Richard Vranch

Last updated

Richard Vranch
Richard Vranch Glastonbury 2019.jpg
Richard Vranch performing at the Glastonbury Festival on his 60th birthday, 29 June 2019, with the Stephen Frost Improv All Stars
Born
Richard Leslie Vranch

(1959-06-29) 29 June 1959 (age 64)
Frome, Somerset, England
NationalityEnglish
Alma mater Trinity Hall, Cambridge
Occupation(s)Comedian, actor
Website Official website

Richard Leslie Vranch (born 29 June 1959) is an English actor, improviser, comedian, writer and musician. He is known for providing the music for the British TV series Whose Line Is It Anyway?

Contents

Early life

Vranch attended Bristol Grammar School and Trinity Hall, Cambridge, graduating from Cambridge University with a BA and PhD in physics. [1] [2] While a first-year doctoral student, he joined the Footlights in 1981 and was a contemporary of Stephen Fry, Hugh Laurie, Morwenna Banks, Tony Slattery and Neil Mullarkey. [3] He was a researcher at the Cavendish Laboratory and a research fellow at St John's College, Oxford for nine months before going into comedy full-time. [4]

Career

Richard Vranch [5] improvises comedy on stage with the Comedy Store Players every Sunday at The Comedy Store in London. He performs as a stand-up comedian, and with Pippa the Ripper he is half of the hula-hoop/science double act Dr Hula. He has voiced TV and radio commercials for companies including British Airways, Lidl and Saab and he narrates TV documentaries, including the first series of Hotel Inspector. He has performed since 1979, and formed a comedy double-act with Tony Slattery in 1981. The duo hosted the Channel 4 quiz The Music Game and over 100 episodes of Cue The Music on ITV. He was the improvising pianist and guitarist on the original British television show Whose Line Is It Anyway? in 1988, but only a small proportion of his work is musical. Vranch co-wrote and performed in The Paul Merton Show at the London Palladium in 1994.

Acting work includes Dogman, The Dead Set, and sketch shows touring the world from Mexico to the Palestinian Territories. He appeared as Gilmanuk in the audio Doctor Who story "Theatre of War" (Big Finish Productions). He has improvised comedy in the Middle East, Far East and India – 40 countries in all. He has written for stage, radio and TV, and made several animated films with artist Lucy Allen. They have had their cartoons published in Maxim , Punch and The Spectator .

He presented the children's shows Let's Pretend on ITV and Jackanory on BBC One, and was a contestant on a charity special of The Weakest Link in 2005. He guested on BBC Radio 4's long-running panel game Just a Minute in 1999. In 2002 he was commissioned by Tamasha Theatre (East is East) as a writer for their show Ryman and the Sheik and worked for a few years as an Artistic Associate of the company.

Vranch had a previous career as a research physicist, and has appeared on the panel shows Puzzle Panel and The Infinite Monkey Cage [6] on Radio 4 and Mind Games on BBC TV.

Vranch hosted his own science series, Beat That Einstein, on Channel 4 in 1994, and has published papers in scientific journals. He discussed the switch-on of the Large Hadron Collider in September 2008 with Jeremy Vine and Simon Singh on BBC Radio 2.[ citation needed ]

In 2006, he appeared at the Ars Nova theatre, New York and co-founded the improv storytelling group The YarnBards. In 2012, with others he co-wrote and appeared in the UK tour and West End run of the stage show Paul Merton Out of My Head.[ citation needed ]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Clive Anderson</span> English television and radio presenter

Clive Stuart Anderson is an English television and radio presenter, comedy writer, and former barrister. Winner of a British Comedy Award in 1991, Anderson began experimenting with comedy and writing comedic scripts during his 15-year legal career, before becoming host of Whose Line Is It Anyway?, initially a radio show on BBC Radio 4 in 1988, before moving to television on Channel 4 from 1988 to 1999. He was also host of his own chat show Clive Anderson Talks Back, which changed its name to Clive Anderson All Talk in 1996, from 1989 to 2001. He has also hosted many radio programmes, and made guest appearances on Have I Got News for You, Mock the Week and QI.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Graeme Garden</span> British comedian and actor

David Graeme Garden OBE is a Scottish comedian, actor, author, artist and television presenter, best known as a member of the Goodies and a regular panellist on I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue.

<i>Whose Line Is It Anyway?</i> (British TV series) British TV improvisational comedy series

Whose Line is it Anyway? is a short-form improvisational comedy television series created by Dan Patterson and Mark Leveson, presented by Clive Anderson, and produced for Channel 4 between 23 September 1988 and 4 February 1999. The programme's format was on a panel of four performers conducting a series of short-form improvisation games, creating comedic scenes per pre-determined situations made by the host or from suggestions by the audience. Such games include creating sound effects, performing a scene to different television and film styles, using props, and making up a song on the spot. The programme originally began as a short-lived BBC radio programme, before the concept was adapted for television.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Paul Merton</span> English comedian (born 1957)

Paul James Martin, known by the stage name Paul Merton, is an English comedian.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Footlights</span> Amateur theatre and comedy group at the University of Cambridge

The Cambridge Footlights, commonly referred to simply as Footlights, is a student sketch comedy troupe located in Cambridge, England. Footlights was founded in 1883, and is one of Britain's oldest student sketch comedy troupes. The comedy society is run by the students of Cambridge University.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jan Ravens</span> British comedian

Janet Ravens is an English actress and impressionist, known for her voice work on Spitting Image and Dead Ringers.

The Comedy Store Players is a group of improvisational comedians who perform at The Comedy Store in London. The group first came into being in October 1985.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tony Slattery</span> English actor and comedian (born 1959)

Tony Declan James Slattery is an English actor and comedian. He appeared on British television regularly from the mid-1980s, most notably as a regular on the Channel 4 improvisation show Whose Line Is It Anyway? His serious and comedic film work has included roles in The Crying Game, Peter's Friends and How to Get Ahead in Advertising.

James Thomas Mulville is an English comedian, comedy writer, producer and television presenter. He is best known for co-founding the British independent television production company Hat Trick Productions with Denise O'Donoghue and Rory McGrath. In 2003, Mulville and O'Donoghue, as co-founders of Hat Trick, were listed in The Observer as two of the 50 funniest people in Britain.

Josie Lawrence is an English actress and comedian. She is best known for her work with the Comedy Store Players improvisational troupe, the television series Whose Line Is It Anyway? and as Manda Best in EastEnders.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ben Miller</span> English comedian and actor

Bennet Evan Miller is an English actor, comedian and author. He rose to fame as one half of the comedy duo Armstrong and Miller. Miller is also known for playing the lead role of DI Richard Poole in the first two series of the BBC crime drama Death in Paradise, and for portraying James Lester in the ITV science-fiction series Primeval.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Colin Sell</span> British pianist (born 1948)

Colin Sell is a British pianist who has appeared on the radio panel games Whose Line Is It Anyway? and I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue. He has become famous mostly for his long service on the latter show, where he is frequently the butt of the host's jokes about the supposedly poor quality of his playing.

Michael James Dominic Sweeney is an English actor and comedian, best known for his improvisation partnership with Steve Steen.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jo Kendall</span> British actress (1940–2022)

Josephine Mary Kendall was a British actress and writer. She was known for her work on the BBC radio comedy show I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again, which debuted in 1964, and for her role as Peggy Skilbeck on the ITV soap opera Emmerdale from 1972 to 1973, in which she also spoke the programme's first line of dialogue in the inaugural episode.

Steve Steen is a British television, radio and theatre actor and comedian, known for improvisational comedy works.

Neil Mullarkey is an English actor, writer and comedian.

<i>Just a Minute</i> British radio programme

Just a Minute is a BBC Radio 4 radio comedy panel game, hosted by Sue Perkins since 2021. For more than 50 years, with a few exceptions, it was hosted by Nicholas Parsons. Following Parsons' death in 2020, Perkins assumed the host's chair permanently, starting with the 87th series. Just a Minute was first transmitted on Radio 4 on 22 December 1967, three months after the station's launch. The programme won a Gold Sony Radio Academy Award in 2003.

Lee Simpson is a British actor and comedian best known as a member of the improvisational group The Comedy Store Players.

The Suggestibles is a British improv comedy group, based in Newcastle upon Tyne.

Jason Forbes is a British actor, writer, comedian, impressionist, and TV presenter. He is best known for the CITV series Horrible Science; The Mash Report on BBC Two; as PC Peasey in the Professor Branestawm movies on BBC One; and as a member of the award-winning sketch trio 'Daphne'.

References

  1. ↑ "Cambridge Tripos results", The Times, 19 June 1980, p. 10.
  2. ↑ Interview, livingonfascination.com, 15 June 2014; retrieved 15 December 2015.
  3. ↑ Footlights Alumni - 1980-1989 Archived 15 October 2012 at the Wayback Machine
  4. ↑ "I never wanted to be a pianist anyway". Cambridge News. 8 September 2005. Archived from the original on 2 November 2013.
  5. ↑ "Family history of Richard Leslie Vranch". Lasbury Family History. Retrieved 28 October 2022.
  6. ↑ "The Infinite Monkey Cage, Series 6, Episode 5" . Retrieved 5 August 2014.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.