Stephen Fry - Definition and Overview

Stephen John Fry (born 24 August, 1957) is a British comedian, author, actor and director. He is the son of Alan and Marianne Fry.

He was educated at Stout's Hill, Uppingham and Queens' College, Cambridge. He lives in Norfolk, London, and New York City. He is an erstwhile comedy collaborator of Hugh Laurie. Rather tellingly, he was described as being "a man with a brain the size of Kent" in an interview with Michael Parkinson.

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.

Career highlights

Highlights of Fry's career include:

• While still at boarding school, Fry absconded with a stolen credit card and, when apprehended, spent three months in prison for fraud.
• He made an early television appearance on University Challenge while an undergraduate at Cambridge.
• In 1984, he rewrote the script of the stage musical, Me and My Girl, which subsequently became a huge West End hit.
• Very early in his West End debut (Simon Gray's play Cell Mates), Fry suffered an attack of stage fright so serious that he ran away, leaving only an apology, and turning up some days later in Belgium.
• He famously declared that he practised a celibate lifestyle (which he has since abandoned).
• He made his debut as a film director with Bright Young Things, an adaptation of the novel Vile Bodies by Evelyn Waugh, in 2003.

List of works

• Films (As Director)
  • Bright Young Things (2003)

• Novels
  • The Liar (1992)
  • The Hippopotamus (1994)
  • Making History (an example of alternate history) (1997) Winner of the Sidewise Award for Alternate History
  • The Stars' Tennis Balls (as Revenge: A Novel in the United States) (Fry's take on The Count of Monte Cristo story (2000))

• Other books
  • Paperweight (collection of articles) (1992)
  • (1997)
  • Stephen Fry's Incomplete and Utter History of Classical Music (2004)

• TV scripts
  • A Bit of Fry and Laurie (1989, 1990)
  • A Bit More Fry and Laurie
  • Fry & Laurie #3
  • Three Bits of Fry and Laurie
  • Fry & Laurie Bit No. 4

• Plays
  • Latin! (or Tobacco and Boys.) (1979, included in Paperweight). Winner of the Fringe First at the 1980 Edinburgh Festival.

• Screenplays
  • Bright Young Things (2003)

• Musicals
  • Me and My Girl (adapted Lupino Lane's script) (1983)

Performances

Fry as P. G. Wodehouse's Jeeves in the ITV series Jeeves and Wooster

• TV programmes
  • Blackadder (Mostly Blackadder II and Blackadder Goes Forth, with a cameo in Blackadder The Third)
  • Whose Line Is It Anyway (the original UK version)
  • A Bit of Fry and Laurie (1986 pilot, 1989, 1990, 1992, 1995)
  • Jeeves and Wooster (1990-93)
  • Common Pursuit (1992)
  • Gormenghast (2000)
  • QI (2003-onwards)
  • Absolute Power (2003)
  • Tom Brown's Schooldays (2005)

• Films
  • A Fish Called Wanda (1988)
  • Peter's Friends (1992)
  • I.Q. (1994)
  • Wilde (1997)
  • Spice World (1997)
  • A Civil Action (1998)
  • Whatever Happened to Harold Smith? (1999)
  • Relative Values (2000), based on Noel Coward's play
  • Gosford Park (2001)
  • The Discovery of Heaven
  • Thunderpants (2002)
  • The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2005)

• Plays
  • The Common Pursuit (1988)
  • Cell Mates, by Simon Gray (1995)

• Radio shows
  • Saturday Night Fry (1998, BBC Radio Four, six episodes)
  • A Bit of Fry and Laurie (1994, BBC Radio Four, two half-hour programmes compiled from selected previously-seen sketches from the TV series)
  • Absolute Power, BBC Radio Four
  • Regular guest panelist on I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue, BBC Radio Four
  • Regular guest panelist on Just a Minute, BBC Radio Four
  • Has a regular slot, The Incomplete and Utter History of Classical Music on Classic FM

Stephen Fry also narrates the UK audio versions of the Harry Potter books (this is Jim Dale's job in the US).

Trivia

• The Stars' Tennis Balls' major characters all have names that are anagrams or other simple mutations of their counterparts in The Count of Monte Cristo. This is probably a coincidence.

Edmond Dantes	Ned Maddstone	anagram
Mercedes	Portia	pun (Porsche)
de Villefort	Oliver Delft	anagram
the Abbe (Faria)	the Babe (Fraser)	anagram (partial)
Fernand Mondego	Gordon Fendeman	anagram
Noirtier	Blackrow	translated literally
Capt. Leclere	Paddy Leclare	homonym
Caderousse	Cade, Rufus	similar sound
Danglars	Garland	anagram (mostly)
Monte Cristo	Simon Cotter	anagram

• As well as having competed on University Challenge whilst at Cambridge, he also appeared in The Young Ones as "Lord Snot", one of the "Footlights College" team against whom The Young Ones are competing in a fictitious edition of University Challenge. He later appeared in a Comic Relief edition of University Challenge as part of the "Gownies" team of University-graduate comedians, against the (victorious) team of "Townies".

• He used to be a regular panelist on Have I Got News For You, but now refuses to appear on the show as a protest against the sacking of Angus Deayton.

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

Links

• Official Stephen Fry Web site (http://www.stephenfry.com/)
• Stephen Fry (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000410/) at the Internet Movie Database
• Stephen Fry on PG Wodehouse (http://www.pgwodehousebooks.com/fry.htm)