spent the rest of his childhood and performed in his
parents' plays. After attending the King's School,
Worcester
, he studied drama at the University of Manchester
where he met his future partner and close friend Adrian Edmondson in 1976. He also
met
Ben Elton and
Lise Mayer, with whom he would later write
The Young
Ones.
Career
The alternative comedy boom
Both
Edmondson and Mayall gained their reputation by appearing at
The Comedy
Store
, debuting in 1980. The
double act was then billed as "
20th Century Coyote", which soon became
a popular turn at the Comedy Store, and Mayall also developed solo
routines using characters such as
Kevin
Turvey and a pompous anarchist poet named Rick. This success
led to Mayall and Edmondson, along with Comedy Store
compere Alexei
Sayle and other popular acts
French and Saunders, "The Outer Limits"
(
Nigel Planer and
Peter Richardson),
Arnold Brown and
Pete
Richens, to break away and set up their own comedy club called
"
The Comic Strip" in the Raymond
Revue Bar, a local strip club. Mayall's rising popularity led to a
regular slot for his Kevin Turvey character on the series
A Kick Up the
Eighties, first broadcast in 1981. It was also around this
time that he appeared as "Rest Home" Ricky in
Richard O'Brien's
Shock Treatment, the "equal" to his
cult smash
The Rocky
Horror Picture Show. He played Dentonvale's resident
attendant as the love interest to Nell Campbell's Nurse
Ansalong.
His TV appearances as Kevin Turvey were popular enough to warrant a
mockumentary based on the character
entitled
Kevin Turvey - The Man Behind The Green Door,
broadcast in 1982. The previous year, he appeared in a bit role in
An American Werewolf
in London. His stage partnership with Edmondson continued,
often appearing together as "
The
Dangerous Brothers", a pair of hapless daredevils whose
hyper-violent antics foreshadowed their characters in
Bottom.
Meanwhile, fledgling
Channel 4 offered the
Comic Strip group a series of six short films, which became
The Comic Strip
Presents..., debuting on 2 November 1982. The series,
which continued sporadically for many years, saw Mayall play a wide
variety of roles. It picked up a reputation for anti-establishment
humour, and for parodies such as
Bad News
On Tour, a spoof "
rockumentary" which pre-dated
This is Spinal Tap starring Mayall,
Richardson, Edmondson and Planer as a
heavy metal band.
The Young Ones
At the same time
The Comic Strip Presents... was being
negotiated, the
BBC took an interest in
The Young Ones,
a sitcom written by Mayall and then-girlfriend
Lise Mayer, in the same
anarchic vein as
Comic Strip. Ben Elton,
who had attended Manchester University with Mayall and Edmondson,
was asked to join the writing team. The series was commissioned and
the first series was broadcast in 1982, shortly before
Comic
Strip began. Mayall played his "Rick" character in the series,
a pompous
sociology student and
Cliff Richard devotee, to wide public acclaim.
Despite the sitcom format, Mayall maintained his double-act routine
with Edmondson, who starred as violent
punk Vyvyan.
Nigel
Planer (as hippie Neil) and
Christopher Ryan (as "Mike the cool guy")
also starred, with additional material written and performed by
Alexei Sayle. The show's first series
was very successful, and a second was commissioned in 1984.
Becoming a household name
Following
The Young Ones, Mayall continued to work on
The Comic Strip films. He also returned to standup,
starring on
Saturday
Live - a British version of the American
Saturday Night Live - first
broadcast in 1985. He and Edmondson had a regular section as
"
The Dangerous Brothers",
their earlier stage act.
In 1985, Mayall debuted another of his comic creations. He had
starred in the final episode of
The
Black Adder in 1983 as "Mad Gerald". The series had proven
expensive and a second series was not forthcoming until it was
agreed that the budget would be cut and
Ben
Elton would replace
Rowan
Atkinson as co-writer (alongside
Richard Curtis). The "re-vamped"
Blackadder proved an enormous success
thanks, in part, to the inclusion of a character named
Lord Flashheart, played by Mayall, in the
series' first episode, "
Bells".
Despite being on screen for mere minutes, Mayall's performance as
the boisterous heart-throb Flashheart proved very popular and
raised Mayall's public profile further. The character was given a
bigger part as Squadron Commander Flashheart in
Blackadder Goes Forth in 1989. A
similar character, also played by Mayall, would appear in 2000's
Blackadder: Back and
Forth under the guise of
Robin
Hood.
In 1986, Mayall joined forces once more with
Planer, Adrian Edmondson and Elton to star in
Filthy Rich &
Catflap as "Richie Rich" in what was billed as a follow-up
to
The Young Ones. While he received positive critical
reviews, viewing figures were poor and the series was never
repeated on the BBC. In later years, release on video, DVD and
repeats on UK TV found the series a
cult
following. Mayall suggested the series did not last because he
was uncomfortable acting in an Elton-written project, when they had
been co-writers on
The Young Ones. 1987 also saw Mayall
co-starring with Edmondson in the
ITV sit-com
Hardwicke House. Due to the
adverse reaction of both press and viewers however, ITV withdrew
the series after two episodes, and the remainder has never been
shown.
The same year saw Mayall achieve a number one hit in the
UK singles charts when he and his co-stars
from
The Young Ones teamed up with Cliff Richard to record
a new version of "
Living Doll"
for the inaugural
Comic
Relief campaign. Mayall played Rick one last time in the
subsequent stage show and has supported the
Comic Relief
cause ever since.
That year, Mayall appeared on the children's television series
Jackanory, on which well
known-faces read children's stories. His crazed, anarchic portrayal
of
Roald Dahl's
George's Marvellous
Medicine proved one of the series' most memorable
performances. However, at the time, the BBC received complaints
"with viewers claiming both story and presentation to be both
dangerous and offensive."
In 1987, Mayall undertook his first major solo project as fictional
Conservative MP Alan
Beresford B'Stard in the sitcom
The New Statesman for
Yorkshire Television, written by
Laurence Marks and
Maurice Gran. The character was a
satire of
Tory MP present in the United Kingdom in the
1980s and early 1990s. The programme ran for four series -
incorporating two BBC specials - between 1987-1994 and was a
success both critically and in the ratings. In a similar vein to
his appearance on
Jackanory, in 1989, Mayall was the star
of a series of "bit" shows for ITV called
Grim Tales, in which Mayall narrated
Grimm Brothers fairy tales, while puppets acted out the
stories.
In the early 1990s Mayall starred in a series of humorous adverts
for
Nintendo games and consoles. With the
money he earned from the ads, he bought his house in London which
he jokingly calls 'Nintendo Towers'.
He also lent his voice to the
Playstation and Windows PC video game
Hogs of War. In the early
1990s, he had auditioned for the roles of Banzai, Zazu and Timon in
The Lion King. He was asked to
audition by lyricist
Tim Rice.
Bottom
In 1991,
Mayall and Edmondson co-starred in the West End
production
of Beckett's Waiting for Godot at the Queen's
Theatre. Here they came up with the idea for their next
project,
Bottom. Mayall and Edmondson have said
Bottom was intended to be a cruder cousin to plays like
Waiting for Godot.
Bottom was commissioned by the BBC and three series were
shown between 1991-1995. Mayall starred as "Richard 'Richie'
Richard" alongside Edmondson's"Eddie Elizabeth Hitler". The series
featured their trademark
slapstick
violence taken to new extremes.
The series gained a strong cult following. In 1993, following the
second series, Mayall and Edmondson decided to take a stage show
version of the series on a national tour.
Bottom: Live was
a commercial success, filling large venues. Four additional stage
shows were embarked upon in 1995, 1997, 2001 and 2003, each to
great success. The violent natures of these shows saw both
Edmondson and Mayall ending up in hospital at various points. A
film version,
Guest House
Paradiso, was released in 1999. A fourth TV series was
also written, but not commissioned by the BBC.
Other activities in the 1990s
Mayall starred in 1991's
Drop Dead
Fred as the eponymous character, a troublesome
imaginary friend reappearing from a woman's
childhood. He also appeared in
Carry On Columbus (1992) along with
various alternative comedy alumni.
Mayall also provided the voice of the character Froglip, the leader
of "the goblins", in the 1992 animated film adaption of the popular
1872 children's tale
The
Princess and the Goblin by Scottish author
George MacDonald.
In 1993, he appeared in
Rik Mayall Presents, a series of
three individual comedy dramas. Mayall's performances won a Best
Comedy Performer award at that year's
British Comedy Awards, and a second
series of three was broadcast in early 1995.
In 1995 Mayall co-starred in a production of the play
Cell Mates, alongside his friend
Stephen Fry. The production was to prove
immensely troublesome for Mayall. Not long into the play's run, Fry
suffered a
nervous breakdown and
walked out of the production.
He fled to Belgium
, where he
remained missing for several days, and the play was forced to close
shortly afterwards. In a 2007 interview, Mayall said of the
incident:
"You don't leave the trenches ...
[S]elfishness is one thing, being a c**t is another. I
mustn't start that war again." It is believed that Mayall and
Fry are no longer estranged.
Edmondson later poked fun at the event during their stage tour
Bottom Live:
The Big Number Two Tour, when, after Mayall gave mocking
gestures to the audience and insulted their town in a silly voice,
Edmondson said
"Have you finished yet? It's just I'm
beginning to understand why Stephen Fry fucked off!"
Towards the end of the run of
Cell Mates Mayall revealed a
replica gun — a prop from the play — to a passer-by in the street.
He was later cautioned over the incident. Mayall later conceded
that this was "incredibly stupid, even by my standards".
Starting in 1999, Rik Mayall was the voice of the black-headed
seagull Kehaar in the first and the second season of the animated
television series
Watership
Down.
2000s
In 2000, Mayall appeared in the video production of
Jesus Christ Superstar as
King Herod. He joked in the "Making of"
documentary, which was included on the
DVD
release, that
"the real reason why millions of people want to
come and see this is because I'm in it! Me and Jesus!"
In 2002, Mayall teamed up with Marks and Gran once more when he
starred as Professor Adonis Cnut in the
ITV
sitcom,
Believe Nothing.
However, the sitcom failed to repeat the success of
The New
Statesman and lasted only one series. Following 2003's
Bottom: Live tour,
Bottom 5: Weapons Grade
Y-Fronts, Mayall stated that he and Edmondson would return
with another tour. Shortly thereafter, however, Edmondson told
The Daily Mail that he no
longer wished to work on
Bottom. This effectively
dissolved their nearly 30-year partnership. Edmondson claimed they
were "too old" to continue portraying the characters. Edmondson
added that, since Mayall had recovered from his coma, he was slower
on the uptake and it had become more difficult to work with him, as
well as citing that due to taking medication, Mayall had been
advised to stop drinking alcohol. However, Edmondson said that the
pair remained very close friends.
Mayall released an 'in-character' semi-fictionalised
autobiography in September 2005 entitled
Bigger than Hitler, Better than Christ (ISBN
0-00-720727-1). At the same time, he starred in a new series for
ITV,
All About George.
Mayall reprised the role of Alan B'Stard in 2006 in the play
The New Statesman 2006: Blair B'stard Project, written by
Marks and Gran. By this time B'Stard had left the floundering
Conservatives and become a
Labour
MP. Following a successful two-month run in London's West End
at The Trafalgar Studios in 2007, a heavily re-written version
toured theatres nationwide, with Marks and Gran constantly updating
the script to keep it topical. However, Mayall succumbed to chronic
fatigue and
flu
in May 2007, and withdrew from the show. Alan B'Stard was played by
his understudy, Mike Sherman during his hiatus.
Mayall was cast as the poltergeist Peeves, in
Harry Potter and the
Philosopher's Stone, the first of the Harry Potter films in
2001. Comments by Mayall suggest material for the role was filmed
and shown in cinemas but then never released to the public on any
subsequent release for no apparent reason. He tells the story of
this hiring/firing on his second website blog for his 2008 film,
Evil Calls: The
Raven.
For
Evil Calls, he shot his role as Winston the Butler in
2002, when the film was titled
Alone in the Dark. The film
was not completed until 2008 and was released under its new 'Evil
Calls' title to distance itself from the
Alone in the Dark computer game
movie. He may appear in a possible sequel.
Mayall currently performs the voice of the Andrex puppy in the UK
TV commercials for Andrex toilet paper, and also has a voice part
in the UK Domestos cleaning product adverts. Rik Mayall performs
the voice of the character "King Arthur" in the children's
television cartoon series "King Arthur's Disasters", alongside
Matt Lucas (
Little Britain) who performs the character
"Merlin" on the children's series. He currently has a recurring
role in theChannel Five remake of the cop drama series,
Minder.
In the summer of 2009 Mayall will record a football Anthem called
'Noble England' for the World Cup 2010 with Coventry producer Dave
Loughran. Mayall will perform an adapted speech from Shakespeare's
Henry V on the track which is set to be released by Motivation
Records in the spring of 2010.
Personal life
Mayall wanted to be a footballer and in the early '80s played for
Redditch United reserves aged 18 but
he was only with them for one season before leaving to attend the
University of Manchester. He never returned to football, but on
ebay a programme was found of Redditch United with the name Richard
Mayall (Rik's full first name). Rik supports
Aston Villa.
Family
Mayall
married Barbara Robbin, a former make-up artist from Scotland
, in
1985. They have three children: Rosie (born 1986), Sidney
(born 1988), drummer of London band Pink Cigar, and Bonnie (born 18
September 1995).
Mayall met Robbin in 1981 while filming
A Kick Up The
Eighties. At the time, he was in a long-term relationship with
Lise Mayer. Mayall and Robbin embarked on
a secret affair which lasted until 1985 when Mayall learned that he
had made both women pregnant.
Mayall and Robbin immediately eloped to
Barbados
.
Mayer would later suffer a
miscarriage.
Mayall maintains that, despite a longstanding feud, he and Mayer
are now friends.
Quad bike accident
On 9 April
1998, Mayall was seriously injured after crashing a quad bike near his home in Devon
. He
was in a
coma for several days. Various media
sources reported the comedian was "seriously ill".
Mayall's daughter Bonnie and her cousin had asked him to take them
for a ride on the bike - a
Christmas gift
from his wife - but he was forced to refuse due to rain, and
proceeded alone. Some time later, Mayall's wife Barbara looked out
the window and saw him lying on the ground with the bike, at first
believing he was joking.
Mayall
was airlifted to Plymouth
's Derriford Hospital, where it was discovered he
had suffered two haematomas and a
fractured skull. During the following 96 hours, Mayall was
kept heavily sedated to prevent movement which could cause pressure
on his
brain. His head injuries were so severe
that his family was warned he would either die or possibly suffer
brain damage.
After five days doctors felt it safe to bring Mayall back to
consciousness. In his 2005 spoof biography, Mayall claims at this
point he "
rose from the dead". During
Mayall's hospitalisation, the
Comic Strip special
Four
Men in a Car was broadcast for the first time on TV. The film
involves Mayall's character being hit by a car. Mayall had a long
road to recovery and believed he was being held hostage by the
staff at the hospital. After being transferred to a private
hospital in London, he "escaped" and took a taxi to his home, but
was taken back to the hospital later that day after being sedated
by his doctor.
He was also supposed to take medication to prevent epileptic
seizures for a year until doctors felt the
threat of seizures related to his condition had passed. Mayall
stopped taking the medication a few months later. As a result, he
suffered one or two epileptic seizures. During one such episode, he
bit through his tongue. He is now on the medication for life.
Mayall eased his way back into his career by doing
voice-over work. His first post-accident acting
job was in the 1998
Jonathan
Creek Christmas Special, as DI Gideon Pryke.
Both he and Edmondson have subsequently joked about this event in
the various stage versions of
Bottom, for instance
Edmondson quipping: 'if only i'd fixed those brakes'. The pair
wrote the first draft of their feature film
Guest House Paradiso while Mayall
was hospitalised. They originally planned to co-direct, but
following the accident,
Edmondson
took on the duties himself.
References
- NNDB biodata
- Rik Mayall Biography in Film
Reference
- Mayall interviewed for a Comedy Connections profile of
The Young Ones
- UK Online website
- Acknowledged here on the BBC News website
- Reported at Television Heaven website
- Interview with Theatre.com January 11,
2007
- Police Rebuke Rik Mayall for 'Stupid' Gun
Prank
- The Rik Mayall FAQ
- Article in The Daily Mail's "Weekend" supplement
(2003)
- "Rik Mayall Acts Up"
- House of Fear.co.uk
- Noble
England - Riks Football Anthem
- The
Producer of Riks Football Anthem
- Noble Englands Record Label
- Interview with Roz Laws, IC Birmingham, 29 December 2002
- Interviewed by Michael Owen, You, 21 November
1999
- Report that Mayall was "seriously ill" following the
accident
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