Rowan Atkinson Talking Comedy

With his rubber face, bendy limbs and razor sharp tongue,

Rowan Atkinson has been one of our biggest comedy stars

of the past 30 years.

With just a look, a sudden movement or a raised eyebrow,

he can have audiences in stitches.

Add the extraordinary verbal dexterity he used

with such devastating effect in Blackadder

and you have one of the ultimate comedy cocktails

that fans have been enjoying since he first arrived on the scene,

with appearances like this.

All right, your essays.

Discuss the contention that Cleopatra

had the body of a roll top desk and the mind of a duck.

LAUGHTER

Oxford and Cambridge board O-level paper, 1976.

Don't fidget, Bland.

The answer...

Yes.

Jones M, Orifice, Sediment and Undermanager - see me afterwards.

Most of you, of course, didn't write nearly enough.

Dint, your answer was unreadable.

Put it away, Plectrum.

If I see it once more this period, Plectrum, I shall have to tweak you.

Do you have a solicitor, Plectrum?

You're lying, Plectrum, so I shall tweak you anyway.

See me afterwards to be tweaked.

Yes, isn't life tragic?

Don't sulk, boy, for God's sake.

Has matron seen those boils?

And here, Rowan is interviewed about performances like that one

by Mary Marquis in 1980.

You're almost a physical manifestation

of a caricaturist like Rowlandson

or, in the present day, Gerald Scarfe.

What is it in you which tempts you

to reveal to the rest of us

characters which are very obviously people that we recognise

and yet there's something else as well?

Hmm...!

Well, I don't know what it is about me, or in me,

it's just something that you find that you can do

and, therefore, you feel as though you should do it,

if people want to enjoy watching it.

I mean, I think that a lot of the characters I do

are rather extreme, and they tend to be large,

and even some of them reach into the grotesque,

but I do hope that there's enough acting, if you like,

goes into them to keep them credible.

I mean, I hope that although a lot of the characters are extreme,

they should be real as well, and I don't only do extreme characters.

In particular, in the live show that we're touring at the moment,

I think it's... there are a lot of characters,

and, indeed, in Not The Nine O'Clock News,

I think there are quite a few characters that are quite low-key.

And there I suppose it's where the acting is more obviously,

I hope, credible.

When you're talking about people doing very little,

the people that, some of the people you portray...

-Yes.

-..I was thinking particularly of the man in church.

-Oh, right, yes.

-..who's really doing nothing at all...

-Yes.

-..and yet, it, from you, calls out qualities of mime,

for instance, and very acute observation, as well.

Right. Right, the...

Yes, the church sketch that we're doing in the live show at present

was first thought up by my co-writer, Richard Curtis,

and he just had this idea,

and he knows the sort of wavelengths on which I work,

so he's very good at suggesting ideas that are possible,

was the idea of a guy sitting in a church listening to a sermon,

and there's nothing happening, at least ostensibly, I mean,

there's no plot, particularly, to the sketch,

but it's just watching what that guy does.

And, you know, sitting in a church, what you do, you watch..

and then you...

You know, there's a lot of that, a lot of looking up and down,

and then there's just the falling asleep,

and it's just the way that people do fall asleep

in churches, still trying to stay...

To stay alive!

To stay awake and alive

and this guy, he just falls very close to Richard,

who's sitting beside me,

and then he just falls into a ridiculous posture on the floor.

And it is a sketch and it is a character

who's doing nothing, really,

but it's just the doing of nothing that can be very funny.

Rowan's big television break was Not The Nine O'Clock News.

The show turned him, Mel Smith,

Pamela Stephenson and Griff Rhys Jones into household names.

A year after it launched,

Rowan was booked for what was genuinely a show-stopping appearance

on Parkinson.

It's been my pleasure for the past two years to share office space

with a gang of certifiable lunatics who avoid identification

by calling themselves Not The Nine O'Clock News.

Jointly and separately,

they've both delighted and horrified the nation

with their anarchic humour.

Out of this combination of talent has emerged a young man

who's been called Britain's greatest comedy hope since John Cleese.

He's a strange mixture and an interesting psychological study.

In real life, he's a farmer's son from Newcastle

who is quiet to the point of being invisible.

Onstage, he often displays a kind of manic energy...

-Come on!

-..which has led him to being described as this semi-lunatic

-simmering psychopath.

-For God's sake, hurry up!

He's so slow, isn't he?

It's pathetic.

It's pathetic. Come on, let's get on with it, come on.

Let's get the bloody show on the road, for goodness' sake.

Come on.

Wait!

Who...

Who are we bloody waiting for, anyway?

-Rowan Atkinson.

-Rowing?

Rowan Atkinson.

Oh, Ron, oh, Ron, Ron, are you there, Ron?

Come on, Ron, you're all right, come on!

If you... I tell you, Ron, come on, don't be shy.

I tell you, if you don't do it, I'll do it.

Right, stuff it, I'll do it.

-Rowan Atkinson.

-I'm here, thank you very much.

APPLAUSE

What happened when you first tried

that marvellously manic character out?

Cos that was on Not The Nine O'Clock News, wasn't it?

Yes, that's Not The Nine O'Clock News, yes.

It was, I think, probably in this very studio.

-Was it?

-In this very studio that I first sat, very nervous,

in the audience, cos it's a very nerve-racking thing to do,

I can tell you, sit amongst those real people there,

just to be about to perform, and I stood up,

and I was in the middle of spouting

and this...and this commissionaire came down from the back

who hadn't been told of the fact

that some strange member of the public was going to stand up

and then shout at everyone. So he came up and he stood in front of me

and said, "All right, Sir, it's all right, come on.

"Just, just, just come quietly."

And I said, and I said, "I'm on television."

And he was facing me, away from the camera,

and this was all shown, actually, in the second edition

of the first series, all this happening, and the camera

was luckily facing me, so it wasn't facing him,

and the look of realisation on his face when he discovered

that he actually was, his back at least,

was on television and the look of complete horror.

Then he just turned, turned and disappeared.

A great deal of your humour is very visual humour.

You also observe people - or do you observe people?

I mean, or can you demonstrate how watching human behaviour,

-you can transfer that into humour?

-It's just, yes, it's just,

it's just the very ordinariness of life that I so like watching.

I've never consciously, again, copied any, any individual.

Characterisations that you tend to do tend to be based on people

who you might have seen ten years ago but you can't remember

for the life of you who they are, and they've just somehow,

their mannerisms and things and just the idea of people...

I mean, it sounds like an old cliche

derived from the cliche that, you know,

truth is stranger than fiction, and, actually just the way,

you know, the person sitting opposite you on the train behaves,

like a very... Right, a quick demonstration of a very ordinary,

very inoffensive person doing nothing but somehow being funny.

I'll do it. So, he stands up.

And he's standing up, and he sits down.

And it's just that kind of thing.

Strange.

APPLAUSE

Of course, one of the things about that kind of comedy, too,

is in observing, or breaking the cliche, again,

of how people respond in certain situations.

I mean, I know that you do one about drunkenness, don't you?

-Oh, right.

-Which reverses what people normally think about.

Well, yes, it's there, it's... it is a cliche

about trying to act drunk, is you feel as though you should act drunk

and actually they say that the key to it is to act sober,

and just to try and be sober, and it's just,

it's just the fact that everyone exaggerates everything

to such an extent, and they're sitting there...

Yes, you're right, yes.

And it's just that,

it's just that you try and make things bigger all of the time,

and drunkenness is an example.

Two years after that appearance came a role

that would make Rowan Atkinson even more recognisable

and define his work for the next decade.

It was, of course, Blackadder.

Here he is on Wogan

before the original series had even gone out

when the only clue to the character was some very distinctive hair.

You've been wearing that haircut for a bet, have you?

Which haircut?

This one. Yes, no, this is,

this is the haircut of the character that I've been working with

for nearly a year now,

and it's a programme which will be coming on television quite soon,

at the end of May.

It's something I didn't really want to talk about a tremendous amount

because I know the haircut makes it difficult not to want to know

what kind of character that could possibly lead a normal life

with this cut, but it's a situation comedy,

it's six half-hour programmes

and it's called The Blackadder

and it'll be on towards the end of May, I believe.

-And we still haven't finished it, so...

-A touch of the medieval,

-I would say.

-It is, exactly right.

-Yes.

-It's set in medieval times.

-Quite.

Don't want to say too much.

-No, I don't.

-I get a lot of people on this show, do you notice,

who refuse to tell me anything about themselves or the shows

-that they're doing!

-It's a mystery, yes.

Well, it's best to keep people waiting in anticipation.

Yes, it's that thing of not wanting to blow things up too much

so people expect everything.

-Yeah.

-And then they're bound to be disappointed when they see it.

I hope you won't be disappointed when you see it, but, anyway,

-it's coming soon.

-Do you see your face as your greatest asset,

your facial dexterity?

Mark how kindly I put that!

Yes, facial dexterity.

It's something that I never...

I never realised I had until I was about 20, 21, only seven years ago,

when I realised that I did have this face that seemed to have

all the permutations that could be funny.

And the problem is that you don't...

You know, one doesn't like to be labelled a face-puller

because you feel as though

if you have got a face that, you know, that's malleable

and can...and can go like that...

you know, and can twist about,

that you feel that people are going to assume

that you're just, you know, that's all you can do

and if in doubt, go, you know...

and then someone'll laugh.

But you don't want that,

so I try and use it in a characterful way

so that every character has his face

and it tends to be different from some other characters, but I...

But, yes, it's funny how sometimes, though, when you're asked a question

and you can't remember what the question was halfway to the end.

-Facial dexterity.

-Yes, facial dexterity, of course!

-Of course, yes.

-You've always had an ambition to do a film.

-Yes.

-And I understand you've fulfilled that, have you?

Well, yes -

well, I mean, I've done those filmed versions of stage shows.

-Yes.

-But otherwise, but I've always wanted to play a part

in a James Bond film.

I really always wanted to be the villain.

I always wanted to be the man who said, "Not so fast, Mr Bond."

Do you know that man?

Just when he's about to escape, "Not so fast, Mr Bond."

And I always wanted to say that in a film.

But I did one last November, I think it was,

which is the new Sean Connery Bond film, Never Say Never Again,

which will be out sometime towards the end of the year, I suppose.

But, unfortunately, I don't play a villain, I play a goody-goody.

I played the British consul in the Bahamas, who's very, very dry.

-And...

-It's not a serious part, is it?

-It's...

My ambition fulfilled!

No, no, not really, no, it's got, it's got...

But at least it's...it's a nice, I think, quite rounded character.

You wouldn't have any ambitions to play the part of Bond himself?

-Well, actually, actually...

-Cubby, old Cubby,

is looking for another James Bond.

Would I like to play James Bond?

I, no, I once thought I'd like to play Doctor Who.

But I didn't.

Such a shame Rowan never got to play the Doctor.

As he demonstrates here, he's certainly got the acting range.

I want to fire some emotions at you.

-Blimey.

-Love.

Hate.

Sexy.

Bored.

Evil.

And, finally, suicidal.

Rowan and Richard Curtis weren't overly happy

with the first series of Blackadder,

but still felt the potential was there for something special.

So, Blackadder was reborn as a cynical Elizabethan schemer.

He had charm,

even a certain sex appeal,

and a loyal but ludicrous assistant, Baldrick,

forever in tow.

This new series of Blackadder,

is it different from the humour of the first series?

-Has it changed at all?

-Well,

it's not particularly different in style

from the humour of the first series

but I think it's significantly improved.

A lot of the problems with the first series...

I wasn't a great fan of the first series, I have to say.

I thought it had its moments,

but I thought that the moments were two few and far between,

and this is an attempt to tighten it all down

to make it simpler, tighter, cheaper,

much, much cheaper than the last one.

Well, that's, that's our great leader Michael Grade.

-That's right.

-Has said that he wanted it cheaper,

-was that the point?

-Yes, that's right.

-Cheaper and funnier.

He wanted more jokes per pound!

So, I think the JPP ratio has increased substantially.

Well, we won't be able to judge from this little clip

but let's have a brief, fragrant nosegay from the latest Blackadder.

EVIL LAUGHTER

Tell me, young crone, is this Putney?

Putney, that it be.

"Yes, it is," not "That it be."

You don't have to talk in that stupid voice to me,

I'm not a tourist.

I seek information about a wise woman.

The wise woman. The wise woman?

Yes, the wise woman.

Two things, my Lord, must ye know of the wise woman.

-Yes?

-First...

she is...

a woman!

And, second,

she is...

Wise?

-You do know her, then.

-No, just a wild stab in the dark -

which is, incidentally, what you'll be getting,

if you don't start being a bit more helpful.

APPLAUSE

So, not only are we getting more jokes to the pound, but we're...

-Much better value.

-Yeah.

-So much better value.

And that terrible pudding basin haircut is gone.

-Yes, it's gone. Yes.

-And the beard, I mean, you look a bit, I mean,

I would imagine many a young lady might fancy you in that.

-Dashing.

-Dashing is the word, yes.

Well, it was, it was my own beard, it's not stuck on.

And it was, it was an attempt, really,

to make me look completely different from the character

in the first series, who as you say, did look absolutely terrible.

And this character is, as you probably gathered from that clip,

extremely different. He's really quite smart,

and quite smarmy and quite romantic.

There's a lot of romanticism, I think, in this new series,

-which there wasn't before.

-Did you have a hand in writing it?

I didn't this time.

Last time I did and this time I didn't.

-Is that because Michael Grade wanted it funnier?

-Yes.

-No, he wanted it cheaper.

-Cheaper!

-So I didn't, no.

And this was largely written by Richard Curtis and Ben Elton,

and, I think, as a result of my not being involved, actually,

I think it's slightly, it's slightly better.

It's slightly funnier for that reason.

Is it in relation...

What relation is Blackadder to this new Blackadder II?

Right, Blackadder II is the bastard great-great grandson

of Blackadder I.

So, although we never saw Blackadder I with either a wife

or a girlfriend, or anything,

he obviously found some wench somewhere with which to procreate,

-so...

-Well, with that extraordinary codpiece he had,

-I'm surprised he was able to do anything.

-Exactly.

Is it the start of what the Americans would call a dynasty?

Well, yes, there's a thought that next series,

if this series goes well,

then the plan is next time to probably make Blackadder VII,

rather than Blackadder III,

which is to move on a few hundred years instead of only moving on

100 years like we have in this series into the Elizabethan period,

and to move on to the kind of First World War,

we think, is quite a funny idea.

Which might be Von Blackadder,

which is the idea of a German air ace who is...who is the bastard,

bastard great-great-great-great, grandson of Blackadder II,

and then on into...

-And then go on to Blackadder XII?

-On to Blackadder XII, or Staradder.

The new Blackadder was an instant hit and provided us

with many of television's best-loved lines and moments.

Rowan, however, would always downplay

how funny he was personally,

despite all the evidence to the contrary.

I regard myself as, I think, as more of an actor than I am a comedian,

to a certain extent. I mean, I seem to specialise in comedy

because it's probably what I do best

but, otherwise, I think the skills that you employ as a comedian

are very...are very actory sort of skills and I can't, as you can tell,

-just sit here and be funny. I've got...

-But, now, is that a burden?

I've got to hide behind a character.

Is that a burden - because you know that people expect

people of your stature to come on and be funny?

-Now, do you find that as a weight?

-Well, not so much any more,

in a way, because it's almost quite a well-known cliche now

that people who are funny on-screen are not remotely amusing off-screen.

I mean, Eric Morecambe was a classic exception to that rule.

He was a terribly funny man at all times, whenever you met him,

and it's a wonderful talent, but it's a talent

that I certainly haven't got and it's a talent that I think

most comic performers of my ilk don't have.

God had a good day when he gave you your face, didn't he?

But is it your fortune or your misfortune?

Well, I think it's been fortunate, all right, so far.

I mean, I don't think about it a lot.

I don't think about the faces that I pull,

I just try and...try and be amusing inside a characterful persona,

-and generally the face suddenly starts...

-As in fact...

-..starts to take off.

-..here, when you're walking down the street

and you're here walking down the street on Not The Nine O'Clock News

and waving to any person who happens to take an interest in you.

By the 1990s, Rowan was introducing a new character to his fans,

the sometimes infuriating, sometimes lovable, Mr Bean.

At the same time, we were saying goodbye to Blackadder,

who met a surprisingly poignant end in the trenches of World War I.

That reduced people to tears, that ending of Blackadder.

To a certain extent, that sad ending was thought up

when we thought that the whole series -

this was before it was ever screened

and when it was being written, it's when the writers were convinced

that the whole series was going to be lambasted

for being tasteless, you know,

for making any jokes about a situation

as serious as the First World War.

So, that ending was put there to, sort of, that was our serious bit,

to sort of justify and to try to allay the criticism

that actually never came, that no-one actually thought, in the end,

that it was particularly tasteless.

You remember it all very fondly, Blackadder.

Yes, I do, actually, yes.

It was a terrific time.

What I enjoyed, really, was the shared responsibility,

the fact that there was such a good team of folk to act with

and to work with, and if you were in the middle of a scene

and you, you know, you were having a little difficulty with it,

or you didn't think that you were being particularly amusing,

then you knew at any minute Tony Robinson

as Baldrick was going to walk in with an extremely amusing vegetable

and then you could, you know,

you could metaphorically throw the ball to him and let him play with it

for a while and you could sit back and...

Why did you stop? I mean, that was a kind of inevitable finish,

but it didn't have to be. Why did you stop after four series?

No, I mean, he... The Blackadder and most people in it

tended to die at the end of every series, in fact, it wasn't just,

that was a particularly memorable death,

but there was a death at the end of at least two of the other series

as well, and, so, you know, merely the fact that he died in that series

doesn't mean to say that, in theory, he couldn't come back.

-Come back again, yeah.

-Although I suspect that he won't.

Mr Bean would go on to become an international sensation

and appear in two hit films.

Another of Rowan's creations,

the not-so-secret agent Johnny English would do the same,

confirming his position

as one of our most successful entertainment exports.

So, how does he manage to keep hitting funny bones

in countries right across the globe?

Perhaps our final clip contains something of the answer,

capturing, as it does, a comedy master in full flow.

Pray silence, please, for the father of the bride.

Ladies and gentlemen,

and friends of my daughter.

There comes a time in every wedding reception

when the man who paid for the damn thing

is allowed to speak a word or two of his own.

And I should like to speak,

much as my wife sang in the service that we've all just enjoyed...

..with no real notes.

As far as I'm concerned...

..my daughter could not have chosen a more delightful, charming, witty,

responsible, wealthy, let's not deny it, well-placed,

good-looking and fertile young man...

..than Martin as her husband.

And I therefore ask the question...

..why the hell did she marry Gerald instead?

If I may use a gardening simile here,

if this entire family may be likened to a compost heap,

and I think they can,

then Gerald is the biggest weed growing out of it.

I think I'd be more inspired by the sight of a cowpat.

Gerald is the sort of man I think people emigrate to avoid.

He's the sort of chap who fosters kamikaze units,

resolved to drive their cars into his living room

until one of them is lucky enough to get him.

As for his family,

they are quite simply the most intolerable herd

of steaming social animals I've ever had the misfortune

of turning my nose up to.

I spurn you as I would spurn a rabid dog.

I would like to propose a toast...

..to the caterers.

Whether it's a speech at a wedding,

a man falling down a hole, or simply a very rubbery face,

with Rowan Atkinson, it's always pure comedy,

and, when it comes to successfully pulling it off,

he's shown time and time again that he's simply one of the best.

# Everyone who meets his way

# Oh, our love is like the flowers

# The rain and the sea and the hours

# Oh, our love is like the flowers... #