- Born
- Died
- Birth nameRichard Michael Mayall
- Height5′ 11¾″ (1.82 m)
- Rik Mayall, one of the first and foremost alternative comedians in the UK, was born in Matching Tye, a village just outside Harlow in Essex. His parents, John and Gillian, were both drama teachers. His acting debut was at the age of seven when he appeared in one of his father's stage plays. He met his comedy partner and best friend Adrian "Ade" Edmondson at Manchester University in 1975. Soon, the duo began performing together as a comedy act called "Twentieth Century Coyote" at the now legendary Comedy Store in London. They later moved their act to a venue called "The Comic Strip" and it was there that they were discovered by producer Paul Jackson. Rik and his friends, including Adrian Edmondson, Jennifer Saunders, Dawn French, Alexei Sayle, Peter Richardson, and Nigel Planer were boomed onto television screens with immense success. He wrote The Young Ones (1982) with Ben Elton and Lise Mayer. You loved it or hated it, but you can't deny the impact it had on British sitcoms.
His career was launched, and, aged 24, he became one of the most popular comedians in Britain. He wrote and starred in various other television programmes and films over the years such as The New Statesman (1987); his role in it as Alan B'Stard earned him a BAFTA. He had his brief touch of Hollywood in 1991 when he starred as the title role in Drop Dead Fred (1991), but he soon returned to the British TV screens with Bottom (1991) a show which only ran for 3 seasons from 1991 to 1995 but was so popular that he and "Ade" toured with live shows based on the series around Britain every two years or so up until 2014.
In 1998, he suffered a severe accident and ended up in a coma after he crashed with his quad-bike at his farm in Devon. Luckily, he recovered and starred in films and shows such as Guest House Paradiso (1999) and Day of the Sirens (2002). In 2002, he proved that he was back and ready for action in the comedy series Believe Nothing (2002), which reunited him with Laurence Marks and Maurice Gran, the writers of "The New Statesman". In 2003, he toured the UK alongside "Ade" with the fifth Bottom Live show.- IMDb mini biography by: LC
- SpouseBarbara Robbin(1985 - June 9, 2014) (his death, 3 children)
- RelativesAnthony Mayall(Sibling)Libby Mayall(Sibling)Kate Mayall(Sibling)
- Frequently performed alongside Adrian Edmondson
- Frequently played narcissistic and obnoxious characters.
- In most of his television work, he would look at the camera and pull a face
- His sneer.
- Very manic comic performances, often shouting and screaming.
- He was seriously injured in a quad bike accident in 1998 and was in a coma for several days. His first words on regaining consciousness were to the doctor: "So you're the bastard that keeps sticking needles into me!". He made a full recovery.
- His final performance was in the Dutch film The Escape (2015), filmed just a week before his sudden death, and his last scene ends with him quoting the following soliloquy from Macbeth: "Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, creeps in this petty pace from day to day, to the last syllable of recorded time. And all our yesterdays have lighted fools the way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle. Life's but a passing shadow...".
- In November 2014, a memorial bench for Rik Mayall was unveiled in Hammersmith, London. The bench is situated at the junction of Queen Caroline Street and Hammersmith Bridge Road. A plaque on the bench reads: 'In Memory of The Man, The Myth, The Legend. Dr The Rik Mayall. Pan Global Phenomenon. Equality, Opportunity, Wisdom, Freedom & Love. Barbara: Love Is The Answer'.
- He played Peeves the Poltergeist in Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (2001), but was cut out during editing because he kept making the child actors laugh. But he can be seen for a moment in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004), when Harry and his friends are going to the common-room after the feast on the first night.
- He was an avid video game fan and did a series of ads for Nintendo in the 1990s. He spent his vast fee on a house in an expensive area of London, which he named Nintendo Towers.
- One of my hobbies is people-watching. I love to sit outside a cafe watching people go by. I use things that I see in different characters that I play.
- I'm a difficult person to interview. Everything I have to say is in my performance. I don't like to give too much away.
- I'm not trying to do anything spectacular except to change the fabric of our society and bring down the Government.
- I was always a show-off and liable to get over-excited. But I have got it under control. I now find people who can't control their energy very funny.
- It hasn't happened to me yet, but I would now take a job simply to earn money for my family.
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