Rowan Atkinson[Mr.Bean]
Rowan Sebastian Atkinson (born 6 January 1955) is an English comedian, screenwriter, and actor. He is most famous for his work on the satirical sketch comedy show Not The Nine O'Clock News, and the sitcoms Blackadder, Mr. Bean, and The Thin Blue Line. He has been listed in The Observer as one of the 50 funniest actors in British comedy, and amongst the top 50 comedy actors ever in a 2005 poll of fellow comedians.
Early life and educationAtkinson, the youngest of four brothers, was born in
RadioAtkinson starred in a series of comedy shows for
After university, Atkinson toured with
The success of Not the Nine O'Clock News led to his starring in the
Atkinson's other famous creation, the hapless
The Thin Blue Line television series, written by Ben Elton, which takes place in a police station located in fictitious Gasforth.Kronenbourg, Hitachi electrical goods, Fujifilm, and Give Blood. Most famously, he appeared as a hapless and error-prone espionage agent in a long-running series for Barclaycard, on which character his title role in Johnny English and Johnny English Reborn was based.comedy spoof of Doctor Who as the Doctor, for a red nose day benefit.Top Gear in July 2011, where he recorded the fastest lap in the Kia Cee'd with a time of 1:42.2
Atkinson has fronted campaigns for
He also starred in a
Atkinson has also starred as the Star in a Reasonably Priced Car in the motoring show,
FilmJames Bond movie Never Say Never Again and a leading role in Dead on Time with Nigel Hawthorne. He appeared in former Not the Nine O'Clock News co-star Mel Smith's directorial debut The Tall Guy in 1989. He also appeared alongside Anjelica Huston and Mai Zetterling in Roald Dahl's The Witches in 1990. In 1993 he played the part of Dexter Hayman in Hot Shots! Part Deux, a parody of Rambo III, starring Charlie Sheen.Four Weddings and a Funeral. That same year he was featured in Walt Disney's The Lion King as Zazu the Red-billed Hornbill. Atkinson continued to appear in supporting roles in successful comedies, including Rat Race (2001), Scooby-Doo (2002), and Love Actually (2003).Keeping Mum, which also starred Kristin Scott Thomas, Maggie Smith and Patrick Swayze.Bean to international success. A sequel, Mr. Bean's Holiday, was released in March 2007 and may be the last time he plays the character. He has also starred in the James Bond parody Johnny English in 2003. Its sequel, Johnny English Reborn will be released in 2011.In 2005, he acted in the crime/comedy
In addition to his supporting roles, Atkinson has also had success as a leading man. His television character Mr. Bean debuted on the big screen in 1997 with
TheatreThe Secret Policeman's Ball (1979).Oliver! as Fagin. The production was directed by Rupert Goold. A year prior he starred in a pre-West End run of the show in Oxford, directed by Jez Bond.Comedic stylephysical comedy in his trademark character of Mr. Bean, Atkinson's other characters rely more heavily on language. Atkinson often plays authority figures (especially priests or vicars) speaking absurd lines with a completely deadpan delivery.comic devices is over-articulation of the "B" sound, such as his pronunciation of "Bob" in a Blackadder episode. Atkinson suffers from stuttering, and the over-articulation is a technique to overcome problematic consonants.Buster Keaton, sets him apart from most modern television and film comedies, which rely heavily on dialogue, as well as stand-up comedy which is mostly based on monologues. This talent for visual comedy has led to Atkinson being called "the man with the rubber face": comedic reference was made to this in an episode of Blackadder the Third, in which Baldrick (Tony Robinson) refers to his master, Mr. E. Blackadder, as a "lazy, big nosed, rubber-faced bastard
Rowan Atkinson did live on-stage skits - also appearing with members of Monty Python - in
Rowan Atkinson appeared in the 2009 revival of the West End musical
Best known for his use of
One of his better-known trademark
Atkinson's often visually based style, which has been compared to
.Personal lifeIndian father and a British mother. The couple married at the Russian Tea Room in New York City in 1990. They have two children and live in Oundle, Northamptonshire as well as Ipsden, Oxfordshire and Highbury, London.[citation needed] In October 2010, his Blackadder co-star Stephen Fry confessed on The Rob Brydon Show that he had contemplated asking Sastry out (she was a make-up artist on the series), but discovered she was going on a date with Atkinson and kept quiet. Fry was best man at Atkinson's wedding in 1990. Atkinson was formerly in a relationship with actress Leslie Ash.PoliticsNicholas Hytner, Stephen Fry, and Ian McEwan, to the British Parliament in an attempt to force a review of the controversial Racial and Religious Hatred Bill, which they felt would give overwhelming power to religious groups to impose censorship on the arts.cars that began with driving his mother's Morris Minor around the family farm. He has written for the British magazines Car, Octane, Evo, and "SuperClassics", a short-lived UK magazine, in which he reviewed the McLaren F1 in 1995.driving licence, gained in 1981, because lorries held a fascination for him, and to ensure employment as a young actor. He has also used this skill when filming comedy material.Henry Birkin in the television play Full Throttle in 1995. In 1991, he starred in the self-penned The Driven Man, a series of sketches featuring Atkinson driving around London trying to solve his car-fetish, and discussing it with taxi drivers, policemen, used-car salesmen and psychotherapists.Atkinson has raced in other cars, including a Renault 5 GT Turbo for two seasons for its one make series. He owns a McLaren F1, which was involved in an accident in Cabus, near Garstang, Lancashire with an Austin Metro. He also owns a Honda NSX. Other cars he owns include an Audi A8, and a Honda Civic Hybrid.Conservative Party politician Alan Clark, himself a devotee of classic motor cars, recorded in his published Diaries this chance meeting with a man he later realised was Atkinson while driving through Oxfordshire in May 1984: "Just after leaving the motorway at Thame I noticed a dark red DBS V8 Aston Martin on the slip road with the bonnet up, a man unhappily bending over it. I told Jane to pull in and walked back. A DV8 in trouble is always good for a gloat." Clark writes that he gave Atkinson a lift in his Rolls Royce to the nearest telephone box, but was disappointed in his bland reaction to being recognised, noting that: "he didn't sparkle, was rather disappointing and chétif."Porsche: "I have a problem with Porsches. They're wonderful cars, but I know I could never live with one. Somehow, the typical Porsche people—and I wish them no ill—are not, I feel, my kind of people. I don't go around saying that Porsches are a pile of dung, but I do know that psychologically I couldn't handle owning one."Top Gear as the guest of "Star in a reasonably priced car" section, where he drove the Kia Cee'd on the test track in 1"42.2, knocking off John Bishop(1"42.5) to become new leader of the board.
Marriage and childrenAtkinson first met Sunetra Sastry in the 1980s, who was working as a make-up artist with the BBC. Sastry is of mixed descent, being the daughter of an
In June 2005, Atkinson led a coalition of the UK's most prominent actors and writers, including
In 2009, he criticised homophobic speech legislation, saying that the House of Lords must vote against a government attempt to remove a free speech clause in an anti-gay hate law.
With an estimated wealth of £100 million, Atkinson is able to indulge his passion for
Atkinson holds a category C+E (formerly 'Class 1') lorry
A lover of and participant in car racing, he appeared as racing driver
The
One car Atkinson has said he will not own is a
He appeared in Episode 4, Season 17 of
Atkinson's film career began in 1983 with a supporting part in the 'unofficial'
Atkinson gained further recognition with his turn as a verbally bumbling vicar in the 1994 hit Consett, County Durham, England. His parents were Eric Atkinson, a farmer and company director, and Ella May (née Bainbridge), who married on 29 June 1945. His three older brothers were Paul, who died as an infant, Rodney, a Eurosceptic economist who narrowly lost the United Kingdom Independence Party leadership election in 2000, and Rupert. Atkinson was brought up Anglican, and was educated at Durham Choristers School, St. Bees School in Cumbria, and Newcastle University. In 1975, he continued for the degree of MSc in Electrical Engineering at The Queen's College, Oxford, the same college his father matriculated at in 1935, which made Atkinson an Honorary Fellow in 2006. First achieving notice at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 1976, while at Oxford, he also acted and performed early sketches for the Oxford University Dramatic Society (OUDS), the Oxford Revue and the Experimental Theatre Club (ETC), meeting writer and composer Howard Goodall, with whom he would continue to collaborate during his career.CareerBBC Radio 3 in 1978 called "The Atkinson People". It consisted of a series of satirical interviews with fictional great men, who were played by Atkinson himself. The series was written by Atkinson and Richard Curtis, and produced by Griff Rhys Jones.TelevisionAngus Deayton as his funny man in an act that was eventually filmed for a television show. After the success of the show, he did a one-off pilot for London Weekend Television in 1979 called Canned Laughter. Atkinson then went on to do Not the Nine O'Clock News for the BBC, produced by his friend John Lloyd. He starred on the show along with Pamela Stephenson, Griff Rhys Jones and Mel Smith, and was one of the main sketch writers.medieval sitcom The Black Adder, which he also co-wrote with Richard Curtis, in 1983. After a three-year gap, in part due to budgetary concerns, a second series was written, this time by Curtis and Ben Elton, and first screened in 1986. Blackadder II followed the fortunes of one of the descendants of Atkinson's original character, this time in the Elizabethan era. The same pattern was repeated in the two sequels Blackadder the Third (1987) (set in the Regency era), and Blackadder Goes Forth (1989) (set in World War I). The Blackadder series went on to become one of the most successful BBC situation comedies of all time, spawning television specials including Blackadder's Christmas Carol (1988) and Blackadder: The Cavalier Years (1988).Mr. Bean, first appeared on New Years Day in 1990 in a half-hour special for Thames Television. The character of Mr. Bean has been likened somewhat to a modern-day Buster Keaton. During this time, Atkinson appeared at the Just for Laughs comedy festival in Montreal in 1987 and 1989. Several sequels to Mr. Bean appeared on television in the 1990s, and it eventually made into a major motion picture in 1997. Entitled Bean, it was directed by Mel Smith, his former co-star from Not the Nine O'Clock News. A second movie was released in 2007 entitled Mr. Bean's Holiday.
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