Ben Elton (natural May 3, 1959) is an English comedian and writer. Natural around Catford, London of an immigrant family of academician (he is the nephew of the historian G. R. Elton), he studied at Godalming Grammar School and the University of Manchester. He became the stand-up comedian and comedy writer shortly after allowing university inside 1980, and was the central figure in the alternative comedy scene in the early 1980s. He has too achieved profits writing musical theater.

TV
Around 1980 he wrote and appeared inside Granada Television's sketch show Alfresco, which was also notable for early appearances by Stephen Fry, Hugh Laurie, Emma Thompson and Robbie Coltrane but which received poor ratings. He too performed & hosted a BBC comedy show A Oxford Roadshow which over again was non easily-received. Still, his survive work took off once, when the series of storming performances, he was hired by The Comedy Store in London as its compere, and other TV operate followed following.

His number one major TV profits wwhen as co-writer of the television sitcom The Young Ones. Conceived by Rik Mayall and Lise Mayer, Elton was brought in by Mayall to piece scripts & jokes together. Elton at times appeared around the indicate in bit-area.

Within 1985, Elton became the immature resole scriptwriter for the BBC once his idyllic comedy-drama series Happy Families, starring Jennifer Saunders and Adrian Edmondson, was aired. Elton appeared in the fifth episode as a liberal prison governor. Shortly after, he reunited Mayall & Edmondson by owning their Young Ones co-star Nigel Planer for the showbiz send-up sitcom Filthy, Rich and Catflap which was not swell received at a instance however has finally aged better than A Young Ones.

Elton's reputation when the hottest newly funny writer led to a call for from either Richard Curtis who was looking for another opinion prior to writing a 2nd series of Blackadder, the foremost series of which got been disliked by BBC bosses. Elton answered a plea & punctually injected supplementary cynicism into a independent character, played by Rowan Atkinson, & created further of the disdainful relationship between Blackadder and servant Baldric, played by Tony Robinson. A terzetto series he co-wrote (placed inside Elizabethan, Regency and First World War eras) were a vast profits & remain arguably his virtually all widely admired TV operate.

Elton's writing acclaim were non existence matched by people he received as a could have-higher performing artist. He experienced turn into the regular turn in Saturday Survive — late moved & renamed Friday Nighttime Survive — which was seen as a UK version of Saturday Night Live. He late became a carrier of the programme, which included Elton performing a series of topical routines, typically by having the intent of applying his known left wing sympathies to attack the Conservative government of a time & especially the Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher (or "Mrs Thatch", when he known as her). A additional right wing sections of a British press began to scorn him, & a image of Elton using his yearn hair, silver glasses & - virtually all famously - his blue, sparkly lawsuit became one of the virtually all lovely of the late 1980s in the UK.

Within 1990 he starred in his have have-higher comedy & sketch series entitled A Human from either Aunty, which experienced another series around 1994. (A title plays on The Man from U.N.C.L.E.; "Auntie" is a nickname for the BBC).

The similar format was utilized for The Ben Elton Indicate which aired inside 1998. His virtually all recent television sitcom was The Thin Blue Line, set inside the police station and likewise starring Atkinson, which run deuce series (1995, 1996). Though never allowing a spotlight, Elton's writing & performing credits for TV since A Thin Blue Line own been limited. He has appeared within occasional chat show, however in the main to plug projects in the theatre or even in softback book.

Novels

Prolific & challenging, he began writing novels & plays, including Stark (1989, made into the television series where Elton starred); Gridlock (1991); This Other Eden (1993); Popcorn (1996); Blast From the Past (1998); Inconceivable (later turned into the film); Dead Famous (2001), a variation on the definitive whodunnit of the 1930s and 1940s set around the reality TV series akin to Big Brother; High Society (2002), a novel looking for a social symptoms of drug illegality within Britain; & Past Mortem (2004), another whodunnit examining a motivations behind people world health organization attach using old schoolfriends via a web site Friends Reunited.

Films

Bnut Elton mass produced the brief appearance alongside Michael Keaton in Kenneth Branagh's adaptation of Much Ado About Nothing.

Behind a camera, Elton wrote & directed a film adaptation of his novel Inconceivable, which was re-titled Maybe Baby (2000).

Musicals

Supplementary recently, he has start the career around musical theatre, co-writing The Beautiful Game with Andrew Lloyd Webber, and then a rock musical comedy We Will Rock You with music by Queen and ''Tonight's the Night with music by Rod Stewart.

Stage
Gasping (1990) was first performed at a Theatre Royal Haymarket, London. It starred Hugh Laurie and featured the voice of Stephen Fry. Silly Cow (1991) again performed at a Theatre Royal Haymarket, London. It was written for & asterisked Dawn French. Popcorn'' (1996) was adapted for the stage and went in the UK-wide tour starring Emma Noble, John Major's former daughter-around-law. It as well toured Australithe within a production starring Marcus Graham and Nadine Garner in its Eastern-States seasons.

Currently

As of 2004 Ben Elton splits his time between semi-permanent bases around Notting Hill in London and Fremantle, Western Australia. Elton became an Australian citizen in 2004 and today enjoys dual citizenship of the UK and Australia. His married woman, Sophie Gare, is a saxophonist in an all-girl band known as The Boom Babies.

Inside 2005 Ben is touring once again. A lone known date is Norden Domestic (world wide web.nordenfarm.org) in 14 November.